SUBSECT. 4. Farming in the warmer Climates of France.

403. The culture peculiar to the vine, maize, olive, and orange climates, we shall extract from the very interesting work of Baron La Peyrouse. The estate of this gentleman is situated in the maize district at Pepils, near Toulouse. Its extent is 800 acres; and he has, since the year 1788, been engaged, and not without success, in introducing a better system of agriculture.

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404. The farm-houses and offices in the warm districts are generally built of brick ; frame-work filled up with a mixture of straw and clay; or, en pisé; and they are covered with gutter-tiles. The vineyards are enclosed by hawthorn hedges, or mudwalls; and the boundaries of arable farms by wide ditches; and of grass-lands by fixed stones, or wild quince-trees. Implements are wretched, operations not well performed, and laborers, and even overseers, paid in kind, and allowed to sow flax, beans, haricots, &c. for themselves. The old plough fig. 53.) resembles that used by the Arabs, and which the French antiquarian Gouguet (Origine des Lois, &c.) thinks very probably the same as that used by the ancient Egyptians. plough for stirring fallows, called the araire (fig. 54.) A plough with coulters was first employed at Pepils; and a Scotch plough, with a cast-iron mould board, was lately sent there, and excited the wonder of the whole district. In nothing is France so deficient as in agricultural imple

ments.

405. Fallow, wheat, and maize is the common rotation of crops.

They have also a light one-handled

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406. The live stock consists chiefly of oxen and mules; the latter are sold to the Spaniards. Some flocks of sheep are kept; but it is calculated that the rot destroys them once in three years. Beans are the grain of the poor, and are mixed with wheat for bread. The chick pea (Cicer arietinum,) (fig. 55.) is a favorite dish with the provencals, and much cultivated. Spelt is sown on newly broken-up lands. Potatoes were unknown till introduced at Pepils from the Pyrenees, where they had been cultivated fifty years. In the neighborhood they are beginning to be cultivated. Turnips and rutabaga were tried often at Pepils, but did not succeed once in tenp years. Maize is reckoned a clearing crop, and its grain is the principal food of the people.

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407. The vine is cultivated in France in fields, and on terraced hills, as in Italy, but managed in a different manner to what it is in that country. Here it is kept low, and treated more as a plantation of raspberries or currants are in England. It is either planted in large plats, in rows three or four feet apart, and the plants at two or three feet distance in the row; or it is planted in double or single rows alternating with ridges of arable land. In some cases also two close rows, and a space of six or seven, feet alternate, to admit a sort of horse-hoeing culture in the wide interval. Most generally, plantations are made by dibbling in cuttings of two feet in length; pressing the earth firmly to their lower end, an essential part of the operation, noticed even by Xenophon. In pruning, a stem or stool of a foot or more is left above ground, and the young shoots are every year cut down within two buds of this stool. These stools get very unwieldy after sixty or a hundred years, and then it is customary, in some places, to lay down branches from them, and form new stools, leaving the old for a time, which, however, soon cease to produce any but weak shoots. The winter pruning of the vine generally takes place in February: a bill is used resembling that of Italy (fig. 37.); the women faggot the branches, and their value, as fuel, is expected to pay the expense of dressing. In summer, the ground is twice or thrice hoed, and the young shoots tied to short stakes with wheat or rye straw, or whatever else comes cheapest. The shoots are stopped, in some places, after the blossom has expanded, and the tops given to cows. In some places, also, great part of the young wood is cut off before vintage for feed to cows, and to let the sun directly to the fruit. The sorts cul.. tivated are almost as numerous as the vineyards. Fourteen hundred sorts were collected from all parts of France, by order of the Comte Chaptal, and are now in the nursery

of the Luxembourg; but little or no good will result from the collection, or from attempting to describe them; for it has been ascertained, that after a considerable time the fruit of the vine takes a particular character from the soil in which it was planted; so that fourteen hundred sorts, planted in one soil and garden, would in time, probably in less than half a century, be reduced to two or three sorts; and, on the contrary, two or three sorts planted in fourteen hundred different vineyards, would soon become as many distinct varieties. The pineau of Burgoyne, and the auvernat of Orleans, are esteemed varieties; and these, with several others grown for wine-making, have small berries and branches like our Burgundy grape. Small berries, and a harsh flavor, are universally preferred for wine-making, both in France and Italy. The oldest vines invariably give the best grapes, and produce the best wines. The Baron Peyrouse planted a vineyard twenty years ago, which, though in full bearing, he says, is still too vigorous to enable him to judge of the fineness and quality of the wine, which it may one day afford." In the Clos de Vogois vineyard, in which the most celebrated Burgundy wine is produced, new vine plants have not been set for 300 years: the vines are renewed by laying the old trunks; but the root is never separated from the stock. This celebrated vineyard is never manured. The extent is 160 French arpents. It makes, in a good year, from 160 to 200 hogsheads, of 260 bottles each hogshead. The expense of labor and cooperage, in such a year, has arisen to 33,000 francs; and the wine sells on the spot at five francs a bottle. The vineyard is of the pineau grape. The soil, about three feet deep, is a limestone gravel on a limestone rock." (Peyrouse, 96.) 408. The white mulberry is very extensively cultivated in France for feeding the silkworm. It is not placed in regular plantations, but in corners, rows along roads, or round fields or farms. The trees are raised from seeds in nurseries, and sold generally at five years, when they have strong stems. They are planted, staked, and treated as pollards. Some strip the leaves from the young shoots, others cut these off twice one year and only once the next; others pollard the tree every second year.

