that if steam can be profitably applied here, it may be anywhere. Messrs. Blyth and Squier speak with the greatest satisfaction as to the apparatus they have employed, and though the expenses have in each case been great, still they have been enabled to do, although at a high rate, what they feel persuaded could not have been accomplished by means of horse labour. The performances of the Fowler grubber and Howard cultivator so please them on their thin-skinned soil, that they wish for heavier soil on which to reap the full reward of its employment. Fowler's steam tackle was sent to them a few months before they took possession of the farm, and it did some little work for neighbours, until the former tenants removed. They received it as it was exhibited at the Warwick meeting-a Clayton and Shuttleworth 10-horse power double cylinder locomotive steam engine, carrying three drums beneath it, a 4-furrow plough and cultivator, the self-moving anchor, and 800 yards of steel wire rope, with other etceteras. With this some 330 acres were ploughed and grubbed; but the season was so wet and the land so matted together with couch grass, that the expenses during this initial experiment were very great. Messrs. Blyth & Squier, however, were enabled to strike a blow, and to work when horses were fain to lie by; for, though the land is light, it runs together, and sets in wet weather, and is much injured by hoof pressure. Last year this apparatus had about 174 days' work, the manual labour amounting to 3s. 7d. an acre, the labour and material used in repairs to 2s. 2d., the rope to Is., and oil to 4d. per acre. What further charges are be brought against it for depreciation and interest I need not particularize. Howards' tackle was brought to its help in July, 1861, and worked 72 days at an expense in manual labour of 48. 4d. an acre, and something considerable in repairs and oil. The two together, in the absence of the 7 horses which they are supposed practically to displace (the actual number now kept is nine), prepared the land upon which nearly all the crops of the present year were grown. Fowler's plough has not been much used, but the cultivator has proved a most valuable implement, lifting and displacing the soil entirely. The first cultivator sent by Messrs. Howard ran through without moving or lifting the soil; but fitted with the shares and reversible horns brought out at Farningham, it now does excellent work. Where land breaks up in great clods the sun will rid the farmer of the couchplague; but in the soil of a large part of this estate, unless the weed is entirely removed, it cannot be killed. The usual plan in clearing the blocks, therefore, has been somewhat as follows; Fowler's cultivator goes first; then in about a fortnight a huge six-horse Essex harrow, hinged to a pair of front wheels and axletree, runs raking to the bottom of the cut; a coat of rubbish is secured; and then follows Howards' cultivator, and so on until the plot is ready for the drill. Steam has consequently been employed, I should suppose, to do many operations horses would have done at a cheapear rate, and hence a considerable wear and tear of rope and other members of the tackle. Altogether, the rope supplied from Leeds amounts to 1,600 yards, of which 800 remain in fair condition. To the original 1,400 yards from Bedford must be added a fresh rope in June last, very little of the old one remaining. By the road from Tilbury I entered the best side of the farm. A 27-acre division of one of the "blocks" faced me, in wheat stubble. The previous pea stubble had been broken up and crossed by Fowler to a depth of 9 inches (equal to 25s. an acre), harrowed, drilled, and top-dressed. The season was against the crop, which, though small, was "better than it would have been." It now lies broken up by Fowler 8 inches deep (15s.), preparatory to being sown, fairly clean. Be yond this a 14-acre bit of heavier land had paid better for steam culture. Last year it was completely "swarded" with couch: now it lies in wheat stubble (smashed up) after a fine crop of 9 sacks an acre, very clean, at comparatively small cost. Forty acres of clean strong barley stubble beside this spoke of a fine crop by means of steam culture. In the neighbourhood were plots of ground which had been merely under horse culture, and displayed by their sparse produce and foul condition the advantages of steam. I was pointed to 20 acres of swedes, a fair crop, on a good piece of red loam in a hollow, which had been redeemed from a wretched state to one tolerably clean, and that, too, in time to save a crop; a feat which, under horse tillage, would have been impossible. There happens to be in the neighbourhood a case in point, where a 40-acre plot of the same description was treated for three or four months with horse tillage, but with no other result than a tolerable crop of white turnips. The expenses in the first case were as follows:-Two 12-inch cultivations with Fowler's implements, 30s. ; one with Howard's, 10s., last autumn. In the spring, twice with Howard's and twice with Fowler's. Add to this the intermediate harrowings and