The manufactures are, however, rapidly declining, and will probably, in a few years, become extinct. The improvements in machinery, the fine dreams of water for turning mills, and the low price of fuel, have created a competition in the northern counties with which it is not possible that Essex can long contend. On the eastern side of the county, conti guous to London, there are some establishments for printing calicoes and for bleaching. There are also manufactories of sal-ammoniac, of Prussian blue, of iron liquor for the calico printers, and some other chemical preparations.
The face of the county is generally very beautiful ; it is well inclosed ; for the most part displays good verdant pastures ; the hills, none of which rise to great heights, are cultivated to the tops, and there are abundance of trees, especially oak and chesnut, which give a rich appearance to the prospects. There is no county in England in which the proportion of waste land is so small. The forests and wastes can indeed scarcely be considered as utterly uncultivated, and the whole of them do not amount to more than 14,000 acres, including the two forests of Epping and Hainault. These belong to the crown ; though the inhabitants of many surrounding parishes have the right of pasturage for their cattle upon them. The king has an unlimited right to keep deer on all the inclosed woods, and the occupiers of land, in the various parishes included within the ancient boun. daries of the forests, have a right to feed horses and cows, but no other cattle. The numerous common rights have led to considerable devastation of the timber of these forests, and considerable injury to the property of the crown, but plans have been late ly adopted for preserving the trees, and converting a part into a nursery for growing timber for the royal navy. The vicinity to navigation makes these forests well deserving to be appropriated to this purpose.
That part of Essex which lies on the banks of the Thames, and on the shores of the ocean, is a rich alluvial soil on a subsoil of very tenacious clay. It produces, with good cultivation, most abundant crops of wheat, beans, oats, and clover. It is found ne cessary on the cultivation to fallow very frequently, and repeated ploughings is a practice very generally adopted. The swing-plough is much used, and sometimes a wheel-plough drawn by two, and occa sionally by three horses a-breast, which are guided with long reins by the ploughman. In fallowing it
is common to plough the land six or seven times, and it is not unusual with the best cultivators to plough it eight or even ten times After the summer fallow, by which the soil becomes completely pulverized, and rendered as fine as a garden, it is sometimes the prac tice to sow wheat in the autumn, but it is more corn..
mon to let it remain through the winter ; and then, after a spring ploughing, to sow barley or oats. The rotation of crops which usually succeeds to a fallow is, 1. Barley or oats ; 2. Clover, red or white, mostly the former ; 3. Wheat ; 4. Beans, twice hoed at least ; 5. Wheat. After this course the land is again fallow ed. The whole produce of the course of crops is said to depend on the accuracy and skill exercised in the process of fallowing.
There is in this district some land adapted for turnips, and the rotation on such soils is usually, 1. Turnips; 2. Oats or barley ; 3. Clover ; 4. Wheat ; 5. Beans ; 6. Wheat. These courses are occasionally varied, tares being introduced when the clover fails, and sometimes pease being sub stituted for beans. The best cultivators often omit the second crop of wheat, and fallow again after the beans, A rotation which is sanctioned by some very skilful agriculturists is the following : 1. Fallow ; 2. Barley or oats; S. Clover ; 4. Beans; 5. Wheat; 6. Tares or pease ; 7. Wheat. In this case the manure is laid on the clover ley for the bean crop. In the district we are describing all the farms have a portion more or less extensive of rich marsh land, on which oxen are fed, which supplies hay for winter consumption, and is consequently the source from whence the manure is derived. The best wheat that is brought to the market of the metropolis is raised in the part of Essex of which we are speaking, which is usually denominated the hundreds. It has the convenience of water-carriage to London ; the rent of land is comparatively low, and it is of extraordinary fertility ; but it suffers from a scarcity of good water. It is, especially in the au tumn, a very agueish country ; and though, of late, the roads have been much improved, they are still in such a state as, added to its insalubrity, prevents the gentry from residing on their estates.