62 
Report on the Agriculture of Belr/iaui. 
afford that, therefore they take a grass fallow instead, sometimes 
assisting the natural growth by sowing a few seeds. 
The most advanced polder-farmers, however, have begun to 
grow clover as a regular course (most frequently sown with beans 
or flax), and this has enabled them to dispense with the grass- 
fallow, if they take it once in five or six years. Of course it is 
not all cow-grass. So deeply rooted, however, is the idea that 
any course which does not bear grain is unproductive, that we 
sometimes were in danger of recording as fallow a good crop of 
seeds. In some districts again, sugar-beet is grown, and this 
culture has had there the usual effect of a root-course, in enabling 
the farmer to dispense with fallows, and to obtain better crops 
of grain. The misfortune is that very frequently the pulp is not 
used on the farm, and the only portions returned to the soil are 
the undigested residue of the tops and leaves. This arises from 
the circumstance that it is chiefly in the polder-districts that the 
land is hired for the cultivation of the sugar-beet by the sugar- 
manufacturer. The Flemish adage, " No cattle, no manure ; no 
manure, no crops," cannot be gainsayed where artificial manures 
are almost unknown ; and thus this polder-land — the best in all 
Belgium — may be quoted as a model of the worst farming in the 
country. 
It is not only that the arable land is managed badly, nor is it 
only that there are very few beasts kept on these farms ; but 
everything else is in the same category. The polder-farmer of 
100 or 150 acres, and such farms are of the ordinary size, often 
has no more education and no more intelligence than the farmer 
of 30 or 40 acres in other districts. Frequently, indeed, he has 
not so much ; and, in proportion to the size of his farm, he has 
not one-half, frequently not one-quarter, of the capital. The 
polder-farmer relies on the fertility of the land, while the sand- 
land farmer makes up his mind to fight against its sterility, and 
relies solely on his own industry and the amount of manure he 
can put on the land.* Thus the " traditions " of the two classes 
of farmers are entirely opposed. The consequences are obvious. 
Men who now hold the farms which their fathers held before 
them, cannot grow such heavy crops as they can remember to 
have assisted in harvesting in their youth. The exhausting rota- 
tion pursued during a series of years, without the use of phosphatic 
manures, and in the absence of good implements, has "run out" 
the land. The use of superphosphates and steam-ploughing 
machinery would probably create an agricultural revolution, which 
would benefit alike the landlord, the tenant, and the country. 
* The best farming is frequently the result of a contest with difficult conditions, 
either legal or natural ; and most men have heard of the landlord who turned a 
bad farmer into a good one simply by raising his rent. 
