182 SOWING. 



and thresh them, to discharge the seeds and prepare 

 them for the seed-bed. 



A few seeds receive a preparation before sowing : 

 and many, especially such as have been long in the 

 warehouse, would, no doubt, be the better for it. The 

 excitement from a dry soil is not always sufficient to 

 awaken the vital principle. It is said, that some 

 seeds will not vegetate at all without the extraor- 

 dinary stimulus of passing through the stomach and 

 intestines of an animal ! Be this as it may, we are 

 well assured, that in the case of pulse seeds, their 

 % germination is accelerated by being steeped in water 

 for a few hours before sowing. Soaking the seeds for an 

 hour or two in oxalic acid, or slightly watering them 

 with it after being sown, is said to assist germination 

 materially. 



Wheat is always prepared for sowing. This old 

 custom is differently regarded by agriculturists as 

 to its real object and efficiency. We hear nothing of 

 brining and liming in old Tusser's time, 1575. 

 Drawing the wheat seed, *". e. laying it on a table 

 and separating the good grains from the bad, or vice 

 rersd, was then the usual practice. This was the far- 

 mer's and his family's task on evenings during seed- 

 time, a most tedious process ; and no doubt gave rise 

 to the custom of washing it, to separate at once the 

 light from the heaviest grain. A lixivium made by 

 the addition of common salt to the water was found 

 best for this purpose of floating the light grains, 

 smut-balls seeds, of weeds, and other extraneous 



