Of the turnip we have now many varieties--though it is only seventy or eighty years since it was first introduced into field culture--at least in those districts of the island in which its importance is most fully recognised. The history of its introduction into Scotland is thus given by Mr Stephens-- "The history of the turnip, like that of other cultivated plants, is obscure. According to the name given to the swede in this country, it is a native of Sweden; the Italian name _Navoni di Laponia_ intimates an origin in Lapland, and the French names _Chou de Lapone_, _Chou de Suède_, indicate an uncertain origin. Sir John Sinclair says, 'I am informed that the swedes were first introduced into Scotland _anno_ 1781-2, on the recommendation of Mr Knox, a native of East Lothian, who had settled at Gottenburg, whence he sent some of the seeds to Dr Hamilton.' There is no doubt the plant was first introduced into Scotland from Sweden, but I believe its introduction was prior to the date mentioned by Sir John Sinclair. The late Mr Airth, Mains of Dunn, Forfarshire, informed me that his father was the first farmer who cultivated swedes in Scotland, from seeds sent him by his eldest son, settled in Gottenburg, when my informant, the youngest son of a large family, was a boy of about ten years of age. Whatever may be the date of its introduction, Mr Airth cultivated them in 1777; and the date is corroborated by the silence preserved by Mr Wight regarding its culture by Mr Airth's father when he undertook the survey of the state of husbandry in Scotland, in 1773, at the request of the Commissioners of the Annexed Estates, and he would not have failed to report so remarkable a circumstance as the culture of so useful a plant, so that it was unknown prior to 1773. Mr Airth sowed the first portion of seed he received in beds in the garden, and transplanted the plants in rows in the field, and succeeded in raising good crops for some years, before sowing the seed directly in the fields." The weight of a good turnip crop--not of an extraordinary crop, which some persons can succeed in raising, and the accounts of which others only refuse to credit--is a point of much importance; and it is so, not merely to the farmer who possesses it, but to the rural community at large. The conviction that a certain given weight is a fair average crop in well-farmed land, where it does not exceed his own, will be satisfactory to the industrious farmer; while it will serve as a stimulus to those whose soil, or whose skill, have hitherto been unable to raise so large a weight. According to our author-- "A good crop of swede turnips weighs from 30 to 35 tons per imperial acre. "A good crop of yellow turnips weighs from 30 to 32 tons per imperial acre.