Land may be fallowed under turnips in drill, or under potatoes, mangel-wurzel, or any other drilled crop that will admit of the intervals being horse-hoed; but the drills should be sufficiently wide apart to admit of this being done effectually, or it will be difficult to keep down the weeds. Beans are also considered a fallowcrop, but as they must be planted in March, if the land should require a good summer cleaning, the drills ought to be not less than two feet and a half asunder, in order that the intervals may be well worked with the horsehoe, and for the weeds to be carried off without injuring the stalks.

The process of naked fallowing, when resorted to on strong land, should be as follows :--Winter-plough as deep as the roots of couch or rooted weeds have penetrated, and let the land lie in narrow ridges until February or March; then cross-cut the sods at the same depth, leaving them as open as possible on the surface. When the land becomes dry in spring, either scuffle it, or break it down with a heavy harrow, and leave it in a rough state for a fortnight, until the seed-weeds have vegetated. The land should then be rolled flat, and again well harrowed, observing not to roll more of it than what can be harrowed and well cleaned during the same day; for should showery weather succeed after the land is rolled, it will be more difficult to work it afterwards. After this operation, wait until more seedweeds appear, when the land should receive the third ploughing, a little deeper than the first, and so remain until the same process is gone through again. The fourth ploughing is to be given at the period of putting in the crop; but should the season prove favourable for the destruction of weeds, and for the pulverization of the soil, no more than three ploughings may be necessary; although, as a general rule, it may be said, that the oftener the land is ploughed the better.

This is the only proper system of naked fallowing, and it is very different from the natural fallow, too commonly practised, where the land, become foul and exhausted by over-cropping, is left to lie waste for a season, throwing up weeds and rubbish.

SOWING.

The seed to be sown, must be suited to the soil and the climate. It should be sound, and have been thoroughly ripened; and it should not be the produce of successive crops on the same land, but be changed, or else be raised from seed which had been changed the preceding year. These points are each important, and will always be attended to by the intelligent farmer.

The effects of a change of seed are often extraordinary, sometimes nearly doubling the quantity of grain, whilst the straw is at the same time increased in proportion. The change may, however, be too extreme, and failure may ensue in consequence; and it seems therefore desirable to make the change, and to introduce the several varieties, gradually and successively, having regard in each case to climate, soil, and situation.

Sowing, though most commonly done broadcast, may yet be advantageously done by drilling, and on very small farms even dibbling may sometimes be resorted to with advantage, the saving of seed more than compensating for the additional labour. Instead of dibbling, the seed is sometimes dropped by hand into the furrow after the plough. By this mode much seed is saved, and the crop will rise as regular as if it had been drilled. It is somewhat less laborious than dibbling, but it takes more seed. In broadcast-sowing the chief object is to scatter the seed equally over the surface, leaving no part bare, and yet not too thickly sown. In drilling, the space between the drills admits of hoeing and hand weeding, and hence the land may be kept clean, while the crop will in general be more equal on every part of the field.

A prejudice sometimes exists against early sowing, because the straw is said not to be so bulky as when the seed is sown later; but if we observe the practice of those farmers who are most successful, it will be found that the man who is backward in his operations, who sows late, and consequently reaps late, is always poor;

whilst there is no surer sign of prosperity, than seeing farm-labour in advance of the ordinary practice. The first object with corn crops of every description is to produce the greatest weight of grain from the seed sown. The straw is a secondary object, and if fodder for the cattle be wanted, hay, clover, and turnips should be cultivated for that purpose. Every agricultural operation has its distinct object, to which other objects must be considered subservient; and it may be laid down as a general rule, that you cannot sow too early, if the weather be favourable.

CROPPING.

The particular kind of crops which it may be expedient for the farmer to raise, depends upon the nature of the soil, the climate, and other circumstances; but to vary the crops, and to have different crops in succession upon the same land, is absolutely essential in a right system of husbandry.

