AGRICULTURE. 



half are a full distance for them. The 

 best protection for them from the cater- 

 pillar, by which these and greens in gene- 

 ral are apt particularly to be injured, is 

 to pull off the large umler-leaves, (which 

 may be given to cows with great benefit) 

 on which the eggs of those insects are 

 usually deposited. Sowing beans among 

 the cabbages is also considered a most 

 effectual preventive of the nuisance. 



Carrots require a deeper soil than any 

 other root, and when the soil does not na- 

 turally extend to the depth of twelve 

 inches, equally good throughout, it must 

 be artificially made so for their culture, 

 which may be easily effected by trench- 

 ploughing. Loams and sandy soils are 

 the only ones in which they will flourish, 

 and no dung can be used for them in the 

 year they are sown, as it will inevitably 

 rot them. The ground must be prepared 

 for them by the deepest possible furrows, 

 and, when they are sown about the be- 

 ginning of April, it must be smoothed by 

 a brake. In large plots of ground, where 

 horse-hoeing is requisite,three feet should 

 be the distance between the drills. Where 

 an acre or little more only is employed, 

 the interval should not be greater than a 

 foot, and hand-hoeing will be found more 

 convenient, and scarcely attended with 

 greater expense. From six to nine hun- 

 dred bushels have been produced per 

 acre of this root, where the land has been 

 carefully prepared and attended to. As 

 food for horses, its culture is rapidly 

 spreading. For oxen, milch cows, and 

 pigs, carrots are admirably applicable and 

 nourishing, and, when boiled, turkeys and 

 other poultry are fed on them with great 

 success. 



The ease with which parsnips are cul- 

 tivated, and the great quantity of saccha- 

 rine and nutritious matter which they 

 contain, in which they are scarcely ex- 

 ceeded by any vegetable whatever, ren- 

 der them well worthy of the attention of 

 the husbandman. Though little used in 

 Britain, they are highly esteemedin many 

 disHcts of France, in some parts being 

 thought little inferior to wheat as food 

 for man. Cows which are fed with them 

 are stated to give as much milk as they do 

 in the months of summer. All animals 

 eat them with avidity, and in preference 

 to potatoes, and fatten more quickly upon 

 them. In the cultivation of them the seed 

 should be sown in the autumn, immedi- 

 ately after it is reaped. When the seed 

 is put in at this season, the plants will an- 

 ticipate the growth of weeds in the fol- 

 lowing spring. Frost never does them 



VOL. I. 



any material injury. The best soil foi 

 them is a deep rich loam. Sand is next 

 suitable to them ; and in a black, gritty 

 soil they will flourish, but not in gravel 

 or clay. In the deepest earth they are al- 

 ways largest. In an appropriate soil no 

 manure is necessary for them, and a very 

 good crop has been obtained for three 

 years in succession, without using any. 

 The seed should be sown in drills, at the 

 distance of eighteen inches, for the great- 

 er convenience of hoeing; and by a se- 

 cond hoeing and a cautious earthing, by 

 which the leaves may not be covered, the 

 crop will be luxuriant. In Jersey, the root 

 has been known and cultivated for seve- 

 ral centuries, and is highly valued. It is 

 considered as an excellent preparation for 

 wheat, which, after parsnips, yields an 

 abundant crop without any manure. 



The profit of cultivating hemp-seed is 

 by no means small. It requires, how- 

 ever, the best land that can be found on a 

 farm, or which is made such by manuring. 

 A rich, deep, putrid, and friable loam is 

 what it particularly delights in; and in 

 addition to natural richness, forty cubical 

 yards of dung per acre should be suppli- 

 ed. Besides this original cost of land in 

 natural richness and preparation, it is to 

 be considered that hemp returns nothing- 

 to the farm yard, while corn will give 

 straw, and the dung-hill is improved by 

 green crops. The question concerning- 

 the propriety of its cultivation by any in- 

 dividual is not to be determined, there- 

 fore, only from the circumstance of any 

 price in the market, but is to be inferred 

 from a view of all its bearings and con- 

 nections. For many crops, tillage should 

 be given with caution. With hemp such 

 caution is unnecessary, as its rank and 

 luxuriant growth proves fatal to all those 

 weeds, by which corn would not only be 

 injured, but destroyed. From the au- 

 tumn preceding to the time of sowing- 

 hemp, the land should be three or four 

 times ploughed, and be well harrowed to 

 a fine surface. The quantity of dung- 

 should be proportioned to the deficiency 

 of the soil; and when the culture is con- 

 tinued from year to year, a plentiful dress- 

 ing must be every time applied. About 

 twelve pecks should be sown per acre : 

 and as the destruction of weeds in the till- 

 age is here no object, the broadcast me- 

 thod is universally preferable to the drill. 

 It will be ready for pulling in August, or 

 about thirteen weeks after it is sown. 



Flax, with due attention, will repav its 

 cultivation ; but, generally speaking, in 

 this country the same land and manure 



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