TJie Husbandry of the Period. 



239 



army." The drilled crop, standing upon about one-sixtli of 

 the ground occupied by the same amount when broadcast, 

 greatly reduced the number of necessary strokes from the 

 sickle ; and when it came to be set up in shock was far more 

 speedily brought into a condition for carrying and stacking, 

 on account of its almost entire freedom from weeds. Under 

 the old process of wheat cultivation the various tillages, inclu- 

 sive of the previous season's bare fallowing, were three 

 ploughings, one harrowing, then the sowing, and lastly the 

 weeding. 



TuU made out the cost per acre of the new process to be 

 just one-ninth that of the old : — 



Old System. 



Three ploughings, har- 

 rowing, and sowing ... 



2^ bushels of wheat, at os. 



Rent of the year's fallow 



Weeding ... 



30 loads of dung, and 

 carriage... 



Reaping ... 



New System. 



8 hoeings ... 

 Drilling ... 



Weeding 



3 pecks of seed ... 

 Uncovering from clods 

 Pickling seed 

 Reaping ... 



£ 





 

 

 

 

 

 



d. 

 

 6 

 6 

 3 

 2 

 1 

 6 



£0 10 



It might have been supposed that the yield from 2| bushels of 

 seed under the old system would have exceeded that from 

 three pecks under the new ; but Tull claimed not only a 

 superiority for his process in this respect, but a greater cer- 

 tainty of a good crop, and a better condition of the soil for 

 further cultivation when it had been harvested. 



In his cultivation of the turnip he formed the same six-feet 

 breadths, but drilled only one line of turnip seed. In order to 

 counteract the ravages of the fly he not only sowed two lots of 

 seed at different depths along the same row, but old and new 

 seed, so as to insure a germination so prolonged as to survive 

 any reasonable spell of unpropitious weather. 



Tull's work appeared in 1731, and a generation later it was 



