48 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



[ July 21, 1863. 



a very pleasant and appropriate manner, while the Lady 

 Mayoress and the ladies of her family inspected with 

 much delight the splendid specimens of Pines, Grapes, 

 Peaches, Nectarines, &c., which were displayed in the 

 saloon. — (Ciiy Press.) 



THE OLD KENTISH PLOUGH. 



It is seldom that the gardener calls in the assistance of 

 expensive machinery to aid him in his manifold duties. True 

 a water engine is a machine ; and of late years much improve- 

 ment has been made in mowing machines, which, in fact, 

 have become so common, that it is a question if more turf 

 is not kept in trim by these appliances than by hand- 

 mowing. Machines for fumigating and dusting plants with 

 sulphur have been tried, but are often more novel than 

 useful ; and there seems much difference of opinion about the 

 relative values of the different tree-planting machines. The 

 one containing the greatest compheation of parts, giving it 

 the greatest claim to the character of a machine, is certainly 

 not the best; it is, in fact, more a mechanical appai-atus 

 than a horticultural one. 



Pre-existing machines of a simpler construction, which 

 did their work with a less amount of screw and other com- 

 plications of a mechanical kind, but with, perhaps, an in- 

 creased amount of hand-labour, did it much better for the 

 patient operated on ; simplicity in most things is best 

 for the multitude, and unless a piece of mechanism perform 

 its work much better and cheaper than the same can be 

 done by liand it soon falls into disuse. Its strongest ad- 

 vocates fail in maintaining its popularity, and the original 

 implement it was intended to supersede is restored to favour 

 again. Nevertheless, we now and then meet with decided 

 improvements in something where it was thought perfection 

 already existed. Tools have been much improved in the last 

 few yeai-s, digging tools especially ; and the implements used 

 in different localities have been brought into competition 

 with each other, and the axlvantages and disadvantages of 

 each made apparent to all not too deeply tinctured with 

 prejudice. 



Every one connected with rural affairs knows a plough ; 

 but there are plenty of ploughmen who are, no doubt, adepts 

 at theii- calling that would be puzzled to understand the 

 action of a Kentish plough ; and if they accidentally came 

 upon one not at work, they would, in all probabOity, suppose 

 it to be intended for some other pui-pose than tilling the 

 soil. And yet this implement — heavy, cumbersome, and 

 to all appearance the most antiquated ijn its class — has not 

 been exceeded in the quality of its work by the best-con- 

 structed implement that has been brought to contend 

 against it from the manufactories which have a European 

 reputation for the skilful adjustment of all the pai-ts of 

 their implements. In the matter of ploughs, Kentish 

 farmers have taught their brethren a lesson in other paits 

 of the kingdom, while in return they have received some 

 useful lunts in the same way themselves. Doubtless some 

 amount of prejudice still exists in both cases, but that will 

 in time vanish. Sound principle will in the end prevail; 

 and when once the way is opened for the admission of an 

 error, its removal is more easy. Returning, however, to 

 the matter of ploughs, let us see in what way the Kentish 

 plough differs from others in the way in which it does its 

 work. 



In most parts of England where I have been the ploughing- 

 up of a Clover-bed is regai-ded as a job in which ploughmen 

 delight to show off then- skill ; and when working hours are 

 over it is not unusual to see them all walking backwaj-d and 

 forward along the headland, examining with the eyes of con- 

 noisseurs each other's work, and commenting accordingly. 

 The qualification for such work is to exhibit the fui-row sUce 

 turned up with great exactness, so as to resemble the ridge 

 of a house, or, in fact, a series of ridges and furrows, each 

 side of the ridge presenting the angle of 45° ; and, assuming 

 the sharp edge of the ridge and of every ridge to be straight, 

 the work would be considered well done. This is, or until 

 lately was, one of the criterions of good ploughing in the 

 central and northern counties of England. We will now 

 compare it with what is done in Kent. 

