Part 51

5. Land be strong, let it be sown early, wet or dry (tho’ wet is worst), ’tis apt to grow so stale and hard by Spring, that his Crop is in Danger of starving, unless the Land be very rich, or much dung’d: and then the Winter and Spring proving kind, it may not be in less Danger of being so big as to fall down, and be spoil’d.

6. Another thing is, that though he had no other Impediment against plowing dry, and sowing wet, ’tis seldom that he has time to do it in; for he must plow all his Ground, which is Eight Furrows in Six Feet;

7. and, whilst it is wet, must lie still with his Plough. When he sows under Furrow, he fears to plow, deep, lest he bury too much of his Seed; and if he

8. plows shallow, his Crop loses the Benefit of deep plowing, which is very great. When he sows upon

9. Furrow (that is after ’tis plowed) he must harrow the Ground level to cover the Seed; and that exposes the Wheat the more to the cold Winds, and suffers the Snow to be blown off it, and the Water to lie longer on it; all which are great Injuries to it.

Our Hoeing Husbandry is different in all of the fore-mentioned Particulars.

1. We can plow the Two Furrows whereon the next Crop is to stand, immediately after the present Crop is off.

2. We have no Use of the Fold; because our Ground has annually a Crop growing on it, and it must lie still a Year, if we would fold it, and that Crop would be lost; and all the Good the Fold could do to the Land, would be only to help to pulverize it for one single Crop; its Benefit not lasting to the Second Year. And so we should be certain of losing one Crop for the very uncertain Hopes of procuring one the ensuing Year by the Fold; when ’tis manifest by the adjoining Crops, that we can have a much better Crop every Year, without a Fold, or any other Manure.

3. We can plow dry, and drill wet, without any manner of Inconvenience.

4. He fears the Weeds will grow, and destroy his Crop: We hope they will grow, to the end we may destroy them.

For, before they grow, they cannot be killed; but if they are all killed as soon as they appear, there will be no Danger of their exhausting the Land, or re-stocking it with their Seed; and ’tis our Fault if we drill more than we can keep clean from Weeds by the Horse-hoe, Hand-hoe, and Hands; the First for the Intervals, the Second for the Partitions, and the Third for the Rows: By the Two former, as soon after they appear as they can; but by the last, when they are grown high enough to be conveniently taken hold of.

5. We do not fear to plant our Wheat early (so that we plow dry), because we can help the Hardness or Staleness of the Land by Hoeing.

6. The Two Furrows of every Ridge whereon the Rows are to be drilled, we plow dry; and if the Weather prove wet before these are all finished, we can plow the other Two Furrows up to them, until it be dry enough to return to our plowing the first Two Furrows; and after finishing them, let the Weather be wet or dry, we can plow the last Two Furrows. We can plow our Two Furrows in the Fourth Part of the Time they can plow their Eight, which they must plow dry all of them, in every Six Feet; for they cannot plow part dry, and the rest when ’tis wet, as we can.

7. We never plant our Seed under Furrow, but place it just at the Depth which we judge most proper; and that is pretty shallow, about Two Inches deep; and then there is no Danger of burying it.

8. We not only plow a deep Furrow, but also plow to the Depth of Two Furrows; that is, we trench-plow where the Land will allow it; and we have the greatest Convenience imaginable for doing this, because there are Two of our Four Furrows always lying open; and Two plowed Furrows (that is, one plowed under another) are as much more advantageous for the nourishing a Crop, as Two Bushels of Oats are better than one for nourishing an Horse: Or if the Staple of the Land be too thin or shallow, we can help it by raising the Ridges prepared for the Rows the higher above the Level.

Very little of my Land will admit the Plough to go the Depth of Two common Furrows without reaching the Chalk; But deep Land may be easily thus Trench-plowed with great Advantage; and even when there is only the Depth of a single Furrow, that may sometimes be advantageously plowed at twice.

9. We also raise an high Ridge in the Middle of each Interval above the Wheat before Winter, to protect it from the cold Winds, and to prevent the Snow from being driven away by them. And the Furrows or Trenches, from whence the Earth of these Ridges is taken, serve to drain off the Water from the Wheat, so that, being drier, it must be warmer than the harrowed Wheat, which has neither Furrows to keep it dry, nor Ridges to shelter it, as every Row of ours has on both Sides of it.

This is a Mistake; for the Ridges in the Middle of the Intervals do not always, nor often in thin shallow Land lie high enough to make a Shelter to the Rows, they being higher: But when Wheat is drilled on the Level, ’tis sheltered by the Ridges raised in the Intervals: But we never weed or hand-hoe Wheat before the Spring.

IV. The Condition in which the Land is left after a Crop.

The different Condition the Land is left in after a Crop, by the one and the other Husbandry, is not less considerable than the different Profit of the Crop.

