!?4 OF HOT BIDS. SECT. XIII. 



heats, however, are often too violent, and 1 lit not long • 

 yet may they be lined with the fame materials it clone 

 in time, othetwife if a green hot bed gels greatly cool 

 it will not be recovered. A grafs bed may be uied 

 as foon as warm, but let it not be overweighted by 

 putting on heavy frames, or more mould than necehVy. 

 It mould rather be worked with hand glailes, or oiled 

 j>aper covers. 



Hot beds are fometimes made of the refufe bark of a 

 tanner's yard, and alfo of oak' leaves ; but thefe muft 

 have walled pits for them, of a large fize, and arc 

 feldom ufed out in hot-houfes. A bark-bed properly 

 made, and managed by forking up at two or three 

 month's end, &c. will hold a fair, moderate, and fleady 

 heat, four, five, or fix months. 



The bark is to be got frefh, after it has been thrown 

 out of the vats a few days, and if not moderately dry, 

 kept a few days longer to drain, and if the weather is 

 fair, it may be opened to the fun to dry ; for it will 

 not ferment if it is put together wet. When it ir 

 made into a bed it muft be only beat together with the 

 fork, and not trampled. In a fortnight it will have 

 come to a fine heat, for immediate ufe. 



The/)// fliould be eleven or twelve feet long, five 

 and a half or fix feet wide, and a foot, or a little more, 

 .higher than the bark in front, and two feet higher be- 

 hind, to receive the mould on a body of bark, three 

 feet deep : But if for the cultivation of any thing in 

 pots, as there will need no mould, the pits need not 

 be fo deep, the pots being pkui|ed in the bark : or the 

 pit may be made level all round, of a depth to hold 

 the bark and mould, on which frames of wood may 

 be fet. Let the pit be funk one third, or one-halt in 

 the ground, as the foil about it is dry or not. 



To encreaje the heat of a dung bed when it declines, 



a v. urn lining of ftraw, or hay, put round it, a foot 



.., and lard high up the fides of the frames, will 



recover it for a few days; but a lining of hot dung; 



one 



