HORTICULTURAL LABOURS ON THE SOIL. 



229 



532. Marking with the garden line is an operation preparatory to various 

 others, and it consists in stretching and fixing the line or cord along the sur- 

 face of the ground, or sometimes, as in clipping edgings and hedges, at some 

 distance above it. When the direction is straight, two fixed points at the 

 extremities are sufficient ; but when it is curved, a number of intermediate 

 stakes or pins are requisite to bend and fix the line to the proper curvature. 

 Also, when the line is raised from the ground, as when stretched for cutting 

 straight the top of a hedge, it must be supported at a sufficient number of inter- 

 mediate points, otherwise a deflection will take place more or less in proportion 

 to the distance between the extremities of the line, its degree of tension, and 

 weight of materials. The ground or plants are next marked, cut, or clipped, 

 in the direction of the line. 



533. Digging. The use of the lever and the pick, the former in moving 

 large obstacles, such as stones, and the latter for perforating and raising up hard 

 soils or subsoils, may be considered as preparatory operations for the more per- 

 fect pulverization and mixture of the soil by digging. Previous to performing 

 this operation, if tKe surface is uneven, it should be levelled ; but as we are 

 treating of garden digging, we shall suppose that the surface is already in a 

 fit state to be dug. The first step is to fix on those parts of the plot where 

 the operation is to commence and finish ; which being done, a trench is to be 

 opened at the former place, and the earth wheeled or carried to the latter. 

 In most gardens where there is to be a regular course 

 of cropping, the compartments are rectangular, and 

 these are easily divided into smaller figures of the 

 same kind for temporary purposes, the number of 

 which divisions, with a view to digging or trenching, 

 for reasons which will presently appear, must always 

 be even. For example, a piece of ground of a square 

 form, fig. 159, a, 6,c, d, may be thrown into two pa- 

 rallelograms, a, /, and e, d, and the soil taken from 

 the trench opened from a to e can be laid down from 

 e to fe, where the operation will be finished, 

 the plot been divided into three parallelograms, trenching. 

 as in fig. 1GO, the soil must have been removed from g to /*, which would 

 have more than doubled the labour of wheeling. A 

 fourfold division would not, however, have been liable 

 to the same objection, which confirms the rule, that 

 the division ought always to be into equal numbers. 

 Where a plot is circular or oval it may be divided into 

 zones, and an irregular plot may be thrown into figures 

 approaching as near as may be to regularity. In dig- 

 ging for pulverization and mixture, the surface is re- 

 versed by the operator, and broken at the same time, 

 Fig. ico. A plot of ground &Q ^^ ft new gurface is exp0 sed to the air. When a crop 



disadvantageousiy marked * , - - 



off for digging or trenching, is to be sown or planted, this surface is broken more 

 or less fine according to the kind of crop, and in very 



dry weather in summer, it is sometimes raked smooth as the digging 

 proceeds, to lessen the evaporation of moisture. When the ground is not 

 to be immediately cropped, it is commonly "rough dug," that is, laid 

 up in unbroken spitfuls, so as to present as large a surface as possible 

 to the action of the weather ; and afterwards, when a crop is to be intro- 



. 



TT , Fig. 159. A plot of ground pro- 



Had re riy marked off for digging or 



