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EUROPEAN AGRICULTURE. 



time, the fertile abode of animal and vegetable life. The re 

 cuperative power of nature is every where seen most active. 

 Lands exhausted by cultivation are restored by the skill and 

 labor of the faithful and enlightened cultivator. Even left to 

 themselves, to the spontaneous efforts of nature, they recover 

 their exhausted fertility ; and soils, which have never yet seen 

 the sun, by being brought to the light and warmth of day, and 

 to the refreshing and renovating influences of sun, and air, and 

 rain, become productive, and stand ready to perform their part 

 in supplying the wants of the vegetable, and through them of 

 the animal creation. Trench-ploughing, which aims wholly to 

 assist this operation of nature, and take advantage of its ready 

 benevolence, is done by a single plough, which goes to a depth 

 of at least fourteen inches, completely inverting this quantity of 

 soil ; or the land is first ploughed in the ordinary mode, and a 

 second plough follows in the same furrow, at a depth determined 

 at the pleasure of the ploughman. In the former case, it is 

 obvious that the surface soil is completely inverted and buried ; 

 in the latter, the substratum is rather mixed with the upper soil. 

 In the former case, it is clearly a very bold operation. On the 

 Island of Jersey, famous for its cultivation of esculent roots, 

 parsnips, and the white carrot, and other crops, they have what 

 is called a trench-plough, which, going to the depth of fourteen 

 inches, and throwing out a wide furrow, requires a heavy team. 

 In this case, the neighbors club together, uniting their teams so 

 as to assist each other.* The subsoil, unless there is a super- 



* I will give here the account of this operation, from Colonel Le Couteur, 

 whose high reputation is well established in the agricultural community. 



&quot; In most cases, in the month of October or November, a skim-ploughing is 

 given to an old, or two years lea, which is left exposed to the winter frosts. It 

 is well harrowed and cross-harrowed previous to carting out the manure, which 

 is spread on the ground at a rate ranging between 12 and 20 tons per acre. In 

 some cases, the above previous skim-ploughing is deferred until January or Feb 

 ruary, in order to allow the cattle to feed oft any herbage that may be left on the 

 land, so that the two ploughings now to be described take place in the same 

 month. 



&quot; A short time (the shorter the better) previous to putting in the crop, the 

 land receives its second, and generally last ploughing. The trench-plough then 

 comes into play, preceded by its pioneer, the two-horse-plough. A trench is 

 opened through the middle, or length of the field, in this manner. The two-horse- 

 plough is made to cast off a furrow up and down, so as to assist in forming the 

 trench ; the trench is then neatly sunk 18 inches deep, more or less, according to 