Every plant, in the progress of its growth and maturity, exhausts the soil; but all plants do not exhaust the soil equally nor in the same manner, neither do all plants restore to the soil the same quantity nor the same quality of nourishment; and hence it follows that, however well treated in other respects, no soil can long continue to nourish crops of the same kind without becoming exhausted, for every crop impoverishes the soil according as more or less of its own peculiar description of nourishment is abstracted from it.

Perpendicularly-rooting plants, which strike deep into the earth, ought to succeed such as spread their roots horizontally. Plants which greatly exhaust the soil, as all kinds of grain, should only be sown when the land is in good heart; and whenever a soil becomes exhausted by successive crops of the same kind, plants of a different kind, and such as are the least exhausting, should then be cultivated; and it may also be added, that this change of crops has a tendency to

destroy noxious insects, those produced by one crop, being often not supported by another of a different kind.

Nature seems to require, and always provides for, a change in the crops of plants. When a forest is burnt down, trees of a different kind spring up spontaneously, in place of those which have been destroyed. When one kind of plant has exhausted the soil on which it grows, it pushes its roots to a distance in quest of its own peculiar food, and there sends up shoots, while a new race of plants grows up on the spot which it has vacated. The seeds of certain plants, such as the dandelion, thistle, &c., are so buoyant, that they are carried far away from the parent plant by the wind. The seed-vessels of other plants, such as the gorse, when ripe, burst suddenly, and scatter the seeds to a distance from the old plant. In these and in numerous other instances we find that Nature has provided for a perpetual change, an alteration from one condition to another, in endless succession. In the cropping of the ground, the judicious farmer will conform to this great law of nature, and study what species of plants he can most advantageously cultivate in succession.

It is well known that crops are not always abundant, in proportion to the quantity of manure employed, especially when cultivated on the same land for a succession of years. It is also known that land, which has thus become unsuited for one kind of crop, will successfully produce another; and upon these facts, confirmed by all experience, the system of rotation is founded.

The necessity for observing a certain rotation in cropping the land, is now universally recognised; and the questions which the farmer has to consider are,first, what description of crop is any particular field capable of growing to the greatest advantage? and secondly, what is the best succession of crops to be cultivated, looking to the capabilities of the ground, and the means of improvement within reach?

Under the old system of farming, the land was generally cropped with grain until it became exhausted, and was then allowed to rest and recruit itself under

natural pasture. Since the introduction of turnips and other green crops, the alternation of grain with these vegetables, has prevented much of the baneful consequences of the old system, and the produce of the soil has been greatly increased. Although this is the case however, yet, without the intervention of occasional pasturage, most soils will be apt in time to become languid, and get into a state from which the application of manure alone will not restore them.

Upon large farms under good management, in which cattle and sheep form objects of attention as well as corn, about half the arable land is usually kept under grass for pasture, hay, and soiling, and the other half is kept under tillage. These portions are constantly changing crop, slower or faster, according to circumstances; and this alternation may in fact be considered as the foundation of all good systems of farming.

There is one rule, however, to be invariably observed in all rotations, namely, that a fallow, or a fallow crop of turnips, mangel-wurzel, drilled potatoes, beans, or clover, should always intervene between two grain crops. If this rule is attended to, and a due rotation in other respects observed, the land will very rarely get into a foul or exhausted state, provided that proper care is taken to destroy weeds by horse and hand hoeing at suitable seasons.

Strong clay soils are especially adapted for the growth of wheat and beans, and may be continued under these crops alternately for several years. This is the most profitable course of cropping that can be followed on these soils, provided a sufficiency of manure be given, and the beans be thoroughly horse and hand hoed to keep down the weeds. Under favourable circumstances, this course may be continued for six or eight years, or even longer; but to ensure luxuriant crops, the soil must be manured every third year. A crop of clover, vetches, or rye-grass may however be advisable occasionally, to be succeeded by oats; and if the soil should get foul with root-weeds, which will rarely be the case under good management, a naked summer fallow may be resorted to for the pur