220 
Tlie Past Agricultural Year. 
" The winter s lessons are : (1) To guard against the effects 
of severe frost, wheat on clay land should be sown between 
the middle of September and the middle of October, after clover 
and beans, the land plonghed once, quantity of seed used during 
that time not to exceed five pecks per acre ; and it should not 
be planted upon land fallowed alter vetches, or any other 
fallow, which should be left for barley. This will not apply to 
very poor clays or to strong marl upon clay subsoil, the most 
difficult of all land to deal with. (2) To manure and plough 
before winter all land intended for mangolds. (3) To secure 
from frost all root crops as soon as possible after they have 
done growing. This is no new lesson, but it has been enforced 
by the late winter. (4) While giving to breeding ewes dry 
food — chaff, malt dust, maize, and decorticated cotton-cake is 
not an expensive mixture — to take care that they do not crush 
each other to get to it. (5) If growing cabbages, to bear in 
mind that high condition and good cultivation will afford the 
best security against a severe winter. 
"The wet spring teaches us: (1) How utterly helpless we are 
in dealing with foul clay land in such weather, and how import- 
ant it is, when we have such land clean, to keep it so by forking 
after harvest. (2) That high condition — whether it be the result 
of previous manuring by sheep eating green crops, with the 
addition of cake and corn, or of farmyard-manure, or the early 
application to the growing crops of guano, fish guano, or nitrate 
of soda — has a great effect in enabling these crops to withstand 
the ill effects of continued rains. And lastly (3) That even in 
such seasons, relying upon our own exertions and the promise 
that ' seedtime and harvest shall not fail,' we must determine 
to produce all we can, especially of such things as are least 
abundantly imported — mutton and malting barley to wit — and 
hope that with more favourable seasons, and an improvement 
in the general trade of the country, we shall as heretofore get 
over all our difficulties." 
Thus far was written before harvest time last year. The 
paper was sent back to Mr. Randell for any addition which 
the subsequent experience might suggest, and we now add the 
following additional report : — 
" All went from bad to worse. The rain continued, unre- 
lieved by sunshine ; hay in many places was carried away by 
flood, and the quality of that which escaped was materially 
injured ; even with better weather it would not have been good, 
as, like everything else, it had wanted warmth and sunshine. 
The barley-crops went down, and before harvest had a second 
growth from the roots in ear. So, with a great bulk of straw, 
there is nearly 3 quarters of barley per acre less than in 1878, 
