18 GENERAL REMARKS. 



ground, and leave drills two inches deep. If one be made 

 with the teeth eight inches apart, another twelve, and another 

 fourteen, they will be useful in making drills for the various 

 kinds of seed ; and drills thus made serve instead of strain- 

 ing a line when transplanting Cabbage, Lettuce, Leek plants, 

 &c. ; the line being stretched at one edge of the bed, and 

 the drilling machine drawn straight by the line, makes five 

 drills at once. If they are straight, they may be kept so, by 

 keeping one drill open for the outside tooth to work in, until 

 the ground be all drilled. 



Gardeners practice different methods of covering up seed ; 

 some do it with a hoe, others with a rake or harrow ; some 

 draw a portion of the earth to the side of the bed, and after 

 sowing the seed, return it regularly over the bed; in some 

 particular cases a sieve is used, in others a roller. Rolling 

 or treading in seed is necessary in dry seasons, but it should 

 never be done when the ground is wet. 



There is nothing that protects young crops of Turnips, 

 Cabbage, and other small plants, from the depredations of the 

 fly, so well as rolling ; for when the surface is rendered com- 

 pletely smooth, these insects are deprived of the harboui 

 they would otherwise have under the clods and small lumps 

 of earth. This method will be found more effectual than 

 soaking the seed in any preparation, or dusting the plants 

 with any composition whatever ; but as the roller must only 

 be used previous to or at the time of sowing the seed, and 

 not even then if the ground be wet, it is necessary that the 

 gardener should have a hogshead always at hand in dry 

 weather, containing infusions made of waste tobacco, lime, 

 soot, cowdung, elder, burdock leaves, &c. A portion of these 

 ingredients, or any other preparation that is pernicious or 

 poisonous to insects, without injuring the plants, thrown into 

 a hogshead kept filled up with water, if used moderately over 

 beds of young plants in dry weather, would, in almost every 

 case, insure a successful crop. 



Saltpetre is pernicious to many species of insects ; it is 



