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ON THE AIIABLE LAND

inconvenient and unseemly, to have different crops in the samefield at the same time. This inconvenience is more par-ticularly obvious, when pasture and any grain crop happen tooccur in the same field, on which occasion some temporaryfence becomes indispensably necessary, as hurdles, flakes,gates, or the like. Under the supposition, therefore, of arotation of six shifts, it would be very convenient that asmall farm were divided into six fields of nearly equal size :a large farm may, on the same principles, be divided intotwelve, or eighteen, or twenty-four fields. Two or more smallfields near the dwelling of the farmer, not included in thesystem of rotation, in addition to the regular distribution,would add much to the convenience of the farm; as adaptedfor experiments, or as an hospital for sick cattle, sheep, andhorses, or for separating show rams, and various other pur-poses.

SECT. I.

ROTATIONS ON CLAY SOILS.

On all clay soils, a naked and well-wrought summer fallow,as already described in Part II. of this chapter, is consideredto be the indispensable basis of all good husbandry. The par-ticular steps of the rotation, its continuance, or the numberand succession of alternate crops of grain, and green crops,which may be taken before laying the land down again to grass,and the length of time which it ought to remain in pasture,before it is broken up for a fresh course of crops, must dependupon a variety of circumstances which have been already ad-verted to, and need not be repeated. Clay soils are liable toa variety of depth and fertility, and, like all others, to mate-rial differences as to the power of the farmer to procure ad-