899 On the Swedish Turnip.[May,

P.S. I hope shortly to be able to communicate to you an account of the properties attending a species of grassmuch cultivated in Hungary, and which promises a very remarkable and beneficial effect upon horses.

CS eae

ON THE SWEDISH TURNIP. To the Editor of the Agricultural Magazine. Sir,

S T have, for more than a dozen years past, been a cul- tivator of the Swedish Turnip, having sown the seed

from the first parcel that was introduced through Scotland by the late Sir William Fordice, you may naturally suppose that I perused with some attention, a letter in your February Magazine, for 1802,(which but very recently fell into my hands;) and the author’s remarks upon this truly valuable root are, in general, extremely just; but, I hope, he will for- give me in differing from him in two very essential points, namely, as to its nutritiousness and quantity of feed, when put in competition with the other sorts of turnips, an acre of which is, I believe, commonly accounted a good one, that will keep, in a fattening state, an hundred sheep a week; bat, were it necessary, I could mention some respectable Farmers in this quarter, who could prove they have done a great deal more with the Swedish Turnip; and I have myself fattened a score of wethers upon an acre anda half of them, which fully satisfied those sheep(averaging twelve stone) for fourteen weeks; whilst their fellows consumed more than double the quantity of the white-round turnip.‘Their superiority in point of hardness, and in resisting the severest frosts of this climate, also greatly enhances their value: and the advantages they gave in the last, and in the present spring, are again rendering to their pessessors, who aie, at length, fast encreasing around me, are really incalculable. What a sheet-anehor(if[ may be allowed to use a nautical term) is a crop of Swedes to the Farmer who has no watered meadows to resort to in the months of April and May, to which time these turnips may be made to hold out for his stock? At the same time en- abling him to lay up his artificial grasses as early as he pleases. I must further remark, in answer to the objections advanced jn the abovementioned letter, that this neighbourhood is pes- tered with as many depredators, on this sweet and most nourishing root—such as hares, rabbits, rooks, wood-pidgeons, partridges,&c. as ean possibly be met with in any part of the kingdom; but we are by no means deterred from this species of cultivation; and, when once we have escaped those hither- to unconquerable enemies—the fly and slug, we are in little