94 FARMERS ASSISTANT, 



enriching lands. It can only be profitable when it answers 

 the double purpose of sweetening and fertilizing the soil, 

 and, at the same time, riding it of its liability to trouble- 

 some growths of weeds. 



At the same time, it may be truly said, that, for this 

 latter purpose, much of the lands of this Country require an 

 effectual Summer-fallowing : Having been but imperfectly 

 cultivated, in general, they are usually to be found much 

 Infested with the seeds of the common bienniel weeds ; the 

 growth of which, among the growing crops, is not only in- 

 jurious to them ; but also tends very considerably to exhaust 

 the soil. Weeds growing among any crop, must lessen its 

 product, in the proportion which the weight of the growing 

 weeds bears to the weight of the growing crop. 



What we call Summer-fallowing, in this Country, hardly 

 deserves the name : It is very different from that performed 

 by the best English Farmers. They break up the ground 

 early in the Spring; and they plough from five to ten times, 

 as the state of the ground may require ; and the ground is 

 well harrowed between each \ploughing : In short, they 

 plough and harrow, at proper intervals, till no further 

 growths of weeds start from the soil. 



Thus, suppose the ground is turned over by the middle 

 of April ; by the middle of May a growth of weeds will 

 have sprung up from the seeds of weeds in the soil, which, 

 by the ploughing, will have been brought sufficiently near 

 the surface to vegetate : These are to be destroyed by an 

 effectual harrowing. This operation brings other seeds 

 near the surface, which produce a fresh crop of weeds: 

 Plough these under, and this raises other seeds, which then 

 vegetate and grow. Destroy these with the harrow, as be- 

 fore, and this again raises the seeds for another crop; which 

 are again ploughed under: And thus the work proceeds, 

 at proper intervals, until all the seeds of weeds in the soil 

 have successively vegetated, and been destroyed. 



By this culture, most kinds of soils are very considerably 

 Improved; though all not equally so; and they are put in 

 the best condition for growing of crops. It tends greatly to 

 destroy the adhesion of clays for several successive crops, 

 as is asserted by the Writer last mentioned ; it sweetens 

 those soils which are sour, and it warms those which are 

 cold. 



The soils which are least enriched, by this mode of cul- 

 ture, are those which are naturally very rich and mellow, 

 and poor weak sands. The former gains nothing in fertili- 

 ty, for pretty much the same reason that a heap of well- 

 roted and fermented compost would gain nothing, but 

 rather lose, by being too frequently stired up, and every 

 part exposed to the sun, winds, and rains. 



