HOW WE MADE OUR HAY. 125 



Immediately upon the hint I acted. A team of 

 strong horses attached to heavy harrows, newly 

 sharpened, were set to tear the surface this way and 

 that way, until it looked as if a cart-load of wild 

 bees'-nests had been rent and scattered over the 

 surface. A quantity of renovating seed, being a 

 judicious combination of such clovers, grasses, &c, as 

 ought to be the texture of a pasture with a view to 

 butter and beef — supplied to me by Messrs. Sutton, 

 seedsmen, Reading (10 lbs. per acre, at 9d. per lb.) 

 — was then sown over the whole field, being driven 

 home to the fresh soil through the persuasion of a 

 heavy frame, stuffed dense with short, prickly black- 

 thorn — in agricultural parlance, "a bush harrow." 

 It was finally rolled down smooth and close by a 

 Crosskill's crasher sent twice across it, different 

 ways, and a plain roller once when the ground was 

 pretty soft after rain, all sticks and stones having 

 been carefully picked off. To be deprecated is the 

 easy plan, so commonly resorted to, of attempting to 

 press down such obstacles into the ground with a 

 heavy roller. In a county where, as in many (but 

 these usually are fallows), stones are courted for the 

 sake of preserving due moisture in the soil, it may be 

 needful ; but in ours (a limestone region) I regard 

 each such fragment and pebble as an intruder, to be 

 warned off from occupying the room of so many blades 

 of good grass, not to mention the hurt that may occur, 

 from their sudden springing up, to the knives of the 

 mowing machine. You cannot be too particular in 

 the picking. What damage does happen to the knives 

 is caused mainly by the smaller pebbles, not much 



