On the Culture of'Tiirmps. 149- 



to be improved bv the application of duiisj; and thus, by the 

 agency of the sun and air, and rain, upon the dung which is up- 

 permost ou the land, is the work of vegetation, in Nature's la- 

 boratory, more successfully promoted and carried on, than by 

 any other means. Let the man who doubts this, only observe, 

 as I have often done, the effect of a piece of putrescent dung on 

 the surface, which has happened to be hoed near a potatoe or a 

 turnip when growing, and he will soon be satisfied of the truth 

 of this observation. — For these reasons, and on these principles, 

 without being at all able to state chemically how the effects 

 are produced, I prefer using dung in a putrescent to a re- 

 cent state. I practise spreading it on the surface, and j)loughing 

 it in, and then harrowing the ground, instead of burying my dung 

 in the furrow, and there leaving it, that its effects may be spread 

 and felt as universally as possible over the whole surface ; and on 

 these principles, my course of crops are as follows : 



As soon as my wheat is cut, 1 haul out my putrescent dung, 

 say forty to fifty cart-loads to the acre; I plough it in with 

 the stubble, harrow the ground, and sow winter tares; — eat off 

 the tares in April and beginning of May with sheep, and thea 

 give the land two or three earths, as occasion may require, or 

 the season permit, for the turnips; — sow broadcast; — hoe inces- 

 santly, so long as weeds will grow; the third hoeing requires 

 very little labour;— eat off my turnips with sheep; — give two 

 ploughings for my barley or oats; — harrow and hand-rake the 

 surface thoroughly after each ploughing, and pick up every weed 

 on the land, which I constantly haul off to a putrescent dung- 

 heap preparing for pasture land; — sow clover only with the 

 barley or oats, which remains but one year, and is mown twice 

 for hay: — immediately after the crop is carried, break up the 

 clover-ley, run the sheep-fold over the land, and plough thrice 

 for wheat, (never forgetting to barrow well, and pick up and 

 haul off every weed found on each earth,) which I invariably sow 

 under the furrow; and this completes my course of tillage, which 

 may be repeated to all eternity, while the land will be perpetu- 

 ally in heart, like a horse above his work, and will seldom de- 

 ceive the industrious cultivator who does not deceive his land ; 

 and by this succession I have five crops in four years. I have 

 now pursued this system without variation for years, and 1 have 

 every reason to prefer it to all others, from the luxuriance of my 

 crops, the cleanliness of my fallows, and the perpetual amelio- 

 ration of my soil. The farm 1 now occupy was ovcrvvhelmed 

 with couch and colt's-foot at my entrance six years ago, and 

 was incapable of bearing clover; and, in confirmation of this 

 practice, I can only say, that I have repeatedly obtained from 



fifty 



