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cupy a man from fifteen to twenty days. Twenty men might, it is true, do the same quantity of work in one day; but where are the requisite number of labourers to be found for doing this, when wanted ?-and if they could be found at that particular time, how are they to be occupied in those periods of the year when such digging is not required?

The spade is therefore, as an instrument of tillage, chiefly available upon small farms, cottage farms as they are termed, and which are too small to afford labour for a pair of horses. It may also be used occasionally as an aid to ordinary tillage, where there is a redundancy of manual labour; in which case, if the land be a deep sandy loam, it will prove advantageous to trench it with the spade, to bury the exhausted top-soil, and bring the lower stratum of fresh soil to the surface. This practice prevails on the small farms and light soils of Flanders, where manual labour is cheap, and where green crops are raised to a great extent for the feeding of cattle. In wet seasons, moreover, you may often dig when you cannot plough; and in turning up stiff clay lands in autumn, and exposing the soil to the weather, the spade may sometimes be useful.

By double-digging or trenching the land, foul and exhausted soil is thrown to the bottom, and clean fresh soil brought to the surface. In garden-grounds this may be done with great advantage, the depth and quality of the active soil, being thereby greatly improved. In planting trees, deep trenching is the most certain mode of forwarding their growth. When planted on grass land, unless it be trenched, and the sward turned down, it often happens that the young tree will not strike root or flourish, and this applies to fruit as well as forest trees.

PLOUGHING.

The best ploughing is that which comes nearest to trenching, that is, which exposes the greatest quantity

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of fresh soil; and the best plough is that which most effectually accomplishes this object, and is most easily drawn. As to the depth, four inches may be considered light, six inches middling, and nine inches deep ploughing.

In very shallow ploughing, no fresh mould is brought to the surface, which is an important consideration; for the manure naturally filters downwards, and it is necessary to bring it again into action, by mixing the under with the upper soil. This can only be done by deep ploughing, by which the depth of active soil is increased, at the same time that fresh unexhausted soil is brought into operation.

The use of the subsoil-plough is highly valuable in this respect, for although it does not actually turn up the inferior stratum, it loosens and lightens it, and prepares it for being acted upon by the atmosphere and fitted for the sustentation of vegetable life. After subsoiling, therefore, there can be no doubt that deepploughing may be adopted with advantage; and it is believed that it will rarely, if ever, prove otherwise than advantageous, whether the subsoil-plough has been used or not.

Plough the land for green crops as deep as you can, that fresh soil may be exposed, and the surface deepened. Leave a head ridge all round the field, and plough it carefully, leaving no edges untouched, as a nursery for weeds. However winding the head ridge may be, if the others be straight, your field will have a neat and workmanlike appearance. If the plough cannot be worked into the corners, let them be dug with the spade, so that not a foot of land be left unturned.

The stubbles are often not ploughed until the spring, for the sake of allowing the cattle to pick up a few scanty morsels during winter, This is contrary to all sound principles of agriculture; for nothing fertilizes land more than exposure to sun and air, and the frosts of winter have also a very beneficial effect upon the soil. As soon as the crops are off, therefore, you ought to plough down the stubble, in preparation for the next crop.

It requires a farm of forty or fifty acres to give full employment to a pair of horses; and therefore a small farmer, having only twenty or thirty acres of land, should endeavour to plough in partnership with another, and thus obtain the benefit of a team. Those farmers are here spoken of, who have no other employment for their horses than what the cultivation of the farm affords: but there are cases where the distance of fuel and manure, and other circumstances, may make a horse necessary, when it would not be so otherwise.

There are various kinds of ploughs, some with and some without wheels, and new ones are still being invented. Each kind may be supposed to possess some advantages peculiar to itself, and one kind may be better adapted for certain situations than another; but as a general rule, it may be said, that the plough which most effectually opens the soil, with the least labour to the cattle, is unquestionably the best.

