AGRICULTURE sequently the numbers both of cattle and sheep" maintained, but particularly of sheep, are large (for East Kent as a whole the summer census gives about fourteen sheep to every ten acres). Many farmers buy Kent lambs at the large fairs at Romney and Ashford in the early autumn, and fatten out on cake or corn those that they do not require for breeding ; some of them have grazing land in Romney Marsh. Cattle are not extensively bred. A few Irish beasts are fattened, but Welsh cattle, which used to be fattened in the district, are not now seen. Generally speaking there is not much fruit land in this part of the division and only a moderate amount of hops. The best land in East Kent is in the north, extending on either side of the railway from Chatham to Canterbury. It consists of rich deep loams on the London Clay and Oldhaven and Woolwich Beds. No regular rotation is followed, but good crops of grain and potatoes are grown. The barley is of superior quality and is much sought after by brewers, while wheat in Canterbury has of recent years made a higher price than at almost any other market in England and Wales. Large quantities of fruit are grown, greengages and cherries flourish- ing particularly well. It was at Teynham, in the heart of this region, that the improvements in fruit cultivation in Kent commenced more than three centuries ago. Lambard (writing in 1576) described the country from Rainham to Blean Wood, near Canterbury, as ' the cherry- garden and apple-orchard of Kent.' The district still maintains its reputation and the extent of fruit land is being continually added to. Very great improvement has taken place in the management of cherry orchards. Formerly they were mown, but the practice has long been considered injurious and is now abandoned. It is also believed that to allow grass round the trees is prejudicial to fruit-bearing, and that it is exhausting'to the orchards to feed animals in them unless the latter are at the same time liberally supplied with cake or corn. The finest hops in the county and, as some hold, finer than anywhere else in the world, are grown in this area. Not many cattle are fattened, but large flocks of sheep are kept. The general style of farming is better than in almost any other part of the county. This is no modern characteristic, for it was observed by Arthur Young a hundred and twenty years ago that the so-called excellent husbandry of Kent must be understood as applying only to a limited area in the north of the county. East Kent is somewhat subject to cold winds in the spring which at times, especially when accompanied by rain, do much damage to the young crops and the fruit blossom. North Kent. — The North Kent division is marked off approximately by a line drawn from Chatham to Cudham, near the Surrey border, and not including the peninsula of Hoo. Its northern part is principally on the Woolwich, Reading and Oldhaven Beds and the London Clay, giving as a rule a good class of soil. Further south where the chalk is only covered by its natural thin layer of soil much of the land is poor, cold and unkindly. On the shores of the Thames and in the valley of the Darent there is some good alluvium. As in other parts of Kent there is no regular rotation of crops, those being taken which will pay best at the time. The farming is principally arable. Oats is the most widely cultivated corn crop, but both wheat and barley are largely grown. There is also a very large area under potatoes, about half the total acreage in the county being in this division. These, with other vegetables, are extensively raised on the clay lands. In the cultivation of fruit this district occupies a remarkable position, for it contains nearly as large an area of ' small ' fruit as is grown in all other parts of the county put together, and this item occupies a larger area than any ordinary farm crop in the district. Fruit has been planted during the last thirty years in most parts where the soil is suitable, but particularly in the valley of the Cray, where great crops of straw- berries are raised. Large quantities of raspberries, gooseberries and currants are also grown. A remarkable development in the use of glass has occurred in recent years in the Abbey Wood district above Erith Marsh. A succession of artificially raised strawberries with a first crop in January — occasionally ready for Christmas dessert — tomatoes, and finally chrysan- themums and asters, are produced under frames two or three hundred feet in length. The respective plants are brought as forward as possible in the open, and are removed from the houses as soon as they have ceased to be profitable. When in bloom the great length of plants forms a pleasing and interesting picture. The gleaned strawberries — successors to those sold at the ' guinea ' rate — become the ripe fruit which, in the hands of street vendors, sometimes astonishes a Londoner long before a naturally-grown berry has turned colour. Of orchard land the extent, though very considerable, is less marked than that of small fruit, and hops are not much grown except in the east towards Rochester and Chatham. The proximity of London is a great advantage to this district, which possesses ample facilities for obtaining the requisite manure and for the transport of its produce. 461
