Ch. XVIII.] ON TURNIPS. §3^ 



depicted in tlie undemeatli l^ack view, in which A A are the rollers, BB 

 the lioppers, and C C the coulters, and its weight ensures a regularity 

 of sowing hardly to be gained by those of a less size. 



There are, however, various deviations from this construction; the roller 

 being more frequently in the common form, and without any division in 

 the centre. Sometimes, also, light rollers are made to follow the drills 

 for the purpose of covering the seed, when the land is friable and sandy ; 

 this, however, is not always thought necessary, as the tracks made by the 

 coulters are then found to answer the purpose, though we think it ouoht 

 never to be dispensed with : in some machines, indeed, a small rake with 

 two or three teeth is fixed behind the coulter, and thus mixes the seed with 

 the soil. 



After the sowing has been completed, the plants generally make their 

 appearance within about ten days or a fortnight, according to the soil and 

 the temperature of the air; and if the weather prove showery they will 

 grow into what is termed " rough-leaf," when they are a couple of inches 

 high. The process of horse-hoeing then commences, by running a small 

 single-horse plough, or one of the many implements already described in 

 the second chapter of this volume, up and down between the "rows, as near 

 as it can be done without injury to the crop ; or at about three inches dis- 

 tance from the plants ; so as to cut up any weeds that may have sprung, 

 and to turn off a shallow portion of earth from the turnips. Within two 

 or three days afterwards, this is succeeded by the operation of hand-hoeino-, 

 which is performed by the labourer going along the sides of the drills with 

 a gardener's hoe, having a blade of about eight inches in breadth. 



With this he stands opposite the rows, and at one stroke across the rido-e 

 he cuts out the plants at regular distances, leaving them standing singly, 

 with a vacant space of at least nine or ten inches between each ; thus 

 thinning them sufficiently, and leaving room for the roots to grow to a 

 proper size. To see this process for the first time, one would suppose the 

 crop totally destroyed, but the weeders soon acquire great experience in 

 executing it, and a turnip-plant, with ever so little hold of the ground, soon 

 recovers its vigour. When intended for consumption early in the season, 

 the turnips are, indeed, frequently thinned out so as to "stand at the dis- 

 tance of full a foot from each other, for they increase in bulk partly in 

 proportion to the distance at which they stand ; but when meant to be 

 kept for spring use, it is tliought that they should be left thicker, in order 

 that their growth being thereby somewhat checked, and the bulbs thus ren- 

 dered more solid, they may run less risk of being injured by the winter's 

 frost. 



Within a fortnight or three weeks after this has been performed, the 

 weeds will again shoot forth, and the same work must be repeated, with 

 still greater care ; as the hand-hoers should then trim the earth around 

 every single plant, and attentively cut out any other sprouts which liave 



