THE SCOTS GARDENER 



marked stake, cause his assistant or stake-marker 

 proceed. 



To level as the ground lyes, let its slop be what 

 it will, you need neither level or rule, (except you 

 please to try how much it slops, after it is done, for 

 satisfaction) ; only set stakes as before, and viewing 

 the ground narrowly, put nails in the stakes, which 

 are at the extreams, where you think the ground 

 will run when levelled, to make it serve it self, and 

 as it lyes best or easiest for levelling ; and when 

 you have concluded upon the level at the extreams, 

 mark all the stakes in the interval, by viewing as 

 above. 



But to proportion the level to the ground, is the 

 whole art of levelling. 'Tis true it is easy, if you 

 have a plot or walke a foot higher at one end, to 

 take half a foot thereof, and lay on the low end, so 

 as the two ends may be horizontal ; or, if it be hori- 

 zontal, to take nine inches off the one end, and lay 

 on the other, that it may slop eighteen inches; but 

 if some places of it lye one way, and some another, 

 and some neither the one nor the other, this in- 

 creaseth the difficulty. Wherefore you must first 

 drive stakes at the corners of the plot ; then view 

 the ground about and put nailesin the stakes where 



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