AND RURAL ECONOMIST. 283 



more fresh. On retentive soils, where the practice of loosen- 

 ing them to some depth by other implements is omitted, deep 

 ploughing is however extremely necessary.' 



In an ' Essay on the best means of converting Grass Lands 

 into Tillage, by James Roper Head, Esq.,' published in Com- 

 munications to the Board of Agriculture, vol. iii. page 346, 

 it is observed that ' it seems reasonable to prefer light to 

 heavy ploughing, because, all things being equal, it must be 

 preferable to have a small depth of soil to cultivate and im- 

 prove ; and inasmuch as the fibres of grass in general are fed 

 from the upper surface of the earth alone, if they find suffi- 

 cient pabulum, all that lie underneath their nourishment, 

 and has been with much labor moved by the plough, is like a 

 stock in trade, which requires an extra capital, unproductive 

 of interest. 



' 1 have endeavored by all means to search into the nature 

 of sainfoin, clover, and lucerne, and the result of my opinion 

 has been that the long penetrating tap-roots of these grasses 

 pierce the earth in search of moisture only ; that the tap- 

 root is the mere syphon and duct ; that the branches of the 

 crown of the plant are fed alone by the upper surface of the 

 soil ; and that the luxuriancy of their produce depends not 

 upon the congeniality of the bed or iiidus [nest] of the tap- 

 root itself, but on the congeniality of the soil of the upper 

 surface, which alone feeds and furnishes it vegetation.' 



An article in ' Communications to the Board of Agricul- 

 ture,' vol. iv. page 147, written by John M. Mardo, Esq., 

 contains the fallowing statement : ' We have witnessed in- 

 stances where old pasture lands composed of a gravelly loam 

 were broken up in the spring for barley by trench plough- 

 ing. The old sward was turned into the bottom of the fur- 

 row, and a dry subsoil brought to the surface from a con- 

 siderable depth. The crops failed entirely, and there ap- 

 peared two very obvious reasons for the failure ; first, the 

 subsoil brought to the surface to form the seed bed had long 

 been deprived of the ordinary influence of the atmosphere 

 and the rains ; consequently must have been cold and in- 

 fertile. Secondly, the dry tenacious sward having been 

 placed half broken under the seed bed, the natural moisture 

 of the ground, as well as that which falls in rain, was spee- 

 dily and habitually evaporated. Unless in a season of un- 

 common moisture, a crop under such preparation could not 

 prosper.' 



A writer in the General Report of Scotland, Mr. James 