409. The eggs of the moth (Bombyx mori), (fig. 56.) are hatched in rooms heated by means of stoves to 18% of Reaumur. (723° Fah.) One ounce of eggs requires one hundred weight of leaves, and will pro

The hatching commences about the end of April, and with the feeding is over in about a month. Second broods are procured in some places. The silk is wound off the coccoons or little balls by women and children. This operation is reserved for leisure days throughout the rest of the season, or given out to women in towns. The eggs (a) are small round objects; the caterpillar (6) attains a considerable size; the chrysalis (c) is ovate; and the male (d) and female (e) are readily distinguishable.

410. The dive is treated in France in the same way as in Italy. The most luxuriant plantations are between Aix and Nice. The fruit is pickled green, or when ripe, crushed for oil, as in that country.

411. The fig is cultivated in the olive district as a standard tree; and dried for winter use, and exportation. At Argenteuil it is cultivated in the gardening manner for eating green. (See Encyc. of Gard, art. Fig.)

412 The almond is cultivated about Lyons and in different parts in the department of the Rhone as standards in the vineyards. As it blossoms early, and the fruit is liable to injury from fogs and rains, it is a very precarious article of culture, and does not yield a good crop above once in ten years.

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413. The caper (fig.49.) is an article of field culture about Toulon ; it has the habit of a bramble bush, and is planted in squares, ten or twelve feet plant from plant every way. Standard figs, peaches, and other fruit trees are intermixed with it.

414. The culture of the orange is very limited; it is conducted in large walled enclosures at Hieres and its neighborhood. The fruit, like that of Geneva and Naples, is very inferior to the St. Michel's and Maltese oranges, as imported to Britain, but the lemons are good.

415. The winter melon (fig. 57.) is cultivated in different parts of Provence and Languedoc, and especially in the orange orchards of Hieres. It forms an article of exportation.

416. Various other fruits are cultivated by the small proprietors in the southern and in all the districts of France, and sold in the adjoining markets; but this department of rural economy belongs rather to gardening than to agriculture.

SECT. IV.

Present State of Agriculture in Holland and the Netherlands.

417. The agriculture of the low countries, and especially of Flanders, has been celebrated by the rest of Europe for upwards of 600 years; that of Holland for its pasturage, and of the Netherlands for tillage. We shall notice a part of the agricultural circumstances of the two countries.

SUBSECT. 1. Present State of Agriculture in Holland.

418. The climate of Holland is cold and moist. The surface of the country towards the sea is low and marshy, and that of the interior sandy, and naturally barren. A considerable part of Holland, indeed the chief part of the seven provinces comprising the country, is lower than the sea, and is secured from inundation by immense embankments; while the internal water is delivered over these banks into the canals and drains leading to the sea, by mills, commonly impelled by wind. In the province of Guelderland and other internal parts, the waste grounds are extensive; being overrun with broom and heath; and the soil a black sand. The marshes, morasses, and heaths, which are characteristic of the different provinces, are, however, intermixed with cities, towns, villages, groves, gardens, and meadows to a degree only equalled in England. There are no hills; but only gentle elevations, and no extensive woods; but almost every where an intimate combination of land, water, and buildings. The soil in the low districts is a rich deep sandy mud; sometimes alluvial, but more frequently silicious, and mixed with rotten shells. In a few places there are beds of decayed trees; but no where rough gravel or rocks. The soil of the inland provinces is in general a brown or black sand, naturally poor, and wherever it is productive, indebted entirely to art.

419. The landed property of Holland is in moderate or rather small divisions, and in the richer parts, generally in farms of from twenty to one hundred and fifty or two hundred acres, often farmed by the proprietor. In the interior provinces, both estates and farms are much larger; and instances occur of farms of five hundred or seven hundred acres, partly in tillage, and partly in wood and pasture.

