CHAPTER III 

 THE TILLAGE OF FRUIT-LANDS 



THE study of the development of the ideas associated 

 with the tillage of the land opens one of the most interest- 

 ing chapters in history. The subject is all the more 

 suggestive because tillage is such a commonplace and 

 almost universal labor that no one thinks of it as having 

 had a history. Yet the practice of the simple stirring of 

 the soil has been slowly evolved, like all other methods 

 and institutions, through a long period and as the result 

 of many forces that were unobserved or even unknown 

 at the time. 



We think of tillage as a custom; and if one considers 

 the condition of farming at the present moment, he would 

 seem to be warranted in such an association, for a custom 

 is a habit that is not suggested by reason and inquiry. 

 Perhaps the only reason that most persons could give for 

 the tillage of the land is that they are obliged to practice 

 it. It would seem to be the simplest and dullest thing to 

 till the land. It is merely the driving of the animal and 

 the holding of the plow, or taking care that the harrow 

 scarifies the entire surface; or it may be only the stubborn 

 wielding of the hoe or rake. This view of the matter is 

 wholly correct when one thinks of tillage only as labor. 

 The work must be done because, somehow, plants thrive 

 best when it is done; but the sooner it is done and the less 

 there is of it the easier, and what is the easier is the better. 



It was, no doubt, some such mind as this that domi- 

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