If indifferent Land be well pulverized by the Plough for one whole Year, it will produce a good Crop: But then, if, instead of being sown, it be kept pulverized on for another Year without being exhausted by any Vegetables, it will acquire from the Atmosphere an extraordinary great Degree of Fertility more than it had before such Second Year’s Pulveration and Unexhaustion. This being granted, which no Man of Experience can deny, what Reason can there be why such a Number of Plants, competent for a profitable Crop, may not be maintained on it the Second Year, that may keep the Degree of their Exhaustion in Æquilibrio with that Degree of Fertility, which the same Land had acquired at the End of the First Year of its Pulveration, the same Degree of Pulveration being continued to it by Hoeing in the Second Year? Or why may it not produce annual Crops always, if the same Equilibrium be continually kept? Two unanswerable Reasons may be given why this Equilibrium cannot be kept in the random Sowing, as it may in the Hoeing Method; viz. First, In the former, the Land is by the Number of sown Plants and Weeds much more (we may suppose at least Five times more) exhausted: And, Secondly, No Pulveration is continued to the Soil, whilst the Crop is on it; which is that Part of the Year wherein is the most proper (if not the only proper) Season for pulverizing. Therefore, allowing, that, in the random way, a Soil cannot, for want of Quantity of vegetable Food, continue to produce annual Crops without Manure, or perhaps with it; yet that is no Reason why it may not produce them in the Hoeing Culture duly performed.

A Piece of Eleven Acres of a poor, thin, chalky Hill was sown with Barley in the common Manner, after a hoed Crop of Wheat; and produced full Five Quarters and an half to each Acre (reckoning the Tythe); which was much more than any Land in all the Neighbourhood yielded the same Year; tho’ some of it be so rich, as that One Acre is worth Three Acres of this Land: And no Man living can remember, that ever this produced above half such a Crop before, even when the best of the common Management has been bestowed upon it.

A Field, that is a sort of an Heath-ground, used to bring such poor Crops of Corn, that heretofore the Parson carried away a whole Crop of Oats from it, believing it had been only his Tythe. The best Management that ever they did or could bestow upon it, was to let it rest Two or Three Years, and then fallow and dung it, and sow it with Wheat, next to that with Barley and Clover, and then let it rest again; but I cannot hear of any good Crop that it ever produced by this or any other of their Methods; ’twas still reckoned so poor, that nobody cared to rent it. They said Dung and Labour were thrown away upon it, then immediately after Two sown Crops of black Oats had been taken off it, the last of which was scarce worth the mowing, it was put into the Hoeing Management; and when Three hoed Crops had been taken from it, it was sown with Barley, and brought a very good Crop, much better than ever it was known to yield before; and then a good Crop of hoed Wheat succeeded the Barley, and then it was again sown with Barley, upon the Wheat-stubble; and that also was better than the Barley it used to produce.

These Three hoed Crops were of Turneps and Potatoes.

Now all the Farmers of the Neighbourhood affirm, that it is impossible but that this must be very rich Ground, because they have seen it produce Six Crops in Six Years, without Dung or Fallow, and never one of them fail. But, alas! this different Reputation they give to the Land, does not at all belong to it, but to the different Sorts of Husbandry; for the Nature of it cannot be altered but by that, the Crops being all carried off it, and nothing added to supply the Substance those Crops take from it, except (what Mr. Evelyn calls) the celestial Influences; and that these are received by the Earth, in proportion to the Degrees of its Pulveration.

A Field was drilled with Barley after an hoed Crop; and another adjoining to it on the same Side of the same poor Hill, and exactly the same Sort of Land, was drilled with Barley also, Part of it after the sown Crop, the same Day with the other; there was only this Difference in the Soil, that the former of these had no manner of Compost on it for many Years before, and the latter was dunged the Year before: Yet its Crop was not near so good as that which followed the hoed Crop; tho’ the latter had twice the Plowing that the former had before drilling, and the same Hoeings afterwards; viz. Each was hoed Three times.

This was a Wheat Crop, and often well hoed.

A Field of about Seventeen Acres was Summer-fallowed, and drilled with Wheat; and with the Hoeing brought a very good Crop (except Part of it, which being eaten by trespassing Sheep in the Winter, was somewhat blighted); the Michaelmas after that was taken off, the same Field was drilled again with Wheat, upon the Stubble of the former, and hoed: This Second Crop was a good one, scarce any in the Neighbourhood better. A Piece of Wheat adjoining to it, on the very same Sort of Land (except that this latter was always reckoned better, being thicker in Mould above the Chalk), sown at the same time on dunged Fallows, and the Ground always dunged once in Three Years; yet this Crop failed so much, as to be judged, by some Farmers, not to exceed the Tythe of the other: That the hoed Field has received no Dung or Manure for many Years past, is because it lies out of the Reach for carrying of Cart-Dung, and no Fold being kept on my Farm: But I cannot say, I think there was quite so much Odds betwixt this Second undunged hoed Crop and the sown; yet this is certain, that the former is a good, and the latter a very bad Crop.