SOILS, AND HOW TO CULTIVATE THEM 43 



From the foregoing pages it will be gathered that each in- 

 dividual gardener must judge for himself what are the soil con- 

 ditions of his own garden, and what are the remedies which each 

 requires to bring it into good cultivation. There remains, how- 

 ever, one important subject which deserves consideration in some 

 detail I mean that of digging and trenching. This is a part of 

 the science and practice of gardening which does not always 

 receive the careful study ef the amateur gardener that its vast 

 importance deserves. What, it may be asked, is the object of 

 digging ? To put the matter in its crudest and simplest form, it 

 is the promotion of the aeration and good drainage of the soil. 

 The free admission of air to the ground enables the atmosphere 

 to perform its function in the preparation of plant food which 

 shall make the soil more fertile. Good drainage protects plants 

 from drought in summer and from stagnant moisture hi winter. 

 Digging also provides a deep root-run, and, if it be carried out 

 at the proper seasons of the year, a fine seed-bed, when both are 

 most needed. 



But, as is the case with most gardening operations, there are 

 right and wrong methods of digging. Provided one has sufficient 

 physical strength, it looks an easy enough piece of work, but 

 unless some amount of care and forethought be brought to bear 

 upon it, it is certain to be done badly. Obviously, it is useless to 

 endeavour to dig well with the maximum of effect, if an old, rusty, 

 shallow spade be the implement employed. The spade should be 

 bright and clean, as it will be if care has been taken of it when it 

 has been put away in the tool-shed, and its blade must be of such 

 a depth that it will be possible to penetrate at least a foot into the 

 ground. Good digging consists in driving the spade into the 

 ground well down to the haft, almost vertically ; in turning the 

 spit completely over, and in thoroughly breaking up the soil that 

 is to remain below the surface. The reason for this last-named 

 rule will be clear when it is remembered that only a prolonged 

 and abnormal frost can be expected to pulverise the soil to a depth 

 of a foot or eighteen inches. If therefore the lower layer of soil 

 be not thoroughly well broken up during the process of digging, 



