Agriculture of Norfolk. 
321 
wheat, is most common in almost every part of the county ; but 
that arises partly from the occupiers being tenants of others, and 
bound to it by their agreements. On the light, sandy, or chalky 
soils the qencral opinion seems to be, that no other course would 
be mutually more beneficial to landlord and tenant. But that is 
not the case on the strong clay land. In the marshes and fens 
there . is in some instances an entirely different course adopted, 
which would no doubt be the case more generally if each person 
cultivated his own land. 
In some cases I felt a diffidence in asking men, whom I knew 
to be possessed of original talent, ''their course of cropping;" 
because that course was not selected by themselves, but copied 
from some " musty old parchment," and circulated by some man 
in authority as the unbending law, to be applied to all soils, all 
situations, all climates, and all circumstances ! The folly of this 
must be obvious to all intelligent practical men. I do not mean 
in this to convey a censure on the management of estates in Nor- 
folk particularly, for the same error is too common in many other 
counties of England. 
What may be good in one instance, would not be so in a dif- 
ferent situation, or even in the same situation often repeated; as 
then, the original circumstances may be quite changed. 
Thinking it a convenient means of conveying to my readers 
some idea how the business of Norfolk agriculture is carried on, 
I purpose selecting one person to represent the rest, and showing, 
when necessary, the opinions and practice of others bearing upon 
the particular point. 
For this purpose it might seem natural to some to select 
Holkham as an index of the rest, but that would be objectionable 
as being cultivated for an owner, and therefore such as might not 
be supposed proper to be imitated by a tenant farmer. The 
farmer whom I shall select is Mr, John Hudson, of Castle Acre, 
one of the principal tenants of the Earl of Leicester. Mr. 
Hudson names as his model or " tutor" in agriculture the justly 
celebrated Mr. Blakie, late agent at Holkham ; and I could not 
avoid observing that many others of the best farmers of the dis- 
trict are doing precisely as that gentleman recommends in his 
publications. The two farms at Castle Acre occupied by Mr. 
Hudson contain about 1500 acres; the soil being a "sandy loam 
on clay or chalk." He also has a farm of low land at Seech, 
near Lynn, about 200 acres. When he first took the land at 
Castle Acre in 1822, he only kept about 30 head of cattle and 
800 sheep ; he now grazes " about 200 beasts and from 2500 
to 3000 sheep annually ^ He has doubled the produce of barley, 
and nearly doubled the produce of wheat. To account for this 
change ; he uses yearly about 100 tons of rape-cake and bones for 
