VIC 



OR, BOTANICAL DICTIONARY 



V 1C 



749 



esteem, does not grow so high as the rest, is a more plenti- 

 ful bearer, and succeeds better on light land than the Com- 

 mon Horse Bean. Of this again there are several subordi- 

 nate varieties, as Flat Ticks or Ray-Beans, Small or Essex 

 Ticks, and French Ticks. They delight in a strong moist 

 soil, and an open exposure, for they never thrive well on 

 dry warm land, or in small enclosures, where they are very 

 subject to blight, and are often attacked by black insects, 

 called, by the farmers, black dolphins, which often entirely 

 cover the stems of the plant, especially all the upper part, 

 in which case the Beans seldom come to good ; but this 

 rarely happens in the open fields, where the soil is strong. 

 These Beans are generally sown upon land which is fresh 

 broken up, because they are useful to break and pulverize 

 the ground, as well as to destroy the weeds : hence the land 

 is rendered much better for corn after a crop of Beans, than 

 it would have been before, especially if they are sown and 

 managed according to the improved husbandry, with a drill- 

 plough, and the horse-hoe used to stir the ground between 

 the rows of Beans, which will prevent the growth of the 

 weeds, and pulverize the ground, whereby a much greater 

 crop may with more certainty be effected, and the land will 

 be better prepared for whatever crop may be afterwards 

 required. The season for sowing these Beans is from the 

 middle of February to the end of March, according to the 

 nature of the soil ; the strongest and wet land should always 

 be last sown : the usual quantity allowed to an acre of land 

 is about three bushels, but this is nearly double the quantity 

 necessary. The old method is that of sowing after the 

 plough in the bottom of the furrows, which in that case 

 should not be more than five or six inches deep. If the land 

 be newly broken up, it is usual to plough it early in autumn, 

 and let it lie in ridges till after Christmas ; then plough it 

 ID small furrows, and lay the. ground smooth; these two 

 plourhings will break the ground fine enough for Beans, 

 and the third ploughing is to sow the Beans, when the fur- 

 rows should be made shallow, as before-mentioned. Most 

 persons set their Beans too close ; for as some lay them in 

 the furrows after the plough, and others lay them before the 

 plough, and plough them in, so by both methods the Beans 

 are set as close as the furrows are made, which is much too 

 near; for when they are on strong- good land, they are gene- 

 rally drawn up to a very great height, and are less apt to 

 pod than when they have more room, and are of a lower 

 growth : hence it appears better to make the furrows two 

 feet and a half asunder, or more ; which will cause them to 

 branch out into many stalks, and bear a greater plenty than 

 when they are closer; by this method half the quantity of 

 Beans will be sufficient tor an acre of land. In the modern 

 method, the ground should be four times ploughed before 

 the Beans are set, which will break the clods, and render 

 the soil much better for planting ; then with a drill-plough, 

 to which a hopper is fixed for setting the Beans, the drills 

 should be made three feet asunder, and the spring of the 

 hopper set so as to scatter the Bears at three inches' dis- 

 tance in the drills. By this method less than one bushel of 

 seed will plant an acre of larici. When the Beans are up, if 

 the ground be stirred between the rows with a horse-plough, 

 it will destroy all the young weeds; and when the plants are 

 advanced about three or four inches high, the ground should 

 be again ploughed between the rows, and the earth laid up 

 to the Beans ; and if a third ploughing be given at about five 

 or six weeks after, the ground will be kept clean from weeds, 

 and the Beans will stalk out, and produce a much greater 

 crop than in the common way. When the Beans are ripe, 

 they are reaped with a hook, as is usually practised with 



Peas ; and after having lain a few days on the ground, thev 

 are turned; and this must be repeated several times, until 

 they are dry enough to stack : but the best method is, to tie 

 them in small bundles, and set them upright ; for then thev 

 will not be in so much danger to suffer by wet, as when thev 

 lie on the ground ; and they will also be handler to carry 

 and stack than when loose. The common produce is from 

 twenty to twenty-five bushels per acre. The Beans should 

 lie in the mow, to sweat before they are threshed out ; for as 

 the haulm is very large and succulent, so it is apt to give, 

 and grow moist; but if they be stacked tolerably dry, there 

 is no danger of the Beans receiving damage, because the 

 pods will preserve them from injury, and they will be much 

 easier to thresh after they have sweated in the mow than 

 before ; and after they have once sweated, and are dry 

 again, they never give afterwards. By the modern method, 

 the produce has exceeded the old by more than ten bushels 

 on an acre ; and if the Beans which are cultivated in the 

 common method be observed, it will be found that more 

 than half their stems have no Beans on them ; whereas, in 

 the improved method, they bear almost to the ground ; and 

 as the joints of the stems are shorter, so the Beans grow 

 closer in the stalks. Another method is, whatever the pre- 

 ceding crop may have been, whether corn or old grass, to 

 plough but once for planting Beans, and let it be done as 

 soon as the Christmas frost breaks up. Provide boards of 

 slit deal planed, ten feet long, an inch thick, and two 

 inches broad; bore holes through them at sixteen inches 

 asunder : pass packthreads through these holes, to the 

 length of the lands you are about to plant, and fix a pole at 

 every fifty yards. Place also four stakes at the corner of 

 the extreme poles ; fasten them to the ground to keep the 

 lines every where at equal distances, and straight, to facili- 

 tate horse-hoeing. Women then take the Beans in their 

 aprons, and, with a dibbler pointed with iron, make holes 

 along the strings with their right hands, putting in the 

 Beans with their left : while they are performing this at one 

 set of lines, another should be in preparation. By the time 

 that the cold easterly winds come on in the spring, they will 

 be high enough to hand-hoe, if they were early planted ; 

 and it is of consequence, on strong soils, to seize every dry 

 season for such operations. The hoes should be eight inches 

 wide, the whole surface between the rows carefully cut, and 

 every weed eradicated. When they are six inches in height, 

 they should be horse-hoed with a shim of ten or eleven inches 

 wide at the cutting part. This tool is cheap and simple, 

 not apt to be out of order : it is drawn by one horse, which 

 should be led by a careful person, another holding the shin), 

 and guiding it carefully in the centre between the rows. It 

 effectually cuts up all weeds, and loosens the earth two or 

 three inches deep; in a little time after this operation, the 

 hand-hoe should be sent in again, to cut up what the shim 

 may have passed, and to extract the weeds that grow too 

 near the Beans. If the weather be dry enough, a second 

 horse-hoeing with the shim should follow when the Beans are 

 nine or ten inches high ; but in wet Weather it rnust be 

 omitted, and the hand-hoe employed to remove the weeds. 



23. Vicia Serratifoha ; Saw-leaved Vetch. Stsm upright ; 

 pc-tioles without tendrils ; leaflets serrate ; root annual, 

 whitish, branched, and, like those of its congeners, furnish- 

 ed with tubercles. The flowers three or four, of a moderate 

 size, and violet-purple ; legume compressed, with seven or 

 eight globular seeds. It flowers in June. Native of the 

 Hungarian mountains. 



24. Vicia Biflora; Two-flowered Vetch. Leaflets linear; 

 peduncles two-flowered, axillary. Stem angular, slender, 



