ifoo HEDGE S. 14* 



IV. The treatment or old hedges. The 

 hedge-wood being felled to the Itiib, and the 

 pollards headed, the ditch is fcoured to its ori- 

 ginal depth ; the beft of the foil being collcdted 

 into heaps on the brink of the ditch for the 

 ufe of the farmer, in bottoming his yard or 

 his dung-heaps, and the remainder laid to the 

 roots of the ftubs, or formed into a bank 

 behind them. On the top of the bank a brufh- 

 hedge is' fet as a guard to the back ; — while 

 fometimes the bottom of the ditch is pointed 

 (that is, narrowed to a point}, or filled with 

 thorns or other bufhes, — as a guard to the face 

 of the young hedge. 



The laft, however, is feldom done, nor often 

 requifite ; for the Norfolk hufbandmen are 

 pretty obfervant in cutting thofe hedges, in any 

 given year, which face their wheat in that year ;: 

 by which means the young hedge'acqulres four 

 or five years growth before the inclofure, it is ex- 

 pofed to, becomes a fpring or fummer paf- 

 ture. 



This is the ufual treatment of old rough 

 liedges in which pollards and flubwood abound, 

 and which conftitute the principal part of the 

 hedges of Eaft-Norfolk. 



Therr 