expenses of collecting and carting couch, with a ploughing.in of manure with horses, and you have the total of an expensive but efficient course of cultivation. The 8 acres prepared for the fine crop of mangold cost something like 65s. an acre in steam and horse labour. Both pieces are in a creditable state, not quite clear of thistles, but the weeds are so far reduced that the expenses of future cultivation will now be inconsiderable. Passing by several fields which are all in course of reclamation, and skirting the furze, I came upon a 47-acre wheat stubble, where Fowler's tackle was at work. The sting had been taken out of this plot before the wheat was planted, so that except a corner, which had been reserved for horse culture, it was fairly clean. It was broken up and crossed four times in 1861! Three men and two boys, with one boy for water-cart, appeared to be the staff. The 4furrow plough with grubbing breast was moving along at a rate of three miles an hour, and throwing up a wave of earth to a depth of seven inches. The steam indicator of the 10-horse power stood at 80lbs., at which I expressed some astonishment for a soil so light. Howard's tackle was set down on the opposite side of the roadway, but was not at work just then. Both bore marks of excessive toil, and we cannot expect that having left so deep a mark on the fields around they should escape without showing some evidence of strain and struggle. I must observe further that I have given the expenses per acre as I received them from Mr. Squier, who was so kind as to afford me every information. Fifteen shillings an acre on light land for Fowler's first operation, and 10s. for Howard's second, looks excessive; but considering manual labour, repairs, coals, oil, wear and tear, interest and allowance for depreciation, such is their estimate, and I am bound to state it. It must be remembered, however, that this is an exceptional case. In any ordinary state, light land, although cultivated with less advantage by steam than heavy land, would not need the number of operations I have chronicled. I have instanced this case for the purpose of showing what steam-power has enabled Messrs. Blyth and Squier to accomplish under peculiar circumstances, and which they could not possibly have accomplished by any other means. A tract of land, we must remember, has been reclaimed from a most wretchedly foul state to one of comparative cleanliness, hedges have been swept away, buildings have been erected, and roads have been made, all in about two years, and FF with a force of only nine horses, supplemented by the steam-tackle. The great achievement here is that time has been gained. The coup de main has been startling, sudden, overwhelming. Such bold assaults in war are often denounced as extravagant of blood, but they usually turn out to be economical of the vital fluid in the end, and so it will be in this case. These energetic tenants made a bold stroke for a farm in the first instance, and by a clever coup de main they have now, by the trenchant use of well-chosen weapons, added a brace of years to the lease without rent. this, the turnips have been preceded by six crops: peas, barley, beans, wheat, beans, wheat. I have farther to remark that, save for the first crop, the steam-cultivator was only used once in a place. The course of cultivation was this: Last October the wheat stubble was smashed with No. 3, crossed with horse-scuffler, manured and ridged in November, and subsoiled between ridges; costing 17s. an acre. During the summer the turnips have been 4 times horse-hoed, and twice handhoed, the last in July. Looking across the valley to an opposite hill side, a few hundred yards distant I perceived four horses toiling to turn a shallow mould furrow. The scene of this operation was a dead fallow, that, as I learned, had already been ploughed six times, at an expense of £4 16s., and surely must be further pulled about and ploughed, for the surface was covered with thistles. The next plot for investigation was 8 acres of beans, cut and stooked. The stalks were podded from top to bottom, and the stubble was remarkably clean. It stood out from amongst surrounding crops with the same distinctness as Hallett's wheat at Brighton. The land was treated with No. 3 in October, and then crossed with horses. In February, the combined mataking five rows, with 16-inch intervals. In walking across this stubble, I should have thought it a fine friable loam, had I not seen in the neighbouring field the force exerted by four horses to turn a single furrow five inches deep. Drawing the toe of my boot along, it was easy to bury the foot, almost anywhere, in three or four inches of mould. On the 12th September I took a ticket for Fenny Stratford, crossed the Grand Junction Canal, which unites the Grand Trunk Canal with the Thames, soon after I left that station, made across Houghton Common, and struck upon the range of cold clay hill land which is precisely similar to that farmed by Mr. Pike. Most of the fields presented a very foul appearance; bean and wheat stubbles were full of thistles and "beggrement." Two crops and a fallow-a