420. The agriculture of Holland is almost entirely confined to a system of pasturage and dairy management for the production of butter and cheese; the latter well known in every part of the world. Almost the only objects of tillage are some madder, tobacco, and herbage plants and roots for stall feeding the cattle. The pastures, and especially the lower meadows, produce a coarse grass, but in great abundance.

The cows are

allowed to graze at least a part of the day throughout the greater part of the year, but are generally fed in sheds once a day or oftener, with rape cake, grains, and a great variety of other preparations. Their manure is preserved with the greatest care, and the animals themselves are kept perfectly clean. The breed is large, small legged, generally red and white, with long, but small horns; they are very well known in England as the Dutch breed. The fuel used in Amsterdam and most of the towns is peat, and the ashes are collected and sold at high prices, chiefly to the Flemings, but also to other nations. A considerable quantity has been imported to England; they are found excellent as a top dressing for clovers and other green crops, and are strongly recommended by Sir John Sinclair and other writers. Other particulars of Dutch culture and economy correspond with the practice of the Netherlands.

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421. The field implements, buildings, and operations of Holland, are more ingeniously contrived and better executed than those of any other country on the Continent. The best plough in the world (the Scotch plough) is derived from the Rotheram or Dutch implement. The farmeries, and especially the cow-houses and stables, are remarkable for arrangements which facilitate and economise manual labor, and ensure comfort to the animals and general cleanliness. Even the fences and gates are generally found in a better state than in most other countries. They have a simple field gate (fig. 58.) constructed with few rails, and balanced so as it may be opened and shut without straining the posts or hinges, and which deserves imitation. Their bridges, foot-planks, and other

mechanical agents of culture, are in general indicative of more art and invention than is usual in continental agriculture.

SUBSECT. 2. Present State of Agriculture in the Netherlands.

422. The Netherlands and Holland, from the tenth to the fifteenth century, were the great mart of manufactures and commerce in the west of Europe; and at the same time made distinguished progress in other arts. The particular causes which first contributed to the advancement of agriculture are not exactly known at this distance of time; but it is certain that even in the thirteenth century the art was in an advanced state, and ever since, the culture of the low countries, both agricultural and horticultural, has been looked up to by the rest of Europe.

423. About the beginning of the seventeenth century, according to Harte, the Flemings dealt more in the practice of husbandry, than in publishing books upon the subject: so that, questionless, their intention was to carry on a private lucrative trade without instructing their neighbors; and hence it happened, that whoever wanted to copy their agriculture, was obliged to travel into their country, and make his own remarks; as Plattes, Hartlib, and Sir R. Weston actually did.

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424. To make a farm resemble a garden as nearly as possible was their principal idea of husbandry. Such an excellent principle, at first setting out, led them of course to undertake the culture of small estates only, which they kept free from weeds, continually turning the ground, and manuring it plentifully and judiciously. Having thus brought the soil to a just degree of cleanliness, health, and sweetness, they ventured chiefly upon the culture of the more delicate grasses, as the surest means of acquiring wealth in husbandry, upon a small scale, without the expense of keeping many draught horses or servants. After a few years experience, they soon found that ten acres of the best vegetables for feeding cattle, properly cultivated, would maintain a larger stock of grazing animals, than forty acres of common farm-grass: and the vegetables they chiefly cultivated for this purpose were lucerne, saintfoin, trefoils of most denominations, sweet fenugreek (Trigonella), buck and cow wheat (Melampyrum pratense fig. 59.), field turnips, and spurry (Spergula), by them called Marian-grass.

425. The political secret of Flemish husbandry was, the letting farms on improvement. Add to this, they discovered eight.or ten new sorts of manures. They were the first among the moderns, who ploughed in living crops for the sake of fertilising the earth, and confined their sheep at night in large sheds built on purpose, whose floor was covered with sand, or earth, &c. which the shepherd carted away every morning to the compost-dunghill. Such was the chief mystery of the Flemish husbandry.

426. The present state of agriculture in the Netherlands corresponds entirely with the cutline given by Harte, and it has probably been in this state for nearly a thousand years. The country has lately been visited with a view to its rural economy by Sir John Sinclair, and minutely examined and ably depicted by the Rev. Thomas Radcliff. To such British farmers as wish to receive a most valuable lecture on the importance of a proper frugality and economy in farming as well as judicious modes of culture, we would recommend the latter work; all that we can do here, is to select from it the leading features of Flemish farming.

427. The climate of Flanders may be considered as the same as that of Holland, and not materially different from that of the low parts of the opposite coast of England.

428. The surface of the country is every where flat, or very gently elevated, and some extensive tracts have been recovered from the sea. The soil is for the most part poor, generally sandy; but in various parts of a loamy or clayey nature. "Flanders," Radcliff observes," was in general believed to be a soil of extreme natural richness; whereas with the exception of some few districts, it is precisely the reverse." He found the strongest and best soil near Ostend; and between Bruges and Ghent some of the worst, being little better than a pure sand.

