them (regular cart horses), with the assistance of two colts in ploughing the fallows, did the whole tillage of 70 acres, and for different crops led me 2400 bushels of lime and 150 of coal from a distance of 14 miles, besides doing all the extra work which a family in the country must require, I allowed each horse above 91b of oats per day, but I think a great saving might be made in the article of potatoes, with advantage, and I intend to try it, by substituting a large proportion of straw, I neither weighed or measured the green crops, but both potatoes and carrots were very fair, though the latter, being drilled at 30 inches, could not be very heavy by the acre,

I am, dear Sir,

Your very faithful Servant,

JOHN SPEDDING.

TO JOHN CHRISTIAN CURWEN, Esq. M. P.

DEAR SIR,

Cleator Park, Nov. 10th, 1807.

I RETURN you many thanks for the favour of your letter, as also for the civilities you showed me when at Workington, where I much wished to to have stayed longer had the weather proved fair. I think the weight mentioned in your letter must have been of your turnips, although mentioned at the top as potatoe produce. My potatoes were as follows: Early Manchester, on ten yards square, 7 bushels of Our customary measure, each bushel weighing

112lb.; Blue potatoes, 5 bushels 3 pecks; London White, 4 bushels 3 pecks; the stitches were only three, feet a part; as the summer proved so very dry, might be in their favour. I have five large pigs, (which, when fat, are expected to weigh 360lb. each) on steamed potatoes only; this food will be continued till near half fat, then some pease or bean flower will be added; they now eat 350lb. in 24 hours. I have three breeding sows, one boar, and several small pigs, supported with the same food. My six cart horses have each 30lb. a-day of steamed potatoes and cutstraw, with the addition of five pounds of carrots to each horse; they have only one bushel of oats or beans bruised, and one bushel of bran allowed per the week, and I think of withdrawing the bran, now they have carrots. I had 270lb. of this vegetable on ten yards square, and one hundred weight of tops; the summer being so very dry, proved very unfavourable to vege table crops; my carrots had many vacant places, otherwise they would have been a much heavier crop to the prospect.

Your obedient servant,

R. S. DANSIE.

The following interesting Communication was sent me, some time ago, from a very intelligent OFFICER, who had served long in India.

DURING the last seven years of my residence in India, I served with a corps of native cavalry, and had

frequent

frequent opportunities of observing the mode usually adopted by the natives of Hindoostan in their management of that useful and beautiful animal, the Horse, as respects his food and shoeing; in this latter part, viz. shoeing, the practice for many ages, both as to the shoe and nail, is that recommended by Professor Coleman, in his late elegant and useful work on that subject. Horses are never used in agriculture, and those used in the cavalry, or for pleasure, are constantly housed, and with a double collar and hind picquet. Their food is either a large species of pulse, called, in Hindoostan, Channa, which is bruised and steeped for a few hours; or a smaller kind of pulse, called Colli; this is boiled, reduced to a paste, and given in balls; there is also a third mode sometimes practised, which is equal parts of channa and barley, ground to a coarse flower, and given in balls; the quantity from ten to twelve pounds weight, in the twenty-four hours, with from twenty-five to thirty pounds of hay. It is to be observed, the horses of Hindoostan are generally under the size of the English saddle horse; the standard for the cavalry of the East India Company being fourteen and a half hands, and there is often considerable difficulty in procuring a sufficient number at that standard.

I have always been an advocate for cutting hay and straw, and bruising corn, for cattle of every description, and am convinced, that any man who has paid attention to the subject will soon see the advantage that must result from the adoption of that practice. My attention was particularly called to this subject

by

by a circumstance which came under my notice when with the cavalry under Lord Lake, on the western banks of the Junna, 1804. Channa, the usual food for the cavalry, being scantily supplied, Lord Lake ordered the horses to be fed with equal parts of channa and barley, bruised and steeped in the usual way, but from the irregularity of the size of the barley and channa, and inattention on the part of those whose duty it was to see it prepared, the greater part of the barley was given entire, and passed through the stomach and intestines of the horses, apparently little, if at all, impaired in its nutritive quality.

The general scarcity of grain which prevailed at that time induced many thousands to flock to the British camp in search of food, and I daily witnessed, for weeks together, many hundreds of all ages and sexes coming into the lines of our cavalry, and anxiously collecting and carrying away the excrement as it fell from the horse; this they exposed for a few hours to the sun, and by rubbing and sifting it, procured a large supply of good food.

Process of Steaming.

THE washer being removed by the crane, to the place where the dirty potatoes are laid, is filled twothirds (about 16 stone), and then is set into its box, and turned slowly round, the potatoes cleaning themselves by rolling down the inclined plane, which is formed by turning the washer; five minutes are more

than