The climate is reckoned considerably below the ge neral average of England ; being exposed both on the north and east, the county experiences the full rigour of the winds which blow from those points, and which are observed to be extremely prevalent here. It is this circumstance, more than any other, which gives to ve getation so languid and backward a character during the early seasons of the year. The moisture with which the air is frequently loaded contributes to the same ef fect, and is still more pernicious to animal health. In the fenny districts, intermittent fevers arc so general as in some sort to be endemic ; when a stranger is. seized with an ague, the people talk of him as being arrested by the bailiff' of Marshland. The neighbourhood of the sea, or swampy land, is the cause of this dampness; and, in the interior of the county, where both conditions are wanting, the coast being distant, and the soil sandy, the air is dry and perfectly salubrious.
With so few apparent advantages as we have describ ed it to possess, Norfolk might naturally be expected to owe its share of distinction to other causes than its agriculture. But the fact is not so. The ingenuity of the husbandman has here been exerted with remark able success in struggling against the obstacles of na ture, or giving free scope to her productive powels. Since the middle of last century, improvement has ra pidly proceeded; and more corn was zt one time raised within this county than on any equal space elsewhere. A hundred years ago, half the county consisted of rab bit-warrens or sheep-walks ; and, in 1793, it was com puted that above a million's worth of grain went out of it annually. Since that period, Norlolk has parth ed in the stimulus given to agriculture gel eiall:-. ov.:r the kingdom; and, though no longer supr?”-e• ' ranks among the highest in the scale of partially drained ; and the well-known Bedford Level at length completed its improvement. The following table of the Norfolk soils, by Mr. Arthur Young, pro fesses to show the different species, with their respective extents. Though evidently imperfect, and in some re spects erroneous, it is worth subjoining.
ncss. Enterprising proprietors have encouraged farm ers of large capital to enclose the waste lands, to bring the 11131'SiICS and fens under the dominion of the plough ; and those unpromising' tracts have been found to repay the labour bestowed on them with the most exuberant crops. By a skilful system of husbandry, enriched with native and foreign inventions, ancl quickened in its action by various accidental circumstances, Norfolk, naturally unfertile, in part even noxious, has been made to rival in agricultural wealth the vales of Taunton and Evesham.
Farms in Norfolk are usually large ; sometimes the rent exceeds X4000. Hence, in some degree, arises the superior auventurousness and the extreme assiduity vvith which its husbandry is conducted. One charac
teristic which strikes the aglicultural traveller here, in particular, is the high statc of pulveriaation to which the soil is reduced, and the care with which it is kept free of weeds. For this purpose repeated ploughings are employed, and afterwards the operation of wheeled drags and harrows, which are drawn by horses kept at a trotting pace. Another characteristic, but no longer confined to Norfolk, is the unbroken succession of crops, or at least the total disuse of fallowing. The methods of dispensing with this awkward practice have now become common, though Norfolk was once soli tary in the use of them. Among the green crops ap plied to this object, the turnip crop, one of the most valuable, was primarily introduced here. It came from Hanover. Viscount Townshend, when attending George I. in his electoral dominions, was struck with the utility of this vegetable, and brought some seeds of it with him into his estate in Norfolk, from whence it subsequently spread into all corners of the island. The other green crops are potatoes, carrots, beans, peas, vetches, buck wheat, cole-seed, and every sort of artificial grass. Of the white crops, wheat is rather extensively sown; stiff loamy soils will sometimes yield ten quarters of it to the acre; oats are raised more sparingly, only as a shifting crop ; and none of the produce is exported. But the great article is barley. It usually occupies one-third of all the arable land in the county ; and above one half of it is sown on ground previously cleaned by turnips. The produce of an acre will sometimes rise to eight quarters. It is converted into malt, and exported in that state. Both the wheat and the barley are common ly sown in drills, an operation which is effected by the aid of several ingenious machines ; sometimes they are planted by a dibble with the hand. The usual mode of arranging their succession is by what is called a six course-shift. The first year wheat is sown ; the second, barley, with or without clover ; the third, turnips; the fourth, barley or oats, with clover; the fifth, this clover is mown for hu); and during the sixth, the ground is depastured, and ploughed up for wheat, as in the begin ning. According to this system, the average rate of increase for the whole county is three quarters of wheat per acre, and four of barle.y ; though, in the best soils, as we have already stated, it is ga eatly higher, Besides these principal crops, there are several which are raised occasionally, or in particular situations. 'Mustard and saffron are sornetitnes met with towards the borders of Cambridgeshire ; and flax and hemp are cultivated to a small extent in the south.