 The Kentish ploughman turns over his furrow in quite a 



different manner. He has been to see the fashion of 

 ploughing in the midland counties, and he tells them plainly 

 they do not turn over the soil at all, they only tui-n it three- 

 quai-ters over ; that their vaunted angle of 45° means that 

 instead of having turned the ground over as much as 

 180°, as he does at home, they have only moved it 135° from 

 its original position ; and that he could show them how to 

 tui-n it upside down, which, in fact, he does completely — 

 the criterion of good work with him being to do so, leaving 

 the bottom of the fiirrow slice quite flat on the top and a 

 clear crease or Hue of marking between each furrow as 

 straight as possible. The advantages of this plan are that 

 any weeds, rubbish, or dung that may be on the top is 

 completely biuied, the weeds being less likely to grow than 

 when hall' bmied in the three-quarter-tui'nover system of 

 other places, and he consequently feels not a little proud of 

 the old-fashioned wooden instrument which he sees others 

 despise. 



Kentish ploughs have also another peculiarity — only one 

 furrow is wanted, as they are so constructed, that by the 

 movement of a mould-boai-d and another direction being 

 given to the coulter when they come to the end of a fui'row, 

 they retiu'n in the same ground, and turn the soil in the 

 reverse way, the alteration not taking more than a minute 

 I to make. Much stress has been laid on this point at meetings 

 j where Kentish ploughs have competed with others, the latter 

 requiring two furrows to be thrown against each other to 

 staat with, forming a sort of ridge, cei-tainly not wanted for 

 I any purpose ; whereas the Kentish plough, by beginning at 

 the outside, and using only one furrow, leaves aU its work 

 as level as where it begins. It is needless to say it could go 

 round a piece the same as other ploughs do ; but it is seldom 

 if ever done. Some little alterations have been made in it 

 diuing the last few years, but compai-atively few to what 

 its neighbour, the iron plough, has undergone in the hands 

 of a Howard and a Ransome ; and it is not too much to say 

 that these great makers have borrowed from the Kentish 

 plough more than that implement has done fi-om them ; 

 and at a challenge meeting some two years ago, between 

 the advocates of the ploughs of one of these makers and the 

 old Kent implement, much interest was evinced, and im- 

 paitial judges were unable to determine which of them did 

 the best work. Even scientific men, who assume to be 

 oracles in then- way in deciding on the laws which ought to 

 govern mechanics, have found their theories overthrown at 

 times by the perfoianances of the Kentish plough. 



A gentleman well versed in engineering matters and 

 mechanical constnictions, thought he had invented a much 

 lighter implement, but when subjected to the test of the 

 dynamometer, it was found to be the reverse in the draught 

 wanted. One oi#two leading features in the Kent plough 

 being good seem to atone for all that appears clumsy. The 

 parts that penetrate the ground ai'e long, the sole of the 

 plough being upwards of 4 feet in length, and the wing as 

 long ; and it is pulled forward Uke a long, tliin wedge rather 

 than a short thick one. There is less iron in it than in most 

 ploughs. The tiirn-wrest or part moveable at each end is of 

 wood, as also are the beam and most other paits ; but there 

 being no cm-ved mould-boai-d as in other ploughs, strangers 

 not acquainted with its uses would hai-dly suppose that it was 

 intended for ploughing, and it seldom fails to excite the 

 derision of such as inspect it for the first time, if not at 

 work ; but when so employed, and the qiialities of the work 

 done ai-e examined, there is generally a pause, and an inward 

 question is asked. Can tliis be wrong ? Conviction is very 

 unwilling to say No, and the idea is carried home that soils 

 must assui-edly be better that are completely turned over 

 than those which are only partly so, and the application 

 of this problem may be earned into other quarters as well j 

 but enough has been said for the present, and if agree- 

 able, I will at a futiu'e time return to the subject. — J. R. 



Select Orchidaceous Plants. — The fifth Part of this 

 beautifiil and trustworthy publication is j|Ust published, and 

 is a worthy companion to its four predecessors. It contains 

 Pleione lagenaria, Vanda coernlea, Dendi'obium Wardianum, 

 and Lselia superbiens. The portraits by Mr. Fitch, the 

 descriptions by Mr. Warner, and the cultural directions by 

 Mr. Williams, are all excellent. 



