44 On the Great or Jersey Trench- PI oucjh. 



neatly, one man Is placed at eacli corner to perform this work, so 

 that two additional men at each end of the land, or fonr in all, arc 

 now dig-j^ing, levelling', and squaring up the corners. 



Two acres or more may thus be turned in a day, as the trench- 

 plough takes a wide furrow, from 11 to 13 inches, and by its 

 excellent construction moves and turns the whole soil. 



This operation is performed by joint-stock labour by all farmers 

 in Jersey, who bring their teams to assist each other : it is appro- 

 priately denominated not a great ploughing, but a great digging, 

 " une grande fouerie ;"' indeed, no spade-husbandry is so efficient, 

 as most men in digging merely turn the second spit upon the 

 under or trench slice, whereas the whole soil is shaken and 

 broken by the trench-plough. 



The late President of the Horticultural Society, Mr. Knight, 

 thus expressed himself in writing to me in reply to a description 

 of the mode of cultivating potatoes in Jersey : — " Your mode of 

 culture appears admirable ; much better than ours ; and your 

 crreat plough, where the soils are deep and rich, must be an 

 excellent instrument, never used in England — I believe." ' 



This was no slight authority, since corroborated by every 

 British cultivator to whom I have had occasion to exhibit its 

 performance. 



Loudon, in his 'Encyclopaedia of Agriculture,' describes two 

 trenching-ploughs : one, No. 2616, is called a mining or trenching 

 plough ; the other, 2624, Morton's trenching-plough, with two 

 ]jQ(Jies, — both of them quite unsuited for the culture here recom- 

 mended, whatever their merits may be. 



Ordinary ploughings and cross-ploughings are usually a furrow 

 of 10 inches by 7 : hence it is constantly the same soil that is 

 moved, and, if for a long-rooted crop, not as the French writers 

 recommend, to a depth of 3 or 4 inches below the root, but just 

 sufficiently deep to stunt its growth. 



I feel almost convinced that the long or round-rooted are the 

 proper preparatory crops for wheat, and that wheat after a grass 

 ley fallow is erroneous practice. I have never seen a very fine 

 sample grown by such a course. 



It appears to me that I am borne out in these conjectures 

 (hazarded some years since) by the recent discoveries of Liebig ; 

 an admirable writer, whose profound researches may lead to great 

 results. I am aware that much of his work may be called scien- 

 tific, what is sometimes improperly said to be too deep for 

 farmers, but it should be on every farmer's table, were it only for 

 the chapter ' The Art of Culture,' where he observes : — " There 

 is no profession which can be compared in importance with that 

 of agriculture, for to it belongs the production of food for man 

 and animals : on it depends the welfare and development of the 



