90 SOILS 



Nature Works Slowly. Of course, Nature's tools are 

 not meant for fast-working man : too much, now, is re- 

 quired of the producing power of lands for modern men 

 to depend upon these ancient, these earliest forms of til- 

 lage. Nor are meant for our use to-day the ancient 

 forms designed by the early man : the crooked stick has 

 been displaced ; the wooden plow and the wooden harrow 

 have disappeared ; so, also, all ancient, out-of-date tools 

 and implements for every purpose have been replaced by 

 kinds more suited to the needs and the demands of pres- 

 ent-day requirements. 



Tillage not a modern practice. Nor must we for a 

 moment believe that tillage is a modern discovery. For 

 it is not: it is as old as the practice of putting seed into 

 the soil by cunning animal or man. It is a part of every 

 civilization : of the ancient Chinese, of the Egyptians, 

 of the Greeks, of the Romans, of the Britons ; it is older 

 than history, even older than civilization. 



Jethro Tull the father of modern tillage. The first 

 impetus given modern tillage that has not yet abated 

 had its origin with Jethro Tull, who set forth in 1733, in 

 his book "New Horse-Hoeing Husbandry," his ideas re- 

 garding the value of simple tillage for the purpose of 

 fining the land. His entire philosophy was built on these 

 premises : that plants secure food through absorption 

 of the fine earthy particles ; that as the numbers of these 

 are, increased in the soil, so is increased its productivity; 

 and, consequently, that the maximum growth of plants 

 will result when the earth has been made fine. Neither 

 the wise farmer nor the critical scientist can find fault 

 with this system of tillage, for it is the basis of all good 

 farming to-day. The fault is not with the system, but 

 with the explanation, for plants do not absorb by means 

 of their roots the fine particles of earth, as Tull and his 



