48 AUSTRALIAN AGRICULTURE. 



being the unhealthy look of his trees or crops. This state 

 of things occurs on hill sides as surely as on more level 

 lands. Indeed the case of hill sides is the worst. For, in 

 addition to the drowning of roots and development of 

 unhealhy stuff in the subsoil, the best of the surface 

 matter may be washed away and lost. 



CHAPTER V. MECHANICS OF AGRICULTURE. 



Before entering upon the work of crop making, it may 

 be well for us to look still more closely into the nature 

 of the mechanical appliances available for our operations. 

 Agriculture has advanced in two very distinct lines during 

 the hundred and fifty years since the science emerged 

 from the long dark period during which the cultivator of 

 the soil was the drudge of the time, whose main efforts 

 were dependent upon his own manual strength. Those 

 two lines are chemistry and mechanics. The former has 



The Plough Wedffe, .Screw, and Lever. 



done much for agriculture, tending as it has, directly and 

 in the most effectively practical manner, to make clear and 

 plain what, prior to the days of agricultural chemistry, 

 were dark, doubtful, or mysterious. This branch of 

 chemistry, fortunately for agriculture, has been fostered 

 and encouraged by public as well as by the individual 

 efforts of the many grand and noble men who employed 

 their talents in that direction during late years. And in 

 the various schools opened for agricultural instruction, 

 chemistry has been recognised as a leading principle, and 

 due attention has been paid to it. 



But mechanics, as applied to agriculture, have not 

 fared so well. With the exception of the American 



