Agriculture of Hertfordshire. 273 
winters it answers very well, but in a long severe frost the frozen 
roots are for a time unfit for use and after the thaw are much 
injured in quality. 
Mr. Thomas Smith, of Sandridge, has made a good fallow on 
dry land with his steam-cultivator by the following simple , 
operations. The stubble-ground, smashed twice after harvest, 
was left till spring*, and then harrowed and scarified by horses to 
draw out the weeds ; steam-cultivated again in May, and then 
ridged-up by horses and dunged. The swedes were a pretty 
good crop, and better than if moisture had been lost by frequent 
ploughings. Autumn cultivation has its advocates, but among 
its opponents are many able farmers who prefer to keep the 
plough steadily going, turning a good furrow after harvest, 
instead of merely scratching the surface. Smashing with the 
steam-cultivator is a different matter. 
Barley. — Well-folded land is drilled as soon after the first 
week in January as it is in good working order, with a view to 
checking the exuberant growth of straw. March is the principal 
seed month, and much .corn is put in later after the eWes and 
lambs ; the middle of April should be the latest date. May 
sow n barley is sure to be inferior in quality and yield. To avoid 
this, swedes are either finished earlier or carted to the fallows or 
clovers, and mangold are heaped in convenient situations to 
succeed .the swedes. After the fold a rather shallow furrow is 
given. In dry weather in March the drill may follow close 
after the plough, with or without a scarifying, and generally 
with two harrowings before and two after the drill, besides 
rolling. Chevalier and long-eared Nottingham are the sorts 
most in favour ; 2J bushels to 3i bushels of seed per acre. 
Destruction of Charlock. — Charlock is here a troublesome weed : 
hoeing and weeding are the usual, but incomplete, remedy. It 
is fair better and cheaper in the end to take two successive green 
crops and employ the interval in alternately sprouting and 
destroying the store of seed in the soil. Weedings are expensive 
and injurious both to corn-crops and to the clover or grass 
seeds. (The best crop for the second year's fallow is mangold.) 
It should succeed the latest-fed swedes, after one ploughing, with 
a dressing of 2 cwts. of guano and 2 cwts. of superphosphate per 
acre. If it be drilled a yard apart, and the plough used between 
the rows all the summer, immense quantities of charlock-seed 
will vegetate and be destroyed, and a bulky crop of mangold is 
almost ensured. Wheat or barley follows, and will require a 
light dressing of guano. The acreage under corn is thus for a 
time reduced, but ample compensation will be found in the value 
of the mangold crop, in the greater yield of corn per acre when 
the land is thoroughly prepared, and in the abatement of an 
