1S35.] 



F A R M 



S ' REG 



T E R 



733 



over the soil, such a number of women or chil- 

 dren, attended by an overseer, should be employ- 

 ed to Ibllovv the carts, as will effect this in the most 

 perfect manner. That number will of course be 

 regulated by the condition of the manure, the 

 quantity to be used, and the distance, from which 

 it is drawn. The farmer himself, or some trusty 

 person in whom he can confide, should not only 

 determine the number of loads that are to be 

 spread upon each acre, but should carefully regu- 

 late the distance, which each load should cover, by 

 measuring the quantity of land: this, when it is 

 laid on in regular ridges, is very easily ascertained 

 by pacing them, and summing up the length and 

 the breadth of the ridges; and then it is only need- 

 ful to direct the carter to make each load cover a 

 certain space — as one load upon one ridge, or 

 three loads upon two ridges, &c. But if it is deter- 

 mined to lay down the manure in small heaps for 

 the followers to spread entirely, in this case, the 

 distance of each separate heap should be paced 

 over and marked.* The regularity of the distri- 

 bution of manure ought never to be intrusted to 

 common laborers without superintendence. If the 

 carter be employed, unless a boy be given him to 

 drive, the necessary degree of equality can hardly 

 be expected. It may also be sometimes advisable 

 to lay a larger quantity upon one part than upon 

 another of the same field, for the soils may differ; 

 or it may lie upon a declivity, in which case it 

 will only be prudent to put more upon the upper 

 part than upon the bottoms; for, even under the 

 most careful distribution, they assuredly will re- 

 ceive an additional portion, which will be swept 

 from the heights. Care is also requisite, in cart- 

 ing out dung and all manuure, to make the drivers 

 keep on the head-land till they come to the end 

 of the land which is manuring, so as to make each 

 ridge bear its exact proportion of damage; or, for 

 want of such attention, the men, if left to them- 

 selves, make roads across from the gate in every 

 direction, to the great injury of the c'rop.t 



Such is the most approved mode in the broad- 

 cast manner; but where the drill husbandry pre- 

 vails, it is by no means unusual to lay ihe dung 

 in the intervals of these small ridges, as practised 

 for turnips throughout. Scotland and the north of 

 England. The drills are in this case generally form- 

 ed at the distance of 27 inches, or thereabouts, from 

 the centre of each; and by driving the carts along 

 the middle one of the space, intended to be ma- 

 nured, the dung is drawn out in such proportions 

 as may be judged necessary. If the breadth of 

 three drills be only taken at a time, the dun» 

 stands a better chance of being equally laid in 

 them; for it often happens that, when a greater 

 number are included in one space, the outside drills 

 receive a less quantity than those which intervene. 

 Others, however, thinking that by only taking 

 three drills at a time, the travel of the horses is 

 unnecessarily increased, take five drills into one 

 space; but, in that case, the number of spreaders 

 must be increased, as at least one is requisite to 

 each drill, and unless care be taken in the superin- 



* A table, stating the number of heaps or busheU per 

 acre, will be inserted at the close of the subject of ma- 

 nure. 



t Norfolk Report, chap. xi. sect, iii.; Marshall's 

 Midland Counties, vol. ii. p. 37; Brown, of Blarkle, 

 on Rural Affairs, vol. i.p, 399. 



tendence, some, inequality will occur in the distri- 

 bution. It is, however, obvious that the labor of 

 the teams, as well as the poaching of the land, 

 will be thereby lessened; and if a sufficient num- 

 ber of spreaders be employed, the work will also 

 be more speedily executed. Women and children, 

 having light grapes, or forks, are strong enough 

 — four are generally found sufficient for what is call- 

 ed 'a head of carts;' and the, spreading is adroitly 

 perfumed even by small boys and girls, after they 

 have been a little time accustomed to the task.* 



It is obvious in the ploughing down of dung 

 that, if it be not turned down accurately, it be- 

 comes partly exposed to the atmosphere, instead 

 of being buried in the soil. Skim-coulter ploughs 

 have been used to obviate this inconvenience, but 

 — especially in the case of long dung — there is 

 great difficulty in preventing it from choking the 

 instrument, thus occasioning a great, increase of 

 draught to the cattle, as well as of labor to the 

 ploughman, rendering the land foul, and defeating 

 one of the main objects of good husbandry. It is 

 also, by some farmers, expedient to bury fresh 

 dung so deep below the soil as to allow it to fer- 

 ment there without being disturbed by the har- 

 rows, or even by the shallow ploughing of suc- 

 cessive tillage; but independently of the "objection 

 which has been already raised against that prac- 

 tice,! it is not, in any such case, found easy to 

 make clean work. 



Many attempts have been made to correct this 

 fault, and considerable improvement has been ef- 

 fected in the construction of ploughs, particularly 

 by the Scotch, some of whose iron swing ploughs 

 have gone far towards a remedy of the defect. 

 One lately invented by Mr. Finlayson, under the 

 tide of the 'patent self-cleaning plough,' which 

 we shall hereafter have occasion to describe, seems 

 to merit particular attention.!; 



As relating to the quantity of farm-yard dung 

 necessary for raising a course of crops upon arable 

 land of various soils, and under different systems 

 of cultivation, with the proportion which they are 

 capable of producing, it has been justly remarked 

 by Dr. Coventry 'that ignorance, and wrong no- 

 tions about the matter, have produced serious er- 

 rors in practice; and the information concerning it 

 found in books of Agriculture is in general scanty 

 and seldom correct. It is therefore, an object of 

 primary importance to ascertain, as precisely as 

 possible, what are the particulars that merit chief 

 notice on the subject of cropping, the selection of 

 the most proper species, the proportion that should 

 subsist between them, and the most convenient 

 order in which they should be raised. '§ 



The latter subject, will be duly considered when 

 we come to treat on the rotation of crops, and we 

 have already noticed the average product of land 

 of ordinary culture and fertility;]! but, assuming 

 some admitted facts as data upon which to ground 

 our opinion of the quantity of putrescent manure 



* Farmer's Magazine, vol. v. p. 1G5. 

 f See p. 259, 1. 4. 



% See Finlayson's Ploughman's Guide, with en°ra- 

 vings, 2nd edit. 



§ Essay on Manures, by Dr. Coventry. See the 

 Quart. Journ. of Agric, vol. ii. 



|| See pp. 253, 254. 



