MESLIN. This is a mixture of rye and wheat, and forms a favourite crop on land lying within reach of Drogheda market, where it finds a very ready sale. The farmers maintain that it will yield more per acre than either of these kinds of grain singly. I have so often had occasion to remark the obstinacy with which farmers adhere to their old prejudices, that I cannot help ascribing to a bias of the like kind, the idea of the advantage supposed to arise from a mixed crop of these two kinds of grain, though they do not ripen at the same period by three weeks. Meslin is cultivated in the north of England, where it makes better bread than wheat alone, as the rye-meal prevents the flower from growing stale; but the same object might be attained with more advantage by mixing the corn before it is ground, rather than in the seed bag.* OATS. This kind of grain is of much more general cultivation in Ireland than any other, because in consequence of its forming a part of the food of the people, a market for it every where exists. I cannot speak from established facts, but as far as I have seen and heard, I should conjecture, that throughout the whole kingdom there are ten acres of oats for one of any other species of corn. Oats follow every thing, potatoes, flax, wheat, barley, and are sown year after year in succession, till the soil becomes so exhausted, that it is incapable even of returning the seed. For the quantity of seed used, I must refer to the tables at the end of each district. Accidents to which crops are liable.-As there are no fens in Ireland exposed to floods and inundations like those of England, which produce such large quantities of oats, the crop is not subject to accidents of this kind as with us. In Ireland, however, burnt ears among oats are very common. Sort used. Of late years the potatoe oat has come into general use; but in the mountainous districts, the black oats still continue to be the favourite sample. It is by much the best variety of this species of grain; but an important note in Dutton's Survey of Clare,+ evidently shews that the Irish oats, bulk for bulk, are not equal in weight to the English, which, if of a tolerably good sample, weigh in common 44lbs. per Winchester bushel. I shall here take occasion to remark, that new oats make the best oat-meal, as is confirmed by some of the English surveys. * Tuke's Survey of the North Riding of Yorkshire, p. 118. Bailey's Survey of Northumberland, p. 56. + He weighed a bushel of Polish oats, and found it equal to 394 libs. whereas a bushel of very good common oats of the country weighed only 334lbs; a small quantity of Mr. Blood's new oats were equal to upwards of 44lbs. Survey of Clare, p. 42, note. May 10th, 1808.—A barrel of oats, 'weighing 33 stone at 14lbs. to the stone, or 462lbs. were sold this day at from thirty-two shillings to thirty-five shillings. If screening and drying be added, the price will be increased ten per cent. In England a quarter containing 8 bushels each, equal to 39lbs. making altogether 314lbs. sells for forty shillings. Mr. Connolly says, that the millers in Ireland who grind oats for meal are the best judges of this kind of grain. The buyers of horse corn prefer a thick skinned short oat which does not yield much meal. Marshall's Yorkshire, vol. ii. p. 21. Tuke's Survey of the North Riding, p. 126. BEANS. In the baronies of Bargie and Forth, in Wexford, as I have already stated in describing the tillage of that district, beans are cultivated, but in a very slovenly manner. The farmers "consider them as a preparation for barley, and they now generally lay down their lands after beans with barley, clover, and grass-seeds. Beans are not now so general a crop as formerly; they complain that being liable to be full of weeds, the soil is exhausted instead of being ameliorated, and particularly where the crop of beans fails they never have good barley the next year, because the weeds become predominant.' GLEANERS.-I never saw gleaners in Ireland, but I was told in Cork that the practice of gleaning was followed on the southern coast of that extensive county. An instance also was related to me of an Englishman, who had been presented to a valuable living in that diocese, exacting the tythe from the gleaners. I hope, for the credit of the cloth, that there was no foundation for this anecdote, which I am unwilling to believe, unless I had the most positive evidence of its truth. But if any circumstance of this kind, so disgraceful to the sacred character, ever took place, I should consider it as nothing short of robbery; and I would advise those who may be inclined to refuse this paltry boon to indigence, to reflect on the following lines of an elegant poet, whose benevolent sentiments cannot be too often quoted :— Be not too narrow, husbandman! but fling Thomson's Autumn. That this practice is not common in Ireland is to be ascribed to the smallness of the divisions of land. The corn is cut very low, and as the object of the farmer and his whole family is to get in as much as possible, not a single head almost is suffered to drop.