Hop Cultivation. 
223 
about ten miles north, south, and east of the town of Alton. 
Surrey hop land, of which there aie now 1,955 acres, is located 
between Farnham and Guildford, and within eight or nine miles 
of Farnham in a south-eastern direction. Here, in both of 
these hop districts, as in all others, it is found that little or no 
addition has been made to the number of hop-producing parishes 
during the last 100 years, though in many of these the acreage 
has considerably increased. Here also, as in other instances, 
the limits of the hop plantation are sharply demarcated by 
peculiarities of soil. The Hampshire hop land is for the most 
part upon the strip of Upper Greensand which runs out below 
the Chalk escarpment, 1 whose soil is particularly rich in phos- 
phoric acid and silica. This soil, the celebrated “ Malm,” has 
been formed by the debris of a soft white rock, having the 
appearance, to a casual observer, of chalk or limestone. Gilbert 
White calls it “ a kind of white land neither chalk nor clay but 
kindly for hops. . . . This soil produces the finest hops.” 2 
Messrs. Way and Paine writing of this land say : — 
In the parish of Farnham this bed traverses its whole extent from east 
to west coinciding with the line of the very best hop-grounds, those which 
are perennially continued under hop culture. This is a remarkable circum- 
stance tending to confirm the opinion of the profuse abundance of phosphoric 
acid in the soil, as well as the facility with which the hop-plant appears to 
be able to assimilate the acid it naturally contains. For the analysis of the 
hop proves it to be a great consumer of phosphoric acid, annually carrying 
off many pounds per acre, in addition to the quantity abstracted by the bine 
and leaves. 3 
Aubrey, the historian of Surrey, shows that the value of this 
“ Malm ” for hop growing was known in the sixteenth century. 
Camden writes that “ near Farnham, hops are growing nearly 
irf as plentiful a manner as in any parts of England.” 4 
From the descriptions given of the centres of hop cultivation 
in England, it will be seen that the hop land is upon soils of 
the Wealden formation, except in the case of Herefordshire 
and Worcestershire. From these descriptions, and a study of 
surface maps of this formation, it will appear thafin almost all 
cases, and particularly where the best hops are grown, there are 
exceptional conditions of soil or subsoil. 
It must not be inferred that there is no other land than 
1 The Geology of the Weald. By W. Topley, F.G.S. 
2 The History of Selborne. By Gilbert White. 
3 On the Fhosphatie Strata of the Chalk Formation. By Messrs. Way 
and Paine, vol. ix., 2nd series, Journal of the Koyal Agricultural Society. 
* Magna Britannia et Hibernia, Antigua et Nova. Camden, vol. v. p. 395 