The operations of the plough, the harrow, and other instruments of the kind, are all for the purpose of loosening, pulverizing, and mixing the soil, and exposing it to the free action of the atmosphere; and the more effectually this is done, the better will be the produce. In a hard stiff soil, the plants find great difficulty in forcing their way through its unbroken texture in search of nourishment, and their growth is in consequence stunted and feeble; but if this soil be broken up by the plough, and reduced to powder by the use of the harrow and the roller, the plants will readily obtain the nourishment they require, and will flourish accordingly.

The farmer must bear in mind, that solid clods of earth afford no support to the plants; it is only when the clods are duly worked and broken down into minute particles, that the earth of which they consist becomes useful for the purposes of vegetation.

In ploughing, the breadth of the slice is generally about eight inches. The depth must depend on the nature of the soil, and the kind of crop intended to be raised; but it ought never to be less than four inches.

Six or seven inches will generally be sufficient, unless on soils of great depth, or for carrots and other taprooted plants, when the deeper the soil is loosened by the plough, the better will they flourish.

The breadth and elevation of the ridges vary according to the nature of the land. Sixteen or eighteen feet, and raised by two gatherings of the plough, is usually found to be the most convenient-sized ridge; but on dry grounds, it may be formed to any width. If the land is thorough-drained and subsoil-ploughed, it need not be ridged up at all, there being then sufficient means of escape for the water, without the aid of ridgefurrows.

Where the slope of the land will admit of it, the ridges should run as nearly north and south as possible, as they will then be more open to the action of the sun, than if running east and west.

A pair of good horses, working nine hours, ought to plough three-quarters of an acre on strong tenacious soils, and an acre or an acre and quarter on free and light soils. Much, however, will depend on the plough, which, if well made and of a good form, will be light and work easily.

The furrows in an acre will extend to 19,360 yards, supposing each furrow to be nine inches wide; and if we allow twelve yards additional to every 220 yards for the turning, the distance travelled in ploughing an acre may be taken at eleven miles and five furlongs. It has been calculated that when the ridges are no more than eighty yards long, half the working time of the team is lost in turning; but when the ridges are three hundred yards long, only an hour is lost in turning. It follows, therefore, that our fields ought to be of an oblong form, whenever circumstances will admit of its adoption.

When the soil is so stiff and adhesive, that the clods cannot be broken by the usual process of ploughing, cross-ploughing, harrowing, and rolling, recourse must be had to hand-labour with mallets; it being absolutely essential that the hard lumps should be broken down, and the whole of the surface-soil reduced to a pulve

rized state, without which a vigorous vegetation cannot be expected.

FALLOWING.

Generally speaking, if the land be well managed, and a due rotation of crops observed, an open or naked fallow will be unnecessary. But whenever the land gets foul from neglect or bad management, and the farmer is thereby compelled to resort to fallowing, it should be borne in mind, that the three great objects to be attained by a well-conducted fallow are, first, the destruction of seed and root weeds-secondly, a perfect pulverization of the soil-and thirdly, its exposure to the ameliorating influences of the sun and air: and in proportion as these important objects are secured, the productive powers of the land will be increased.

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The regular cultivation of fallow crops, as drilled turnips, potatoes, mangel-wurzel, &c., is found to be generally sufficient for effecting these purposes, and to supersede the necessity for a naked summer fallow. On loose friable loams, and on lands denominated turnip soils," the frequent disturbance of the surface during the summer months, in the operations of hoeing and moulding, opens it to the influence of the sun and air, and at the same time reduces it to the requisite degree of friability; but on soils of a tough adhesive kind, if allowed to get foul, it may sometimes perhaps be found necessary to give a naked fallow, in order to clean the land, and get it into a proper state.

Although a naked summer fallow will generally subject the cultivator to the loss of a crop, yet in some cases an effective fallow may be had on light soils, in time for the Norfolk or white stone turnip, which may be sown as late as the end of July, or even the beginning of August. In general, however, a fallow crop of mangel-wurzel or drilled turnips will be found sufficient to clean and ameliorate the land; and this crop, with barley the year following, will probably pay better than a crop of wheat.

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