586 
Agriculture of North Wales. 
managed, and grow most luxuriant crops of every description of 
grain, the average produce of North Wales is decidedly below the 
average produce per acre of Great Britain ; not more than 20 
"bushels of wheat, and 26 to 28 ditto of Barley and Oats. This 
deficiency in the average arises from the pernicious practice so 
prevalent throughout the country, of taking two, three, or four 
corn crops in succession, and breaking up the lea again within 
two, three, or four years of so exhausting a course. 
North Wales does not grow sufficient grain for its own con- 
sumption, large quantities being introduced from Ireland and 
England. This is further proved by the circumstance, that 
though Wales is decidedly a poorer country than England, yet 
the averages taken for fixing the duty on foreign grain are higher 
in North Wales than any other part of Great Britain, although 
the grain sold in the Welsh markets is of inferior quality to the 
average of the kingdom. Considerable changes have, no doubt, 
taken place since the survey was made, an extract from which is 
given at the head of the present report, but certainly not so much 
as to permit it to be supposed that Montgomeryshire possessed at 
that time 296,960 acres of woods and waste, as it certainly at the 
present time does not contain near so many acres of waste land 
and woods as Merionethshire (70,000) ; the former certainly pos- 
sesses more wood, but not to an extent to approximate to any- 
thing like the number of acres set down as woods and waste. If 
the account was correctly made, two things must have occurred to 
have changed the appearance of Montgomeryshire so materially 
since the survey was made, viz , that it must have been denuded of 
wood to a great extent, and also a vast surface of waste land must 
have been brought into cultivation. I could not glean any evi- 
dence of either having occurred to such an extent as to amount 
to anything like the quantity set down in the survey. That 
both the causes alluded to have taken place there can be no 
doubt, but to what extent 1 am not in possession of sufficient 
data to form an opinion ; certainly not so great as to coincide with 
the survey. Merionethshire possesses the greatest amount of 
waste land of any county in North Wales at the present day, as is 
pretty evident from its small population, although it possesses 
extensive slate-quarries and mines of lead, manganese, &c., which 
employ a considerable portion of its population. 
Pasturage is another very vague term. Taking the county of 
Denbigh, for instance, in which there is certainly more waste 
land in the Hiraethog range alone than would amount to 5000 
acres — if heath and a wretched soil may be considered waste. 
Nor is it the fact that one -sixth of the soil of North Wales is 
arable : it is evident that the quantity of land set down under the 
heads noticed are not correct; were they so, Wales ought certainly 
