BRITTLE HOOF. 



BROCCOLI. 



best. At an average of three years ending 

 with 1831, says Mr. M'Culloch, the entries for 

 home consumption in England amounted to 

 1,789,801 Ibs. annually. They contain a con- 

 siderable quantity of gelatine, which may be 

 separated from them by boiling water. 



BRITTLE HOOF is an affection of the 

 horse's hoof, very common, especially in sum- 

 mer, in England, from bad stable management. 

 A mixture of one part of oil of tar and two of 

 common fish oil, well rubbed into the crust 

 and the hoof, will restore the natural pliancy 

 and toughness of the horn, and very much 

 contribute to the quickness of its growth. 

 (Youatt, On the Horse, p. 282.) 



BRIZA MEDIA. See Plate 6, n. Common 

 quaking grass; ladies' tresses: a perennial 

 grass, flowering in May and June. It is dis- 

 tinguished by the panicle of short spikelets, 

 tinged with purplish brown. The spikelets 

 are ovate, on very slender stems, which makes 

 the panicle tremulous. This grass, says Sin- 

 clair, is best fitted for poor soils ; its nutritive 

 powers are considerable, compared with other 

 grasses tenanting a similar soil. It is eaten 

 by horses, cows, and sheep; and for poor 

 sandy and tenacious soils, where improvements 

 in other respects cannot be sufficiently effected, 

 to fit them for the productions of the superior 

 soils, the common quaking grass will be found 

 of value. 



BRIZE LANDS. A provincial term for 

 lands which have remained long without til- 

 lage. Brize is also a name for the gad-fly, used 

 commonly in the days of Shakspeare and Ben 

 Jonson. (2V. and Cress.; Poetaster, iii. 1.) 



BROAD-CAST SOWING. The primitive, 

 rapidly diminishing method of putting grain, 

 turnip, pulse, clover, grasses, &c., into the soil, 

 performed by means of the hand. This mode 

 of sowing seems better .adapted to the stony 

 and more stiff kinds of land than that by ma- 

 chines ; as in such grounds they are liable to be 

 constantly put out of order, and to deposit the 

 seed unequally. In this way, however, the 

 seeds are scattered over the ground, and not 

 confined in regular rows, as is the case with 

 the drill husbandry, which is in several ways 

 more advantageous to the farmer. This mode 

 . of sowing, perhaps from its being that mads 

 use of in the infancy of agriculture, has often 

 been called the old method. 



In this method of sowing, the usual practice, 

 especially where the ridges are equal in breadth, 

 and not of too great a width, as five or six 

 yards, is that of dispersing the seed regularly 

 over each land or ridge, in once walking over; 

 the seedsman, by different casts of the hand, 

 -sowing one-half in going and the other in re- 

 turning. In doing this, it is the custom of some 

 seedsmen to fill the hand from the basket or 

 hopper which they carry along with them, as 

 they make one step forward, and disperse the 

 seed in the time of performing the next; while 

 others scatter the seed, or make their casts, as 

 they are termed by farmers, in advancing each 

 ste% It is evident, therefore, that in accom- 

 pli^Jing this business with regularity and ex- 

 actness, upon which much of the success of 

 the crop must depend, there is considerable 

 difficulty, and the proper knowledge .and habit 

 226 



of which can only be acquired by experience. 

 This, however, by long practice, is done with 

 surprising regularity and precision. The 

 broad-cast system not only requires more seed, 

 but it renders the hoeing, so essential to the 

 most profitable growth of grain, much more 

 difficult. Machines have been invented for 

 distributing the seed broad-cast, which th'ey 

 perform with perfect precision : these are more 

 especially useful for the grass seeds, and are 

 simple and economical ; a plate of one may be 

 seen in Professor Low's Prac. Jig. p. 108, and 

 another in British Husb. vol. ii. p. 14. These, 

 however, require some attention in their work- 

 ing, to prevent the clogging of the seed. 



BROAD-WHEELED WAGON. A four- 

 wheeled carriage, in which the parts of the 

 wheels that act upon the road are of considera- 

 ble breadth. By the acts 3 G. 4, c. 126, s. 12, 

 and 4 & 5 W. 4, c. 81, wagons, wains, and 

 other four-wheeled carriages, whether on 

 springs or not, whose wheels have their fellies 

 of not less than four and a half inches at the 

 bottom or soles, are considered to be broad- 

 wheeled. 



BROCCOLI (Srassica oleracca botrytis). The 

 varieties of this cabbage are now numerous, 

 and are chiefly the fruits of the great attention 

 which has been paid to its cultivation of late 

 years. For an uninterrupted supply, scarce 

 any of these varieties can be dispensed with ; 

 but the purple and white are those most gene- 

 rally cultivated. With respect to their quality, 

 it has been remarked that they have less of 

 the peculiar alkalescent taste, and are more 

 palatable, in proportion as they approach a 

 pale or white colour. (Transact. Hort. Soc. 

 Land. vol. i. p. 1 16.) 



1. Purple cape, or autumnal broccoli. 2. 

 Green cape, or autumnal broccoli. 3. Grange's 

 early cauliflower broccoli. 4. Green, close- 

 headed winter broccoli. 5. Early purple broc- 

 coli. 6. Early white broccoli. 7. Dwarf brown 

 close-headed broccoli. 8. Tall, large-headed 

 purple broccoli. 9. Cream-coloured, or Ports- 

 mouth broccoli. 10. Sulphur-coloured broc- 

 coli. 11. Spring white, or cauliflower broccoli. 



12. Late dwarf close-headed purple broccoli. 



13. Latest green, Siberian, or Spanish broccoli. 

 Broccoli is propagated by seed. As all of 



the kinds are not generally at command, the 

 following times and varieties are specified as 

 being those employed in general practice, and 

 by which a supply nearly unfailing is accom- 

 plished. A first sowing may be made under a 

 frame at the close of January, and a second at 

 the end of February, or early in March, on an 

 eastern wall-border, of the purple cape and 

 early cauliflower varieties, for production at 

 the close of summer and during autumn ; the 

 seedlings from these sowings are respectively 

 fit for pricking out, if that practice is followed, 

 in March and early in April, and for final plant- 

 ing at the close of tha latter month and May. 

 In April, another crdp of the same varieties 

 may be sown, for pricking out in May and 

 planting in June, to produce at the close pf 

 autumn and in early winter. During the mid- 

 dle of May, a fourth and larger crop than any 

 of the preceding, of the early purple and white 

 varieties, to be pricked out in June and planted 



