The Sun.
London, England, 1865-07-18 00:00:00

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501

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SPORTING INTELLIGENCE—This Day.

BY ELECTRIC TELEGRAPH.
NOTTINGHAM RACES-THIS DAY.
TRIAL STAKES.

Success ............................................................... 1
Sisyphus ............................................................. 2
Five ran.

SPORTING INTELLIGENCE,

TATTERSALLS'-LAST EVENING.

GOODWOOD STAKES.
4to 1 agst Claremont (taken)
11 to 1 agst Redmire (taken)
100 to- 7 agst Blackdown (taken)
100 to 7 agst Sister to the Drake (taken and offered)
15 to 1 agst Lady Hylda (taken)
15 to 1 apt Harry Brailsford (taken)
20 to 1 agst Friday (taken)
.20 to 1 agst Moose (taken)
25 to 1 agst Sprite (taken)
25 to 1 agst Hopper (taken)
33 to 1 agst Guide (taken)
GOODWOOD CUP.
9to 2 agst Union Jack (taken)
9 to 2 agst Eltham (taken.)
9 to 2 agst Gladiateur (offered—take 5 to 1)
10 to 1 agst Cambuscan (taken and offered)
12 to 1 agst General Peel (taken)
20 to 1 agst Hollyfox (taken)
• Pala do l'Air was struck out of the Goodwood Cup at
9 a.m., July 15.

DERBY.
20 to 1 agst Auguste (taken)
25 to 1 agst Rustic (taken)
50 to 1 agst Magician (taken)
50 to 1 agst Robin Hood (taken)
50 to 1 agst Bribery colt (taken)

Crops and Prospects.

Never has there been a plainer illustration of the uncer-
tainty of farmers' prospects than the circumstances of the
current agricultural year. After a Winter unusually long
and singularly inclement and interruptive, there occurred
during April and the early part of May a genial tempera..
ture, with a seasonable supply of rain, which produced
an outburst of vegetation rarely seen in this country.
Where the wheat had net lost plant, from the alter-
nations of frost and thaw during the winter, or from
wire-worm in the spring (as occurred to some ex-
tent, especially on the higher soils), it made a more rapid
and vigorous progress than we ever recollect. This was
remarkably so on the strong and well-drained loans in
fair condition ; and these wheats maintain their high
position to the present time, the straw being unusually
strong, and the ear largo and well corned. If there be
no hailstones, such as we had last Sunday in various
parts of the country, we expect to hear of some very
large yields of wheat at the coming harvest. Yet, though
the season must be regarded as a favourable one for
wheat, there such extensive tracts of light land, and poorly
cultivated land, on which either from defective plant or
want of rain during the latter part of May and nearly the
whole of June, the wheat is thin, that we doubt whether
what is called an average crop will be gathered this year.
The wheat markets, low though they are, indicate, by a
somewhat firmer tone, tho prevalence of some such views
in the trade. Oats were sown late, have come up but in-
differently, and, taking the country through, are inferior
and unpromising. I'Vliat wo shouldhave done for oats with-
out foreign importations seems difficult to conceive. Barley
is better than oats, but by no means good. Beans came up
and have flowered well; and though complaints aro made in
some quarters that they are not corning so well as expected,
we believe that there will be fully average beau crops.
But perhaps the crops which have most signally failed to
realise the early promise of the spring are the grass crops.
A good crop of hay is the exception, and is only to be found
on very good land, or moist land, or under otherwise ex-
ceptional circumstances. Upon ordinary meadow land the
hay crops have been bad, and in the Midland districts they
have been left standing (considering the forward season)
so long that there is now a great deal of hay in the fields,
which has been exposed to the heavy rains of the last fort-
night, and cannot be of very high quality. Grazing pas-
tures have proved better than mowing grass land, though
they had become very bare and very dry when the late
rains commenced.

It is impossible to go through the fine land and manage-
able soils of the Midland Counties without being struck
with the extent to which opportunities are wasted by poor
farming and the absence of landlords' most necessary
improvements. You inquire the cause, and are told the
old, old story—the tenants have insufficient capital, their
tenures aro precarious, they are yearly tenants ; the land-
lords are game preservers, they won't grant leases, they
can't or won't do the permanent improvement, which none
but the proprietor can do with a fair hope of profit ; their
estates are mortgaged or entailed, or both, and they cannot
or will not expend money to improve them. We look
around, seeing what is the state of fine tracts in these Mid-
land counties, seeing also of what much better things they
are capable, and say is this always to be so? Is the capi-
tal required to fertilise these lands for ever to be repelled
from it ? The practical replies supplied by the actual system
of management on the large estates is by no means en-
couraging, for under existing conditions the wonder is,
not that the farming is so bad, but that the land is farmed
at all. Whether the landed property will ever be made as
productive as it ought to be in the hands of the present
owners may be a question. But commercial principle and
commercial action are, perhaps slowly, forcing their way
into land management. This is not through the agency of
the great landowners, they seem quite ignorant and help-
less. They appear to be quite unconscious of the mind of
wealth they might possess if intelligence and capital were
applied to their estates. They stand in a sort of trance—
economically speaking—while the world moves around
and beyond them. They would seem to desire to repel
capital rather than to attract it, where some of their tenants
would gladly improve their farms could they safely do so ;
while too many of their tenants seem well content to sink
into that lethargy recommended by the example of their
landlords. Yet a glimpse of better things comes from the
great towns. The traders and manufacturers of Birming-
ham and other thriving towns are buying, improving, and
farming land for themselves. Many of them are renting
farms on leases, where they can get proprietors to grant
rational leases, and they pay far higher rent, and raise far
themgre as greater produce
This is hopeful. cetsthanthe regular farmers
Herofarmersw
whoe obtain
preceded
a
higher standard of hind management as well as of farming,
which perhaps will by-and by tell upon the old landlords.
Or must there be a breaking-up and re-distribution of the
large estates before our land has justice done to it? Who
can tell? It is certain that the great mass of our English
landlords aro neglecting and misusing the finest inheritance
men ever possessed.—Economist.