dead fallow, mark, which costs no less than £3 per acre-is the course usually followed; and the stubble of the first crop is usually so full of weeds that I wonder how the farmers can have the assurance to sow them again. Until steam was introduced, turnip culture was very unusual in this neigh-chine cultivated and drilled it in eleven hours, the drill bourhood; but in the midst of such a scene as thisdead fallows alternating with weedy stubbles-I came upon a fresh, vigorous plot of turnips, where turnips had never been before. It was on a hill side. The common land mentioned lay at the bottom, and a common, the name of which I forget, covered with furze, above. The secret is that the land was "steamed." The cost of preparing that piece of land occupied by Mr. Bignold, of Laughton, was about £1 per acre! Passing this foretaste of better things, I came by afrough | lane, which gave me a view of poorly-farmed land of similar description, to 40 acres in one field, upon the same ridge, in the occupation of Mr. Smith, of Woolston. It beamed out very much as an oasis in the desert. The thistle and dock were utterly banished; and as for couch grass, one had to look very carefully for it. The stubbles were strong, and clean to a miracle. My questions were first put with reference to ten acres of barley in stook. I ascertained that it was after roots, and had been broken up and drilled with the combined cultivator and drill shown at Farningham, in one-and-ahalf days, at an expense of 6s. 2d. an acre. A fair comparison with horse labour was to be found by crossing the hedge. Mr. Harwood, a neighbour there, had a piece of barley in stook after roots, manured, and fed on the land in a manner similar to Mr. Smith's. The land was ploughed in February with four horses, 16s. an acre; two scufflings, 2s. each; one drilling (the 17th April), 3s. an acre. Excluding seed and harrow-culture-nay, under horse culture, I would say-I pity ings 238. is the cost of preparation in the one case, 6s. 2d. in the other. In both cases the land is clean, but in one the crop is vigorous and abundant, in the other weak and sparse. This difference cannot represent the benefit of this mere operation, but that of previous deep cul ture. I could not but remark how well the new machine had done its work. Wheel-marks were nowhere visible, the lines were very straight, and when he had to follow the windings of a crooked fence I perceived that the steersman possessed complete mastery over his implement. An eight-acre plot of stout, clean wheat-stubble joined the beans. The crop had evidently been fine. The preparation for wheat was as follows: One steam smashing, and crossed with horses. The wheat was sown broadcast; and not a penny had been expended in hoeing or weeding. No hoeing; and such a stubble, with such surrounding evidences of thistle tendencies! The cost per acre of the operations mentioned is 11s., and the crop estimated by Mr. Smith at 45 bushels. I have been thus particular in giving the details of this little plot of land, because it illustrates in the best possible manner what steam can effect, if handled judiciously. It stands in high relief against the surrounding evidences of the expensive and unsuccessful character of horse tillage for this description of soil. The Oxford clay-for such is the division of the middle oolite which crops out here-assumes in this position its character of a cold, stiff, wet clay, and is perhaps the most expensive of all the clays to cultivate. Under good culture, it produces good crops of wheat, beans, oats, clover, and, as I can testify, of turnips; under bad the farmer who has to cope with it: two crops and a fallow are all it will admit of. Turnip and sheep husbandry, until steam culture made them possible, were practically unknown; but yet this is the very means by which it may be made productive. To a man who is not clever in the management of such land, it becomes a constant source of disappointment and poverty. The mechanical disposition of a clayey soil is deranged by trampling and ploughing in wet weather; and although it may have a full supply of manure in it, yet the derangement so entirely locks up all its energies, that the necessary fermentation is stopped, and complete barrenI next came upon a 12-acre plot of turnips-theness is the result. It was the endeavour to induce an seventh crop under steam; and though a failure by rea- artificial friability and a mechanical pulverization of son of the flies, it spoke in its naked cleanliness volumes this churlish clay which led Mr. Smith to abandon the in favour of steam. The character of the land, too, plough in favour of the cultivator, and from thence to judging by the tread, is completely changed. The the employment of steam, without which he found himlands around, with their frequent dead fallow and yet self powerless. Under horse culture, the rent of the foul surface, present a fitting comparison here; for mark land in this neighbourhood is 20s. Under steam, there is no reason why it should not be 50s., and prove thus a more paying concern to both landlord and tenant. The crops raised by Mr. Smith's