TOOLS USED IN HORTICULTURE. 85 



the thrust-hoe, as with the draw-hoe, the branches are less likely to 

 be injured. The hoes a and e are, perhaps, the strongest and safest 

 for general use. 



The spade in general use, fig. 24, consists of the grasping-piece or 

 handle, or upper extremity, a ; the shaft, which joins the handle to the 

 blade, b ; the hose, or part of the blade into which the handle is inserted, c; 

 the hilts, which are two pieces of iron which crown the upper edge of the 

 blade for the purpose of receiving the foot of the operator, d, d ; and the 

 blade e. As the hilt or tread projects over the Fig. 24. 



blade, however useful it may be in saving the 

 soles of the shoes of the operator, it is found in s 

 many soils to impede the operation of digging, by 

 preventing the blade from freeing itself from the 

 soil which adheres to it. Hence, in some parts 

 of the country, instead of a hilt being put on the 

 spade to save the shoes of the operator, a plate of 

 iron about two inches broad, with leather straps, 

 called a tread, is tied to his shoe, and effects the 

 same purpose, while the spade requires much 

 less cleaning. The spade e is for free easily worked soil, and is that 

 most frequently used in gardens ; f, having the lower edge of the 

 blade curved, enters more easily into stiff soil, while the upper part of 

 the blade on each side of the hose being perforated, no soil can adhere 

 there, and therefore spades of this form clean themselves, and in work- 

 ing are always quite free from soil. The spade g has a semi-cylin- 

 drical blade, and is without hilts ; it is chiefly used in executing new 

 works, such as canals, drains, ponds, &c., in strong clayey soil. In 

 consequence of the cylindrical form of the blade, and the lower ex- 

 tremity of it being applied to the soil obliquely, it enters the ground as 

 easily as the blade of the spade /, while the spade separates the edges 

 of the slice of earth from the firm soil ; and, after it is lifted up, serves 

 as a guide in throwing it to a distance. There is a variety of this 

 spade in which the blade, instead of being semi-cylindrical, is a seg- 

 ment of a cylinder, and rather broader at the bottom or cutting-edge 

 than at the tread. This breadth at the entering edge diminishes 

 friction on the sides of the upper part of the blade, by preventing them 

 from pressing hard against the earth while passing through ; in the 

 same manner as the oblique setting of the teeth of a saw prevents 

 friction on the sides of the blade. This spade also, from the greater 

 breadth of the lower part of its blade, lifts more completely the loose 

 soil at the bottom of the furrow. It is chiefly used in engineering 

 works, and in digging or trenching stiff soil. The handles of spades 

 are almost always formed of sound root-cut ash, and their blades of 

 good iron pointed with steel. Spades, however, made wholly of steel, 

 are the best, and, in the end, the cheapest. The blade is not set ex- 

 actly in the same plane as the handle, but at a small angle to it, in con- < 

 sequence of which, when the blade is inserted in the soil, the elbow 

 formed between the blade and the handle serves as a fulcrum ; and 

 the handle being thus applied to the lever at a larger angle, has con- 



