e same land. We manure
liberally, but not extravagantly, and get a fair yield, and the land is
left in admirable condition for future crops.

I mean by this, not that the land is specially rich, but that it is very
clean and mellow.

"In 1877," said the Deacon, "you had potatoes on the land where you grew
mangels the previous year, and had the best crop in the neighborhood."

This is true, but still I do not think it a good rotation. A barley crop
seeded with clover would be better, especially if the mangels were
heavily manured. The clover would get the manure which had been washed
into the subsoil, or left in such a condition that potatoes or grain
could not take it up.

There is one thing in relation to my mangels of 1876 which has escaped
the Deacon. The whole piece was manured and well prepared, and dibbled
in with mangels, the rows being 2-1/2 feet apart, and the seed dropped
15 inches apart in the rows. Owing to poor seed, the mangels failed on
about three acres, and we plowed up the land and drilled in corn for
fodder, in rows 2-1/2 feet apart, and at the rate of over three bushels
of seed per acre. We had a _great crop_ of corn-fodder.

The next year, as I said before, the whole piece was planted with
potatoes, and if it was true that mangels are an "enriching crop," while
corn is an "exhausting" crop, we ought to have had much better potatoes
after the mangels than after corn. This was certainly not the case; if
there was any difference, it was in favor of the corn. But I do not
place any confidence in an experiment of this kind, where the crops were
not weighed and the results carefully ascertained.

Mr. Lawes has made some most thorough experiments with different manures
on sugar-beets, and in 1876 he commenced a series of experiments with
mangel-wurzel.

The land is a rather stiff clay loam, similar to that on which the wheat
and barley experiments were made. It is better suited to the growth of
beets than of turnips.

"Why so," asked the Deacon, "I thought that black, bottom land was best
for mangels."

"Not so, Deacon," said I, "we can, it is true, grow large crops of
mangels on well-drained and well-manured swampy or bottom land, but the
best soil for mangels, especially in regard to quality, is a good,
stiff, well-worked, and well-manured loam."

"And yet," said the Deacon, "you had a better crop last year on the
lower and blacker portions of the field than on the heavy, clayey land."

I