+ * Fraser's Survey of Wexford, p. 79. + The learned Judge Blackstone observes: " also it hath been said, that by the common law and custom of England, the poor are allowed to enter and glean upon another's ground after the harvest, without being guilty of trespass: which humane provision seems borrowed from the Mosaical law. Levit. chap. xix. v. 9, and chap. xxiii v. 22. Deut. chap. xxiv. v. 19, &c." But his editor in a note says, two actions of trespass have been brought in the Common Pleas against gleaners, to try the general question, viz. whether such a VOL. I. 3 L RAPE. It is cultivated for seed in the King's and Queen's counties, and also in some parts of Tipperary. It is sown on the low moory bottoms, after paring and burning. po POTATOES. It is rather extraordinary, notwithstanding the great use made of tatoes and their general cultivation, that considerable difference of opinion prevails in regard to the nature of this valuable root, and the country from which it was brought. Some have called it the sisarum peruvianum,* but the Linnean name by which it is known at present is solanum tuberosum. A Danish author says, that it was brought to Europe in 1586, by Sir Francis Drake, who gave it to the botanist Gerrard; the latter planted it in the neighbourhood of London, and sent some sets to Clusius in Holland, whence it was afterwards spread throughout all Europe.+ Another Danish writer, Professor Begtrup asserts, that it was brought in 1565 from Santa Fé in New Spain, by Captain John Hawkins. But, however this may be, it appears probable that it was introduced into Ireland by Sir Walter Raleigh, and planted in the gardens near Youghal, where Sir Walter had an estate. But no proper instructions seem to have been given to the person by whom it was cultivated, for when it grew up pretty high, he attempted to eat the apple, which he took to be the fruit of the plant; finding it unpleasant he thought his labour lost, and paid it no farther attention; but digging up the earth some time after, he found the roots spread to a great distance, and from these the whole country was gradually supplied. There is reason to believe that potatoes were generally cultivated in Ireland before they were introduced into England,¶ and even here they were long known before right existed; in the first, the defendant pleaded, that he, being a poor necessitous and indigent person, entered the plaintiff's close to glean; in the second, the defendant's plea was as before, with the addition that he was an inhabitant legally settled within the parish: to the plea in each case there was a general demurrer. Mr. J. Gould delivered a learned judgment in favour of gleaning; but the other three judges were clearly of opinion that this claim had no foundation in law; that the only authority to support it was an extrajudicial dictum of Lord Hale; that it was a practice incompatible with the exclusive enjoyment of property, and was productive of vagrancy, and many mischievous consequences." Blackstone's Commentaries, vol. iii. p. 212. fourteenth edit. * Campbell's Polit. Survey of Great Britain, vol. i. p. 246. + Samlinger om Agerdyrkning. Kiobenhavn, 1792, Andet Hefte, p. 218. ‡ Almindelig Udsigt over Agerdyrkningens Tilstand i Sielland og Moen. Kiobenhavn, 1803, vol. ii. p. 188. Moryson's Itinerary, part 11. p. 5. Ody's Life of Sir Walter Raleigh, p. 147. Smith's Nat. and Civil Hist. of Cork, vol. i. p. 128. Ben Johnson, in his play called Every Man out of his Humour, mentions potatoes as a great rarity at the time he wrote. ¶ Dr. Campbell says, they were introduced into Ireland in 1610, and did not reach Cantire in Scotland, till about a century and a half after, which, considering the vicinity of that province to Ireland, is rather singular; they came first from Ireland into Lancashire, where they are still very much cultivated. It was, however, forty years before they were generally planted about London, and they were considered as rarities, without they became common. Some kind of authority even seems to have been necessary to bring them into general use; for we are told that at a meeting of the Royal Society on the 18th of March, 1663, a letter was read from Mr. Buckland, a gentleman of Somersetshire, recommending the culture of potatoes in all parts of the kingdom to prevent a famine. This was referred to a committee, and in consequence of their report, Mr. Buckland received the thanks of the society; such members as had lands, were entreated to plant them, and Mr. Evelyn was desired to mention the proposal at the end of his Sylva. Potatoes, like oats, are to be met with in every part of Ireland, and in many places where the latter are not sown; but they vary as much in quality as in quantity; the former depending as well on the soil as on the manure, seed, and climate. It is to be observed also, that they differ in weight, weighing much more when first taken up than at a later period of the season; but the most striking features in the cultivation of this sort are: 1st. that they exhaust all the manure of the farm; 2d. that they are never produced without manure, or are planted upon lea or maiden land, which is most frequently burned. Of the Soil.