at first, the horses' feet and plough wheels would bruise them), and makes up the land again into four furrow ridges, leaving the furrows where the ridges were before. Just before the green tops appear, he harrows the land, and when they appear, ploughs one furrow from each side of the ridges, which he replaces in ten days or a fortnight, and hoes between the plants in the rows. They then grow fast enough to subdue all weeds. He prefers taking them up with three-pronged forks, for which he pays d. per bushel to ploughing and harrowing, which I have been assured is an effectual method, and the cheapest. Sir T. Beevor pays 1d. per bushel. Mr. Brewerton says, a man and a girl can take up a last a day in a crop that yields six lasts per acre. The method I purpose to adopt, is to cover the land (which has been twice, or, at least, once ploughed since Michaelmas) with long dung, when the plough has drawn two furrows on each side of what was the furrow, and becomes the ridge. I shall place the setts in the loose mould of the last furrow, just out of the way of the horses' feet and plough wheels, and rake the dung from the space of four furrows over them, before the plough returns; so that the manure will all be close to their roots; and in every fourth furrow repeat the same. Just before the tops appear, hoe the whole surface with hand-hoes, or a horse-hoe; and as they grow, and the weather permits, earth them up at different times with a foot plough, and keep

the spaces clean by a horse-hoe. Observe, this is but theory, and Mr. Brewerton's practice. What I have hitherto done has been wholly by handhoe, and earthing them so is too expensive; but it has convinced me, that in a moist season, if I can get a plough coustructed to earth them up as high as I wish, my produce will not be so short of a Marshland crop as any person would think, upon comparison of the soils and situation.

Notwithstanding the length of this letter, I must mention, that having two cows ill, from eating turnips which the frost had rotted, when I went to look at them, I thought of trying whether they would eat Jerusalem artichokes, which my pigs eat as well as yours do Mangel Wurzel. I had great pleasure in seeing both the cows take them directly. I then gave them some potatoes, carrots, and red beet, all of which they ate, without finishing one before they began the other.

The merits of Jerusalem artichokes are, that they will grow in any soil and in any situation. I have had a row on the same spot for nearly twenty years. They are what few people like, and are so seldom called for in the family, that they generally remain in the ground till the Spring, when I take them up for the hogs, and have enough in the ground for a succeeding crop; and I never knew one hurt by the frost. As they require no earthing up, I set a row of them last year in the piece where my Mangel Wurzel grew, on that space which is nearer the back of the hedge than

the plough can reach; and I think they produced nearly as much as a ton of potatoes of the same length would have done. Their stalks rise to seven or eight feet in height, and are of such a substance as to be well worth notice in many places, as an article of fuel, I mean for lighting fires, for which the poor of this place have no small plea for breaking hedges. I think, too, they might be manufactured into a kind of hemp. I conclude they must exhaust the soil too much to venture to recommend them, but I purpose setting a row of them in the bottom of every ditch, when I dress a fence, and have just had an application from a very judicious liberal-minded farmer for a bushel for the same purpose. I am happy in living near several whose flattering attention to any thing I consult them upon, is only exceeded by their readiness to give me all the information and assistance in their power. I may therefore hope to be enabled to give you some satisfaction respecting any inquiries into the husbandry of this neighbourhood, which you may wish to make, through Your obedient humble servant,

M. MARTIN.

LETTERIAXI.

From the same.

April 6, 1789.

I have resumed the study of a scheme for the care of the poor without great workhouses, which, if found practicable, will give liberty to individuals to earn their bread where they can find employment, and annihilate the tyrannical power of refusing a certificate. This will in time create a fund for every parish, which will provide for their poor, and preserve their public buildings, without rates. I am persuaded no good men will object to the purport of my plan, but the difficulty of preventing evasion makes me sometimes almost despair. M. M.

LETTER LXXII.

Dr. LETTSOM to Sir M. MARTIN, Bart.

London, April 10, 1789.

It gives me pleasure to find thy attention turned upon a subject of so much moment as the poor,

who now consume, without any equivalent industry, the annual produce of two millions two hundred thousand pounds. It is a subject I have thought of; and if the hint afforded by the little clubs were improved, and the principal money secured, I conceive that poor-rates might be usefully abolished.

The nation must, from necessity, take up this important subject; the evil is rapidly growing, and must absorb the national revenue, whilst idleness and vice are at the same time encouraged. J. C. L.

LETTERLXXIII.

Sir M. MARTIN, Bart. to Dr. LETTSOM.

Dear Sir,

Burnham, Jan. 14, 1790. I last year gave you my ideas of a course of husbandry, which might bring Mangel Wurzel into use in this country, upon which my friend Henry Styleman, Esq. has greatly improved, and has actually divided a farm into eight shifts, to be cropped in the following order :

1st year-Peas or oats upon the first ploughing of the flag.