FRE 



half pints of water, in form of a 

 drench : keep his feet stufTed with 

 fresh cow manure, and bathe his 

 legs with equal parts of sharp vine- 

 gar, spirits, and sweet oil, or lard. 

 By attention to these directions, in 

 two or three days the horse will 

 again be fit for service." 



FREEZING. As a more com- 

 plete subdivision and pulverization 

 of the soil is one of the chief ends 

 of culture by the plough and the 

 harrow, it is very important that 

 every farmer should be deeply im- 

 pressed with the TRUTH, that frost 

 operates as powerfully as any hu- 

 man means towards the same end. 

 It is indeed generally known and 

 faintly acknowledged, that frost 

 breaks up the soil ; but too small a 

 proportion of our farmers apply 

 this principle sufficiently in prac- 

 tice. Fall ploughing is very im- 

 portant for this purpose, and back 

 furrowing, so as to lay the land in 

 ridges, still more so. 



The European gardeners, who 

 have been introduced here within 

 the last twenty years, annually ei- 

 ther trench our gardens, which is 

 nothing more than digging them 

 two spades deep, or throw them up 

 in high ridges to be open to frost. 

 They learned these usages in Great 

 Britain, where, however, the frost 

 has much less power than with us. 

 We have seen the soil so entirely 

 broken and pulverized by the 

 course just mentioned, as to re- 

 quire no digging in the spring, only 

 levelling, before the very smallest 

 seeds were sown. It cannot be 

 questioned that frost ought not to 

 be overlooked as a very efficient 

 auxiliarv in cultivation, 

 2f 



FRU 



161 



FRUIT TREES. The old 



practice of pruning fruit trees in 

 autumn has been condemned by 

 nnodern writers. Mr. Forsyth, in 

 his Treatise on Fnnt Trees, (p. 18, 

 Cobbett's edition) says, " 1 have a 

 great dislike to autumnal pruning 

 of .fruit trees; of all kmds of stone 

 fruits in particular; for by pruning 

 at that season, you seldom fail to 

 bring on canker. Whereas, in 

 spring, when the sap is beginning 

 to follow the knife, the lips will 

 quickly grow." 



A writer, whose essay on the sub- 

 ject of apple trees, is published in 

 the " Massachusetts Agricultural 

 Repository," vol. V. p. 121 to 127, 

 mentions three modes of misman- 

 agement, which injure orchards in 

 the vicinity of Boston. J. Begin- 

 ning to prune them in March, 

 •' when there is still much wet and 

 frosty weather, and no activity in 

 the sap of the tree." 2. The 

 " old practice o[ hacking and muti- 

 lating apple trees in a manner ruin- 

 ous to an orchard. It is a univer- 

 sal practice among the old farmers, 

 to mount the tree with a hatchet 

 or bill hook, and hack off any 

 branch which is in a state of decay, 

 or which is misplaced, about six or 

 eight inches from its insertion, 

 leaving a stump to rot, and to ope- 

 rate as a conductor of the water 

 frost and canker into the mother 

 branch in which it grew, or into 

 the body of the tree according to 

 its situation. This was done ori- 

 ginally from an idea that if you cut 

 close to the mother branch, or to 

 the body of the tree, the rot or 

 canker will seize more readily on 

 its trunk, than if cut at a distance. 



