22 PREPARATION OF THE SOIL. 



one to three of earth, or with lime at the rate of one 

 to six; the whole to be turned over once or twice 

 a-year, till the hollys, as previously recommended, 

 have attained the proper size; and the soil to which 

 they are destined, beingnow renovated by trenching, 

 may in the meantime, be enriched with manure, 

 and kept clean by alternate crops of potatoes and 

 turnips; whilst the matured compost will be in 

 readiness for application to the roots of the hollys 

 in the final act of transplanting. That so much 

 care and trouble are not needlesly bestowed may 

 be ascertained by examining the state of the mould 

 from which the poor and profitless tenantry have 

 been ejected; it is dry as dust and terribly im- 

 poverished; it seems, at a small depth from the 

 surface, not to have felt the refreshing of a shower 

 for half a century; it has seen no sun and suffered 

 no frost, nor has it breathed the vital air in all 

 that time; it is mingled with the recent chips of 

 the mattock, and full of turfy fibres, which, though 

 dead, are undecaying as wool or hair. In this state 

 it might do well for oats or barley; but not for your 

 hollys, the hope of your old age and of centuries 

 to come: and hence the use of a contrary series of 

 productions, and of the rich mound to be had as 

 above described: or failing that, a portion of the 

 rooty earth may be exchanged for the black mould 

 of an old onion bed. 



Proceeding thus with good assurance of success, 

 you cannot choose for the operation of transplant- 

 ing a better time than the gloomy month of 



