On the Maintenance of Fertility in new Arable Land. 293 
receives almost every other year a thorough fallowing and culti- 
vation ; the consumption of large quantities of cattle-food, by 
which the loss sustained by the soil in consequence of sales of 
farm-produce is in great measure balanced ; and the careful pre- 
servation of the manure that is made. Let the pitch of fertility 
be what it may, and whatever its cause, I have no doubt that 
attention to these particulars will preserve it. It may be owing 
to the natural character of the soil — it may be due to the skill of 
a former tenant — or it may be the extraordinary effect of rotting 
or burning an old sxoard — of bringing old pasture into cultiva- 
tion. However it has arisen, there can be no doubt that ordinary 
energy will maintain it, if attention be paid to the points above 
alluded to. 
No reference has been made to the use of artificial manures, 
as they are called. I believe that they are rarely necessary to the 
maintenance of fertility ; no doubt they may often be advan- 
tageously used to increase fertility, but that is hardly ever desir- 
able in the case of newly broken-up land ; good crops may gene- 
rally be obtained in such a case without much assistance, and 
that they may continue to be so obtained I am very sure. Will 
not the experience at Whitfield Farm which I have described, 
be admitted as proof of this ? Some of the land is a deep gritty 
sand; much of it a stiff clay soil; in many places a peaty, 
loam ; on some fields we have a shallow limestone soil on rock ; 
on others a deep vegetable mould resting on magnesian clay and 
stone ; — on all, when grass-land after drainage has been broken 
up, the scanty produce of cheese and butter, characteristic of its 
former condition, has been exchanged for bulky crops of roots and 
grain, a large produce of food for man and for beast : and on all, 
without the use of bought manure of any kind, these crops, so far 
from diminishing as years pass by, rather exhibit an increasing 
fertility in the land which yields them. Is there not variety 
enough of soil, and uniformity enough of result here, to justify 
general confidence ? The fact is, that our crops of straw have 
latterly been so bulky as seriously to interfere with the produce of 
grain ; the wheat has been laid and its yield injured in conse- 
quence of the luxuriance of its growth. This has been a grow- 
ing evil, but it is certainly no sign of a diminishing fertility. 
Now, I am perfectly aware of the extreme changeableness of 
farm experience, arising doubtless from the many uncontrollable 
and variable causes on which that depends : but it is impossible to 
disregard the uniform evidence of an experience extending over 
eight years ; and I certainly think that the results of farm prac- 
tice at Whitfield may well convince any landowner that the break- 
ing up of his grass-lands, if profitable to him the first year, may 
easily be made so during every succeeding year of their culti- 
