AGKICULTURE [PRACTICE, after took the matter in hand, and has ever since 1 , through the agency of the officers of Inland Revenue, obtained annual returns of cropping and live stock for the whole of Great Britain. The obvious success of this National Scottish Society has led to the formation of similar ones in England and in Ireland, The former, instituted in 1838, and shortly afterwards incorporated by royal charter, at once entered upon a career of usefulness, the extent of which cannot well be over-rated. Its membership comprising the most influential persons in the kingdom and its revenues are now so large as to enable it to conduct its proceedings on a scale befitting its position and objects. These are of a varied character, but its efforts are concentrated upon its journal and annual show. The former, published twice a-year, is chiefly composed of the essays and reports to which the liberal prizes of the society have been awarded, and undoubtedly stands at the head of our present agri cultural periodicals. At the annual shows of the society, a prominent place is assigned to implements and machines. Such as admit of it, are subjected to comparative trials, which are conducted with such skill and pains that the awards command the entire confidence of exhibitors and their customers. The extent and rapidity of the im provement in agricultural machinery which the society has been mainly instrumental in effecting are altogether extraordinary. There are few market towns of any importance that have not their organised club or occasional gathering of the farmers in their neighbourhood, for the discussion of professional topics. We have now also a goodly list of agricultural periodicals, both weekly and monthly, most of them ably conducted, which are extensively read, and are the means of collecting and diffusing much valuable know ledge, which, but for them, would often, as in former times, perish with its authors, or be confined to corners. The facilities now afforded by railways for cheap and expeditious travelling, induce most farmers to take an occasional peep at what is going on beyond their own neighbourhood. This, more than anything, deals death-blows to prejudices, and extends good husbandry. Literature. The literature of agriculture has been enriched by the contributions of many able writers. Some deserve to be particularly mentioned. The volumes of the late David Low, Esq., on Practical Agriculture, Landed Property and Economy of Landed Estates, and Domesticated Animals, must ever be of standard authority on their respective subjects. Mr Henry Stephens Book of the Farm, and Mr J. C. Morton s Cyclopaedia of Agriculture, are invaluable to the agricultural student for their fulness, and for the minuteness of their details. Mr Caird s English Agriculture supplies the means for a most interesting comparison with the descriptions left to us by Arthur Young. Mr Hoskyn s History of Agriculture and Chronicles of a Clay Farm are the very gems of our professional literature. In a series of essays on our Farm Crops by Professor John Wilson of Edinburgh, the scientific and the practical are most happily combined. Among the more recent publications of value may be mentioned London s Encyclopaedia ; How Crops Grow, by Mr Johnson; M Combie s Cattle and Cattle-Breeders ; Mechi s How to Farm Profitably; Hozier s Practical Remarks on Agricultural Drainage; Todd s American Wheat Culturist, &c. Johnston, Anderson, Way, and Voelcker, have done admirable service in expound ing the chemistry of agriculture ; Youatt, Spooner, and Yasey, its zoology ; and Smith, Parkes, Webster, Bailey, Denton, Scott Burn, and Starforth, its engineering, mechanics, and architecture. In reviewing the history of our national agriculture for llie past sixty years, it is pleasing to note the growing intelligence displayed by our agriculturists in the prose cution of their calling. It is curious, also, to observe the analogy between the order of that progress, and that which is usually observed in individual minds. For a long time we see agricultural societies and writers occupying them selves chiefly about the practical details and statistics of husbandry, and attaching much importance to empirical rules. Gradually, however, we observe, along with a zealous collecting of facts, a growing disposition to investigate the causes of things, and desire to know the reason why one practice is preferable to another. When, therefore, the Royal Agricultural Society adopted as its motto, " Practice with Science," it expressed not more the objects to be aimed at in its own proceedings, than the characteristic feature of our present stage of agricultural progress. CHAPTER III. PRACTICE OF BRITISH AGRICULTURE. We shall now endeavour to present a picture of British agriculture in its present state. In doing this, we shall take much the same course which we should pursue, if we were asked to conduct a visitor over our own farm, and to give him a detailed account of its cultivation and manage ment. In the case supposed, we should, first of all, explain to him that the farm comprises a great diversity of soils; that its fields are very variously circumstanced as regards climate, altitude, exposure, and distance from the home stead ; and that in its tillage, cropping, and general management, regard must be had to these diversities, whether natural or artificial. We should then conduct him through the homestead, pointing out the position and uses of the various farm buildings and of the machinery and implements contained in them. From thence we should proceed to the fields to examine their fences and the tillage operations. With some observations about the succession of crops, and the manures applied to them, there would follow an examination of the cultivated crops, pastures, and meadoivs, of the live stock of the farm, and of the measures adopted in reclaiming certain waste lands belong ing to it. This survey being completed, there would naturally follow some discussion about the tenure of land, the capital required for its profitable cultivation, the con dition of farm labourers, the necessity for devoting more attention to the education of the agricultural community, and the duty of the Legislature to remove certain obstruc tions to agricultural improvement. Section 1. Soils. The soil constituting the subject-matter on which the husbandman operates, its character necessarily regulates to a large extent the nature of his proceedings. The soil or surface covering of the earth in which plants are produced is exceedingly varied in its qualities. Being derived from the disintegration and decomposition of the rocks which constitute the solid crust of the globe, with a mixture of vegetable and animal remains, soils take their character from that of the rocks from which they have chiefly been derived. There is thus a generally prevailing resemblance between the soils of a district and the rocks over which they lie, so that a knowledge of the composition of the one affords a key to the character of the other. But this connection is modified by so many circumstances, that it is altogether impossible by the mere etudy of geology to acquire an easy and certain rule for determining the agricultural character of the soil of any particular district or field, as it has been the fashion with some writers of late years to assert. " When, indeed, we regard a considerable tract of land, we can for the most part trace a connection between the subjacent deposits and the
subsoil, and consequently the soil. Thus, in a country of