culture certainly contrasted favourably with what I saw the next day in the neighbourhood of Newport Pagnell, upon splendid land, rented at 60s. an acre. The operations are simpler, less expensive, and more efficient. Horse tillage appears to perpetuate weeds, while steam tillage most certainly eradicates them. In order to come to some definite conclusion as to the pecuniary advantages, on these 38 acres, of steam over horse tillage, I made a few calculations, which are thus summarized: 10 acres of Barley: £ This result, large as it appears for so small a space of land, is, I believe, a fair approximate estimate of the difference between land cultivated for a series of years on the old and on the new system, drawn from my observations upon Mr. Smith's land and the farms around him. It will have been remarked, however, that horses are by no means dispensed with. While they are retained upon the farm for carting, and so forth, Mr. Smith does not object to employ them where they are useful. At seasons when their feet can do no harm, and they are unemployed elsewhere, he always brings their muscles nto play. Descending from this cold clay hill range, and again crossing the canal at another point, I came upon the farm in Little Woolston. Here are 70 acres of arable land, moderately heavy. The staple is clay, very much changed and moderated under the tutelage of No. 3; but beneath it lies a very stiff yellow clay, pierced by drains. My first introduction was to twelve acres of beans, a tremendous crop, about seven feet high, the stalks well corned. The land is light to the foot, and perfectly clean. After wheat it was dressed with ten tons of manure, smashed once in October, crossed with horses, and drilled in February with the combined machine. The wheat will be planted, too, with the combined machine; the cultivator points will penetrate to four inches, and the seed will lie upon a solid bottom. Now for the thirteen acres of mangolds and swedes in strips. They have been flied, and are not so good as they would have been; but still the crop is beyond an average, and the land is excessively clean. The preparatory processes were as follow: Ten tons of manure on the wheat stubble, which was smashed up ten inches deep, and crossed with horses. In November horses ridged it, and it was subsoiled between the ridges to a depth of sixteen or eighteen inches. The total cost of culture so far was 17s. an acre. Thus it lay till spring, when the ridges were cleaned with a hand hoe, and the seed drilled by hand machine. The first plant failed, the land was fresh hoed and drilled, and before me was the crop, which had been four times horse-hoed, and twice hand-hoed between the plants. Beyond this lay a plot of barley, fourteen acres. The carters were at work removing to the stack the abundant produce from off the clean strong stubble, the straight regular lines of which did credit to the working of the combined machine, which cultivated and drilled the piece at one blow in seventeen hours. I do not trouble myself to advocate in these sketches any particular machine or implement, but only to state facts as I find them; but should I deviate from this course, it would be to say that wherever it has been used this combined cultivator drill has produced the best results. It is some test certainly as to the value of a system when it enables a man to obtain with surety a good crop, and which is exceptional in the neighbourhood. Of clover lea there were twelve acres in course of being ploughed with a furrow 7 inches deep. Mr. Smith always ploughs clover lea. It comes in rotation once in six years, and he takes it as a good opportunity to bring up, for salutary mixture with the surface, some of the subsoil which has been broken up by the cultivator. This ploughing (I am stating his theory) must be a little deeper each time. It follows that presently it will be an operation beyond the power of horses, and at this point he acknowledges that some other implement for the inversion of the soil will be required in addition to those he now uses. The furrow was beautifully shattered, and apparently quite changed from its original consistency. It was with the greatest pleasure that I visited this, the oldest steam-tilled farm in England. Everything seemed so judiciously arranged. The quiet, cunning, assured hand of the master-workman was visible everywhere. In my rambles I have found farmers who, having acquired steam, play with it, as a child with a new toy. They set the tackle going, for the sake of seeing it work. Not so Mr. Smith. Not a bit of land bearing crop this year has been steamed twice; the new force "Last year is economized, and reduced to calculation. I had just 17 days' work for the steam tackle," he observed to me," and for my horses 43 days' work on the land. It will be the same for the coming year, with but slight variation." There was a time when steam must be regarded auxiliary to steam. was termed an auxiliary to horses; now it seems horses It has been objected to me that Mr. Smith has so small a farm, and has nothing else to do but to give it his undivided attention. To this very weak objection, I have only to reply that the men around him are in the habit of giving as undivided an attention to farms quite as small, and yet without producing the same results. And I have further to remark that the way he has made amongst the tenant farmers of his own county and adjoining counties, show the opinion of those who have had the best means of judging of the benefits of steam culture. F. R. S. ATWO-STOREY MILKING STOOL.