429. From confounding the Dutch Netherlands with the Flemish Netherlands, a good deal of confusion in ideas has resulted. Radcliff, on arriving in Flanders, was informed that, "with respect to culture, not only the English, but the French, confounded under the general name of Brabant or Flanders, all the provinces of the low countries, however different might be their modes of cultivation; but that in Flanders itself, might best be seen, with what skill the farmer cultivates a bad soil (un sol ingrat), which he forces to return to him, with usury, a produce that the richest and strongest lands of the neighboring provinces of Holland refuse to yield." The districts described as East and West Flanders, are bounded on the east by Brabant and Hainault; on the west by the German ocean; on the north by the seas of Zealand, and the west Scheldt; and on the south by Picardy,

or French Flanders. It is about ninety miles long, and sixty broad, and abounds with towns and villages.

430. The landed property of Flanders is not in large estates: very few amount to 2000 acres. It is generally freehold, or the property of religious or civil corporations. When the proprietor does not cultivate his own lands, which, however, is most frequently the case, he lets it on leases; generally of seven, fourteen, or twenty-one years indurance, at a fixed money rent, and sometimes a corn and money rent combined. The occupier is bound to live on the premises, pay taxes, effect repairs, preserve timber, not to sublet without a written agreement; and to give the usual accommodations to an incoming tenant at the end of the lease. Leases of fourteen or twenty-one years are most common: there are scarcely any lands held from year to year, or on the metayer system. Estates are every where enclosed with hedges, and the fields generally small.

431. Farmeries are convenient, and generally more ample in proportion to the extenof the farm than in England. On the larger farms a distillery, oil mill, and sometimes a flour mill, are added to the usual accommodations. The buildings on a farm of 150 acres of strong soil, enumerated by Radcliff, are: 1. The farm house, with an arched cellar used as a dairy, an apartment for churning, with an adjoining one for a horse wheel to turn the churning machinery. 2. A small building for the use of extra laborers, with a fire-place for cooking. 3. The grange or great barn, 130 feet long, by 35 feet wide. The ground floor of this structure, besides accommodating by its divisions all the horses and cows of the farm in comfortable stables, and furnishing two threshing floors for the flail, is sufficient also for a considerable depôt of corn in the sheaf, in two extensive compartments to the height of twelve feet, at which elevation an open floor of joists, supported by wooden pillars, is extended over the entire area of the barn, and is repeated at every five feet in height, to the top. Each floor is braced from the pillars, and not only forms a connection of strength throughout the whole, but separates at the same time, without much loss of space, the different layers of corn, securing them from damage, by taking off the pressure of the great mass. 4. A house for farming implements, with granary over, and piggery behind. In the centre is the dunghill; the bottom of which

is rendered impervious to moisture.

432. A plan of a Flemish farmery, is given by Sir John Sinclair, as suited to a farm of 300 acres: it is executed with great solidity and a due attention to salubrity, being vaulted and well aired. Sir John mentions, that he saw in some places, "a mode of making floors by small brick arches, from one beam to the other instead of using deals, and then making the floor of bricks," a mode now generally adopted in British manufactories; the beams which serve as abutments being of cast iron, tied together with transverse wrought iron rods.

433. The accommodations of this farmery (fig. 60.) are,

(1) The vestibule, or entrance of the farm-house.

(2) The hall.

(3, 4, and 5) Closets.

(6) Sheds destined for different purposes, but more espe

cially for elevating or letting down grain from the granaries, by machinery.

(7) Kitchen.

(8) Washing-house.

(9) Chamber for female servants.

(16) Hall.

11 and 12) Closets.

(13) Necessaries.

(14) Room for the gardener.

(15) Shed for fuel.

(16) Kitchen garden.

(17) Hoggery.

(18) Poultry-yard.

(19 and 20) Stables for cows and calves.

(24 and 25) Sheds for carts.

(26) Barn for the flax.
(27) Area.

(28) Flax barn.

(29 and 30) Sheep-houses.

(31 and 32) Stables for the horses and foals.

(33, 34, 35, and 36) Places for the hogs

(37 and 38) Cisterns destined to receive the urine of the cattle.

(39) Well.

(40) Dung-pit, concave in the middle.

(41) Pool serving to receive the super-abundant waters of

the dung-pit, the weedings of the garden, &c.

(42) Reservoirs to receive the waters of the farm-yard.

(13) Entrance gateway, with dove-cote over.

(44) Small trenches, or gutters.

(45) Sheds destined for clover, cut green in summer, or dry

in winter.

(46) Cistern for the wash-houses.

(47) Situations of the corn stacks, in years of abundance.