-Potatoes, produced on a calcareous soil, I have always found to be the best; those sown on " mountainy land," when first brought into a state of cultivation, are decidedly the worst, and in Ireland are commonly called "cattle," or "black potatoes." In that country, as in England, they are seldom planted without manure, which is considered almost as necessary to their production as seed. Time and manner of planting them.-For the period at which potatoes are put into the earth in different parts, I must refer the reader to the table added at the end of each district. Apparently, there are but two distinct methods of planting, the drill and the lazy bed. The former method consists merely in planting them in rows, on which account the above term is applied to it. This practice has been adopted by the gentry, and is one of the beneficial effects produced by their becoming farmers, as it introduces the use of the plough instead of culture by the spade. The land is ploughed into small ridges, between which the sets are laid; and the ridges which are split, falling down on both sides form a new ridge over the plants. This system is daily gaining ground in all parts of Ireland, and is by no means confined within the domain walls of the gentry. The "lazy bed" method is the old plan of without any conception of the utility that might arise from bringing them into common use; at this time they were distinguished from Spanish by the name of Virginia potatoes, or battalas, which is the Indian name of the Spanish sort; the Indians in Virginia called them openank. Campbell's Polit. Survey, vol. ii. p. 95. note. Birch's Hist. of the Royal Society, vol. i. p. 207-213. + Tighe's Kilkenny Survey, p. 216. † M'Evoy's Tyrone Survey, p. 111. producing them in wide ridges, having on each side deep trenches, out of which the soil is thrown on the beds. There are various ways of planting potatoes on this system. According to the first, the manure being spread out on the intended ridge, the potatoe sets are deposited, and the earth being thrown upon them from the trenches, it covers the whole ridge; in this case, one-third nearly of the land is wasted in trenches; a second way is to dig up the earth and to drop the sets, the land being previously manured; trenches are then made, but not of such depth as in the preceding case. A third way, is, after digging the land, to drop the sets behind a loy, or sort of long spade, which is forced into the ground, and as the loy is removed, the sets fall into the vacuity it has made; a fourth method, is to plant the potatoes with a dibble, and to throw earth over them from the trenches, by which the ground is formed into beds; one advantage of this method is, that the plants when they first shoot up are preserved from the frost, as the shovelling is always repeated whenever they break through the ground. Mr. Townsend says, that "the best time for this operation is in the evening, when the plants close their leaves, which in the middle of the day they had unfolded to the sun. The peasants are often seen taking advantage of this circumstance."* Mr. Dutton gives the following account of the manner of planting potatoes in Clare.+ "In some parts of the county the ground is manured and formed into a ridge in the usual way, and the potatoes planted with a long dibble, that a man thrusts into the ground with his foot; he is followed by a child, or a woman, who drops a potatoe into the hole; sometimes the potatoes are dropped at the usual distance on the surface, and put into the hole by the man who dibbles. Frequently after manuring the ridges, or the second year after burning, a man forms a deep cut with a spade, which he throws forward, at the same time making an open cut to receive the potatoe set that he has ready in his hand, from a stock usually carried in an apron before him. On drawing out the spade the cut closes on the set; after both of these methods, the potatoes are second spitted or shovelled in the usual way." The drill method pursued by Mr. Christy, an eminent farmer in Down, is thus described by him in the Survey of that county. "The land designed for the crop is ploughed before winter, and remains in that state till the spring corn and flax are sown; it is then harrowed well, cross ploughed, and harrowed again, and the rootweeds, if there are any, are carefully gathered off each time with a close weeding harrow. When the land is thus made fine, it is laid out in shallow drills, at three feet distance, by the double mould-plough, which effects it at one furrow; I call the drills shallow, because I make them much more so than I know * Townsend's Survey of Cork, p. 197. + Survey of Clare, p. 36. other any person Survey of Down, p. 98. |