- Something new under the sun," in the shape of a milking stool for kicking and unruly cows, is described by a correspondent of the Iowa Homestead. The stool can be made of inch boards, and has many advantages over the old-fashioned one. First procure a piece of board of sufficient size to accommodate the milker, and have, in addition, room for the milk pail. This may be put on legs of about eight inches in height. Then upon this erect another seat or stool, covering half the space of the bottom one, for the milker to sit, thereby giving him a chance in front to let the pail remain firm and steady, not liable to get kicked over, and by being up from the ground kept free from dirt and mud, and so close to the udder as to prevent loss from milking over, &c. If a cow is in the habit of kicking, the milker, by using a stool of this description, can have both hands to prevent her heels from coming in contact with the pail, which sits firm upon the front part of the stool, steadied by his knees. He could in a short time effectually break a cow of the habit of kicking while being milked. AGRICULTURAL STATISTICS, IRELAND, 1862. CEREAL CROps. The following are the results as regards the area under crops in 1862 compared with those for the previous year; Compared with 1861 there appears a decrease of 43,427 acres in the extent under wheat; 24,423 in that under oats; GREEN CROPS. The area under green crops is given in the following abstract. There is an increase in turnips of 48,045 acres; in mangel wurzel and beet, of 296 acres; and in cabbage, of 491 acres. Potatoes exhibit a decrease of 116,187 acres; carrots, parsnips, and “other green crops," of 1,926 acres; and vetches and rape, of 504 acres-showing on the whole a net decrease of 74,785 acres in the extent under green crops in 1862, compared with the previous year. Meadow and clover covered 1,552,829 acres in 1862, being an increase of 6,623 acres above the extent in 1861. The following is a summary of the variations in the acreage under cereals, green crops, meadow, and flax, between 1861 and 1862: Acres. Acres. Total decrease in the extent of land under crops in 1862....... Of the decrease in land under crops this year, 138,841 acres, 117,832 would seem to have merged into grass, 1,066 were returned as under woods and plantations, and 870 went to increase the fallow, leaving an area of 19,073 acres, used for grazing in 1861, which appear to have been unstocked at the time of the last enumeration, but are available for pasture when required. According to he revus received from the Enumerators, the increase under the head of "Bog and Waste" would appear to be conaned to the province of Connaught; for, whilst the extent under "Crops" has decreased in all the provinces-Leinster, Munster, and Ulster show an increased area under Grass, Fallow, and Plantations-Connaught alone exhibiting an apparent increase under Bog and Waste. As regards the different descriptions of live stock, the following summaries exhibit the changes which have taken place in their number and value between 1855 and 1862, and between 1861 and 1862 : TOTAL NUMBER OF LIVE STOCK IN IRELAND IN EACH YEAR, FROM 1855 To 1862, INCLUSIVE. TOTAL VALUE OF LIVE STOCK IN IRELAND IN EACH YEAR, from 1855 to 1862, calculated according to the rates assumed by the Census Commissioners of 1841, viz., for Horses £8 each, Cattle £6 10s., Sheep 22s., and Pigs 25s. each. With reference to the reduced acreage under crops this year, I believe that, independent of the growing disposition for pasture land which is observable, it may be very much attributed to the unfavourable seasons of the last few years, owing to which the yield of crops was considerably under the average, and the profits of the farmer greatly diminished; so that the means usually applicable for cultivation of the soil were consequently lessened, and capital encroached upon for the payment of rent and other demands, which under favourable circumstances are paid out of the annual produce of the land. The returns of tillage and live stock from which these abstracts are compiled are altogether voluntary; and I beg to observe, that the good feeling and intelligence displayed by the occupiers of land in Ireland, of every rank and class, by so readily affording the required information to the Enumarators, is most creditable. And I also venture to remark, that it is gratifying to observe the increased desire for the collection of agricultural statistics which has been lately exhibited in many of the counties of England, at very important meetings specially convened to consider the subject. Agricultural and Emigration Statistics Office, 15th Sept., 1862. WILLIAM DONNELLY, Registrar-General. |