AGRICULTURE. 



barley should be increased as the season 

 advances, as early sown crops have more 

 time to tiller than later ones ; and in the 

 same proportion, the importance of the 

 drill husbandry with regard to this arti- 

 cle increases; as, if sown in the latter 

 end of February, in the broadcast me- 

 thod, it would get, the start of weeds, 

 which, if it be sown early in April, would 

 extremely annoy it, according- to the old 

 mode, but by the hoeing practice may be 

 easily removed. 



Oats should never be sown after other 

 corn crops (as the land is by this practice 

 too much exhausted,) and should receive 

 the same preparation as barley: a circum- 

 stance often not sufficiently attended to. 

 Warm, forward sands yield as great a 

 quantity of barley as of oats, and should, 

 therefore be applied to the culture of the 

 former, as generally yielding a better 

 price. Upon various other soils, however, 

 the produce of oats will be in considerably 

 greater proportion than that of barley, 

 and by superior quantity more than com- 

 pensate for being sold at the smaller price. 

 To relieve the business of the succeed- 

 ing months, oats may sometimes be sown 

 in January ; without this view, however, 

 February is preferable. The land should 

 have been ploughed in October. Six 

 bushels per acre may be sown in broad- 

 cast, and on poor soils even eight, to great 

 advantage : the crop being, by thick sow- 

 ing, several days sooner ripe, and the idea 

 of saving seed with respect to this grain 

 not being an object worth any particular 

 attention. In the drill husbandry five 

 bushels per acre are sufficient, and they 

 should be horse-hoed early in the month 

 of May. 



Peas are extremely ameliorating to the 

 soil, and may therefore, with very great 

 advantage, be substituted in tillage for 

 white corn, a succession of which is pe- 

 culiarly impoverishing. They should, 

 however, not be sown on lands negligent- 

 ly prepared, as is too commonly done; and 

 indeed the maxim cannot be too much 

 attended to, with respect to grain, that 

 none should be sown but on lands in real- 

 ly good order, with respect to heart, 

 cleanness from weeds, and well-finished 

 tilth. The uncertainty generally ascribed 

 to this crop is to be attributed in a great 

 degree to a neglect of these circumstan- 

 ces. At the same time, however, it is not 

 meant to be asserted, that for all grain 

 the preparation sh;n;ld be equally high 

 and finished. The earlier peas are sown, 

 the better they will thrive, and the more 

 easily they will be moved off the ground 



in due time for turnips, a circumstance of 

 particular importance. February is the 

 proper month for their being sown. Ear- 

 ly peas will seldom prove beneficial upon, 

 wet soils, and should be cultivated only 

 on dry ones, upon sands, dry sandy loams, 

 gravels, and chalks. The broadcast me- 

 thod should be most clearly njected in 

 relation to them. The only question is 

 between drilling and dibbling ih em. On 

 a ley, the latter practice cannot be too de- 

 cidedly adopted. Put in on a. layer, they 

 do not want manure, \vluc:i will often, 

 make them run to long .straw, a circum- 

 stance unfavourable to podding, and like- 

 wise encourages weeds, which, in the in- 

 fant stage of the growth of peas, cannot 

 be extirpated without danger. If the 

 land be in good heart, therefore, as it 

 ought to be, dung may be applied with 

 much more advantage to other crops ; 

 and being an article for which the farmer 

 has, perhaps in all cases, a greater de- 

 mand than he can supply, should be used 

 with economy, and only where it is sure 

 to answer best. The proper quantity of 

 seeds to be applied in the drill-husbandry, 

 in equally distant rows, about one foot 

 asunder, is seven pecks per acre. It is a 

 judicious and valuable observation, the 

 result of long 1 experience, that peas should 

 not be sown above once in about ien years, 

 being not found to succeed, if sown 

 oftener. 



Beans, where the land is proper for 

 them, deserve from the farmer every at- 

 tention, constituting one of the surest 

 funds of profit. He is enabled by them 

 to lessen, if not absolutely explode, the 

 practice of fallowing. When cultivated, 

 however, with a view of substituting them 

 in the room of fallow, drilling or dibbling 

 must be uniformly employed, so as to ad- 

 mit the plough between their rows, as no 

 hand work will sufficiently pulverize the 

 lands for the purpose, without extreme 

 expence. Dibbl ng, when well perform- 

 ed, with respect to beans, is an admirable 

 method. The difficulty, however, of pro- 

 curing it to be well done must be consi- 

 dered as no trifling objection to it. Beans 

 are too often imperfecily delivered by the 

 various drill-machines employed. On the 

 other hand, however, the practice is less 

 expensive than dibbling, and the seed is 

 more surely put into the desired depth, 

 so that, on the whole, the drilling me- 

 thod seems preferable to that by dibbling. 

 It is a point "n which different circum- 

 stances will suiely and judiciously lead to 

 different conclusions; and soil, season, 

 dependance upon servants, together with 



