TIME OF SOWING- AND CHOICE OF SEED. 129 



occupies the ground but a very little while ; frequently 

 not more than three months altogether. 



Others recommend as much as three bushels, and even 

 three and a half to the acre ; but, if the seed is good, it 

 is unnecessary. The smoothest, soundest, heaviest, and 

 brighest-coloured seed should be selected, rejecting that 

 which contains a large proportion of under-sized grains ; 

 and some of them should be cracked, to see if the kernel 

 and the germ are perfect. The land on which it is sown 

 must have had three ploughings, with harrowiugs sufficient 

 to make the soil perfectly light and crumbling. It is laid 

 flat, with as few furrows as possible. The manure, of 

 which there should be a liberal supply, may either be 

 ploughed in during autumn, immediately after wheat- 

 sowing is finished, or a fortnight before the seed-time, 

 when the last ploughing is given to the land. This will 

 greatly depend on the quality of the manure at the 

 farmer's command. 



For the culture of hemp, M. de Pertuis prefers spade- 

 husbandry to all the ploughs in the world. It takes a 

 longer time : but it is deeper, and more suitable to the 

 tap-root of the hemp-plant. The more deeply the land 

 is broken up, the higher the hemp will rise. It is the 

 hidden treasure of the goodman in the fable, which could 

 only be found by searching in the earth. Land in a 

 finely divided state is less liable to suffer from drought 

 than any other. Land may be said to be deeply broken 

 up, when the depth of nine or ten inches is attained. 

 Spade-husbandry can reach as far as that; the plough 

 will have a difficulty in executing the same task, and in 

 ordinary cases will not go deeper than six inches. Un- 

 burnt turf crushed to coarse powder, and also the ashes 

 of turf and wood, are excellent manures for hemp, on 

 land that is deficient in vegetable remains. It is a well- 

 known fact that the most substantial manures, if they are 

 not well rotted, produce a less active effect on the growth 

 of hemp than the simplest fertilizers, which have been 

 reduced to a state of extreme division. Hemp has short 

 and slender roots ; it springs up, grows, and comes to 



