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16 STIRRING THE SOIL. 
the iron part of the spade, which acts as a wedge, perpendicularly 
into the ground by the application of the foot, and then using the 
long handle as a lever, to raise up the loosened earth and turn it 
over. The quantity of earth thus raised is called a spitful, and the 
gardener, when he has turned it, chops it to break the clods, with the 
sharp edge of his spade, and levels it with the back. ‘During the 
whole operation, the gardener holds the cross part of the handle of 
the spade in his right-hand, while he grasps the smooth round lower | 
part of the handle in his left, to assist him in raising the earth anc 
turning it, sliding his left hand backwards and forwards along the 
handle, as he may find it necessary. 
This is the common mode of digging, and it certainly appears to 
require considerable strength in the foot to force the spade into the 
ground,—in the arms, to raise it when loaded with the earth that is to 
be turned over,—and in the hands, to grasp the handle. But it must 
be remembered that all operations that are effected rapidly by the ex-_ 
ertion of great power, may be effected slowly by the exertion of very 
little power, if that comparatively feeble power be applied for a much 
greater length of time. For example, if a line be drawn by a child 
in the earth with a light cane, and the cane be drawn five or six times 
successively along the same line, it will be found that a furrow has 
been made in the soil with scarcely any exertion by the child, that 
the strongest man could not make by a single effort with all his force 
In the same way a lady, with a small light spade, may, by repeatedly 
digging over the same line, and taking out only a little earth at a 
time, succeed in doing, with her own hands, all the digging that can 
be required in a small garden, the soil of which, if it has been long 
in cultivation, can never be very hard, or very difficult to penetrate ; 
and she will not only have the satiaetctian of seeing the garden 
created, as it were, by the labour of her own hands, ae she will find 
her health and spirits wonderfully improved dy the exercise, ang by 
the reviving smell of the fresh earth. 
The first point to be attended to, in order to render the operation 
of digging less laborious, is to provide a suitable spade; that is, one 
which shal! be as light as is consistent with strength, and which will 
penetrate the ground with the least possible trouble. For this pur- 
pose, the blade of what is called a lady’s spade is made of not more 
than half the usual breadth, say not wider than five or six inches, 
and of smooth polished iron, and ‘t is surmounted, at the part where 
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