214 BOAKD OF AGRICULTUKE. [Jan. 



strong enough to draw them. The hope of success lies in 

 the improvement of the breed, but there is something beyond 

 this, for the best breeds introduced soon degenerate from 

 lack of nourishment. The country must be better governed, 

 property made more secure, before farmers will find it to 

 their advantage to give their cattle more than the scanty 

 grass they can pick up here and there on the parched hill- 

 sides. The improvement of implements will follow as a 

 matter of course. The same thing is true of the ordinary 

 horses ; barley and straw alone, and the treatment received 

 through many generations, has produced the small, wiry, 

 enduring hack of Asia Minor, as far removed from the lithe 

 form and airy grace of the Arab steed as light is from dark- 

 ness. 



The spade is triangular in shape, with a straight handle, 

 longer than a man is tall. A few inches above the blade, a 

 piece of Avood is mortised in, upon which the foot is set, to 

 force the blade deep into the earth. The length of the 

 handle enables the laborer to lay his whole weight upon the 

 extremity, and afterwards use it as a lever in order to raise 

 a large quaintity of soil which he merely turns over. " Shal- 

 low ploughing but deep spading seem then to be the two 

 chief rules of Oriental agriculture." 



The hoe has a broad blade, not flat, but slightly concave, 

 the handle very short, compelling the laborer to crouch to 

 his work. The sickle is about the same form as our own. 

 The scythe shorter, heavier, clumsier, the snath nearly 

 straight, with but one handle, the left hand grasping the 

 snath itself. The blade has no curve worth mentioning. 

 Fortunately for the back of the laborer, hay is in so little 

 demand that the scythe is practically only used in the cradle, 

 and that not by Turks, but almost exclusively by the Bul- 

 garians. As you pass by the great wheat fields you will see 

 men and women with their sickles slowly and laboriously 

 reaping the golden harvest. Ask them whether they could 

 not do the work much more rapidly and easily with the 

 cradle, and they will answer, " Doubtless." Ask them why 

 they do not use it, they will reply, " Good Lord ! it is not 

 our custom." And that is the end of all controversy with 

 an Oriental. To change the custom of his fathers is as 



