THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



899 



Fig. 2. 



f g h. The mould-board of an efficient plough is so 

 set, that surfaces of equal breadth, &% ab,b c, c d,d e, 

 are exposed to the atmosphere ; this arrangement giving 

 the greatest possible extent of surface, and also the 

 greatest possible cubical contents to the angular 

 shoulders on b c d, d ef, &c. The furrow slices thus 

 laid over are unbroken, the shoulders (& c d, &c., fig. 2) 

 and the seed-furrows or beds (a b c, &c.) being left in 

 full development. This unbroken series is, however, as 

 might be supposed, greatly influenced by the nature of 

 the soil on which it operates. Generally the operation 

 is such as to throw over the furrow slices in compara- 

 tively unbroken order, keeping up the integrity of the 



seed beds. But although out of all the series of furrow 

 slices which the surface of a ploughed field presents a 

 certain number lie all in one direction, as shown in fig. 

 2, the whole do not, one half lying in one direction, the 

 other half in another and an opposite. This difference 

 is brought about by the nature of the construction of the 

 plough, in which, as before described, the mould- 

 board is fixed so as always to present the same relative 

 position to the other parts of the plough. To throw 

 then, the furrow slices all in one direction, the plough 

 would have to travel always in the same line of draught 

 Thus, in fig. 3, to throw over the furrow slices all in 

 one direction, &s g h i j, the plough going in the 



Fig. 3. 



direction of the line atob, would have to return to the 

 point c and travel towards d, the return journey from 

 i to c being obviously lost ; if, to save this, the plough, 

 as soon as it reached the point b, having, with its 

 mo*ld-board to the right-hand side, thrown over the 

 furrow slice g hi j, simply were reversed, and com- 

 menced to plough in the direction of d to c, close along- 

 side the line b a, the mould-board still maintaining the 

 same relative position towards the other part, and point- 



ing to the right, would turn over the furrow slice not in 

 the same direction as gr A fi, but in the opposite, &sklmn, 

 thus defeating the very object of the ploughing, and 

 bringing about anything but a covering up of the old and 

 the exposing of new surface, and the formation of a 

 series of seed-beds. The mode of ploughing, then, 

 adopted, is to have one series of furrow slices lying in 

 one direction, the other in the opposite, answering the 

 position when finished as shown in fig. 4— one furrow 



slice being made while the plough is going in the 

 direction of b to a, fig. 3, the slice b while it is coming 

 up the return journey as from c to d. On finishing b, 

 the plough is brought round and makes c going from 

 d to a again (fig. 3), and so on, till all the surface of 

 the ridge 0' st'-^oh is ploughed. 



Now, in the Kentish turn-wrest plough these two 

 features of ordinary ploughing are not met with. In the 

 first place each furrow slice is turned completely over. 

 Thus, if, in fig. 5, abed represent the slice in its 

 original form, b c the upper or sward surface, a b the 

 land side, and a d the lower side ; in its next stagCj h f 



