282 
Agriculture of Hertfordshire. 
possibly feel that benefit, even in a county where yearly holdings 
are the custom ! Half the quantity mentioned is sometimes pre- 
ferred, as lessening- the first outlay, and lasting the average 
duration of a tenancy. 
The Thin Chalk {Hill) District. 
This is a narrow strip passing through the northern pai-t of 
the county, from Royston through Sandon, Baldock, and Hitchin 
to Stopsley, in Bedfordshire. The only circumstance which 
connects the farming of this small and exceptional tract with 
that of the rest of Hertfordshire is the traffic in farm produce 
with London, aided by the Hitchin to Royston railway. Town 
manure is delivered on the route at 7s. Gd. per ton, and has been 
used to much advantage on the farms near the stations. Wheat- 
straw is sent to London ; not much hay is made, the clovers 
and sainfoin being in request for sheep-feed. The common four- 
course rotation prevails. Sheep are the manure-carriers. The 
turnip-crop is grown by artificial manures alone, the dung being 
reserved almost entirely for the wheat-crop, and applied to 
the clover leas soon after harvest, when it may be seen like a 
coat of thatch, scorched by the sun and apparently wasted ; yet 
the plan has long been sanctioned by the leading farmers of a 
first-rate agricultural district, who find that it conduces to a sound 
crop of wheat. This practice, as well as early ploughing, which 
suits the wheat plant, expedites the labour of the farm ; and on 
clean land, where the skim-coulter will work, there is no occasion 
to plough the leas more than once. The benefit of an early furrow 
may always be noticed in a field where the work has been begun 
and interrupted ; on the earlier ploughed strips the wheat- 
plant looks greener through the winter, and at harvest the straw 
is brighter, and the grain more yielding. The system of stock- 
feeding rules the cropping of the fallows ; yard-feeding is quite 
subordinate to the sheep-fold. On most farms a mixed breed- 
ing and fatting flock is kept. The usual plan is to buy in every 
year Hants or West County Down ewes, which are put to a 
Cotswold or other long-woollecl ram, and fattened ; the lambs 
are weaned in June and sold, or occasionally the ewe lambs are 
drafted into the flock. As the land is not warm and early 
enough for stubble green crops, the main dependence for food is 
on the turnip-crop. A few tares are grown for horses, and a few 
mangold for spring use. 
The Hag Farms. 
The hay farms, which occupy a considerable area in Middle- 
sex, occasionally extend over the border, as at Barnet, and from 
