On Bieaking up Grass Lands. 
177 
meadows are as valuable, if not more so, to the tenant and 
labourer as the same land would be in arable, and, in the course 
of years, more valuable to the proprietor, because such lands are 
a never-failing mine of manure, without purchase, by which the 
other lands of the farm will be gradually improved under proper 
management. Hence to break up water-meadows, or meadows 
that can be converted into water-meadows, would be to abandon 
the best and cheapest means of improving other lands — a change 
which would not benefit any party — farmer, labourer, or land- 
owner. The value of the produce of a good water-meadow will 
average from lOZ. to 15/. per acre every year, and the same land, 
during the course, would in arable scarcely average / /. per acre. 
From this would have to be deducted expenses nearly equal to 
those of arable, but with this difference : the expenses of water- 
meadows are all incurred by the employment of manual labour — 
the labourer performs it all ; but in the case of arable, half at 
least would be performed by horses and machinery. 
Again, lands of the best quality should not be broken up, 
whether in the neighbourhood of towns or occupied elsewhere as 
grazing-grounds. It would not be profitable to the tenant or land- 
owner; and unless the farm was all pasture, no convenience would 
be secured by breaking up. If the farm, indeed, did not already 
possess any arable, convenience would justify the breaking up of 
a small portion, even upon the best grass farms. 
But between the best of our pastures and those at the other 
extreme, there is a large extent in England not made the most of 
at present, which there is no question would answer to be broken 
up ; but it would be folly to advocate the breaking up of all such 
lands, because we depend upon them for cheese, butter, and milk. 
There can be no doubt but the best dairy land may be broken 
up, and made to produce large crops, without purchasing manure,' 
simply by raising green crops, and by avoiding to grow two 
white straw crops in succession ; while some dairy lands, rather 
of a thin description, will require help from other sources, and will 
be in danger of being impoverished by severe cropping or igno- 
rant management. If a farmer feels any doubt whether such 
misfortune will happen under his management, he had better 
not break up the inferior portion here alluded to. The evil 
would be soon felt by himself, and could not fail eventually to be 
a disadvantage to the landowner and labourer. The advantage 
or disadvantage would in this case depend on the character and 
the means of the tenant. 
The pasture-land near large manufacturing towns should not 
be broken up. The inhabitants obtain their cheese from a dis- 
tance, but butter chiefly from within a few miles ; and, I believe, 
VOL. VII. N 
