The Sun.
London, England, 1869-06-17 00:00:00

AGRICULTURAL PROSTECTS.

A cold spring, the heavy rainfalls, the changeable
weather of late, and the provoking succession of heat and
cold, wet and sunshine, with which we are being visited,
have together made up a most anxious time for the farmer.
Few periods of the year are more critical than the present.
The weather is day by day telling with the greatest effect
upon the crops, deciding the quantity and the quality of
the various harvests. Wheat is just bursting into ear; the
other cereals are sheaving their strength ; the bay harvest is
being gathered in ; and the whole of the agricultural dis-
tricts are eagerly watching " the signs of the times." The
reports received from all parts of the country regarding
the state of the crops betoken this anxiety. Everything
turns on an "if." If the wet and cold forsake us for
a space, if we have real summer weather for a time, all
will be well. But the continuance of the unsettlement
forbodes ill. Already the cold has retarded the develop-
ment of the crops, and will cause a late harvest. Should
the weather still continue unfavourable, the results will
be disastrous.

The sun shone out gloriouslylast week, and (so the farm ers
say) did more good in four days than is often done in a
fortnight. "Itis an ill wind that blows nobody good,"
and if we shall not have more than an average yield of
wheat, there will be a large harvest of straw. If the barley
looks bad, the peas and beans are more than promising.
If in some cases the clover and artificial grasses are behind,
the meadow hay is almost universally good.
Advices from all parts of the country tally most singu-
larly. The weather has been almost identical throughout
the land, and the crops have progressed simultaneously.
Perhaps Northumberland presents the most discouraging
feature of them all. Wheat in this county looks very
thin and exceedingly poor. It promises only half of what
was gathered in last year. Barley, on the other hand—
which in most other districts has been thinned and damaged
by the wind—is in Northumberland good, reported to be the
best looking of any crop. Farther south, in South Lanca-
shire and South Cheshire, the land has absorbed a good
deal of wet without any very serious injury, and where
good drainage is provided wheat looks well enough. In
Yorkshire also—in the larger portion of it, at least—the
wheat is very fair on good lands. But throughout the
northern counties especially alate harvest must be expected.
Some districts are more forward than others. Hardly any,
however, expect to get in their crops so early as
usual. In this matter the year 1869 is the
very opposite of 1868. Last year the cereals
were safely carried nearly a month earlier than the
" calendar time." The need of warmth is insisted upon
in the case of most of the other crops, as of wheat in the
north. Barley throughout is reported unpromising.
Beans are the very reverse ; and peas, where grown, are
in the very best condition. The root crops are not so
forward as might be wished ; in some cases the crusted
earth has retarded them a little ; but they look healthy,
and promise well. Meadows, hay, and pastures give great
delight to the grazier, but in many cases the grass crops
uncut are beginning to rot at the bottom, and the univer-
sal wet of the last few days has spoiled the bay in forward
districts.
The Midland crops are much the same as those further
north. The reports speak more decidedly, perhaps, of
a late harvest. In Shropshire it will be more than a fort-
night after the usual time, and in Warwickshire will be
at least a week behind. Farmers having sown heavily of
barley in some parts of the first-named shire, will lose
seriously by the bad yield. Potatoes are also very bad in
the neighbourhood. The other root crops look well. In
Staffordshire the root crops are late. In Cambridge the
mangolds are sickly, and the swedes are attacked by flies.
In Buckingham the peas are very good ; the beans and
potatoes are in first-class condition.
In Norfolk and some of the Eastern counties, the barley
promises au average crop, and will amply repay the
farmer for planting. On heavy soils, both in Norfolk and
in Suffolk, the wheat is stated to be in capital condition.
Throughout the Eastern district a very large breadth of
land has been given to peas and beans ; the crops are
large and advancing to perfection. Oats in the same
district look up better than elsewhere, and betoken an
average yield.
In the South and West late harvests are also certain.
The oat crop promises well in most cases. Potatoes alto-
gether seem thriving. In South pants the farmers are
just now von ing vengeance on the wire-worm, which is re.
ported to be doing a great deal of damage to the wheat and
barley crops. The cen.als have not yet recovered from the
cold, and some accounts say it is doubtful whether they will
do so.

Taking the reports as a whole, they point to an
average wheat crop to be gathered late ; to a poor
barley crop, also late ; to average root crops, good pota.
toes, and—if the insects will only spare them—a fair yield
of swede and ma,ngold ; to fine gatherings of beans and
peas, as abundant as we have had of late years. These
reports, however, will necessarily be much modified by the
unusually wet, cold, and windy weather of the last few
days. The wheat is now very generally in blossom, and
the rough winds must be most damaging to the prospects
of the farmer. The state of the weather is now a cause
of the utmost anxiety.

in a strong gale ou Tuesday from the north-east a
vessel was wrecked off Dunbar, and six lives were lost. pi,
name 01 tin YO5Ol 41_11111E120WD.