68 



l>etween those banks were ploug-hort, and drills l)eing' 

 formed, he gave the usual allowance of manure, and 

 planted potatoes in them ; then, that the banks 

 (which were twelve feet in breadth and two and a-half 

 feet in depth) might not be unproductive, he had 

 them also planted with potatoes in the Munster 

 fashion, with the back of a spade, taking care to 

 cover them sufficiently from fu.-rows at each side of 

 the liank. The produce from these heaps was much 

 greater than from the drills. In the succeeding year, 

 he mixed lime or salt with those banks, from which 

 he had a sufficient supply of rich manure for more 

 than four acres of potatoes or turnips. The wheat 

 and oats in the intervals were surprisingly great and 

 perfectly free from weeds, of which the seeds and 

 roots (with the ivire worms which are so destructive) 

 had l)een effectually carried away in the sods and con- 

 verted into manure. Cabbage plants, carrots, tur- 

 nips and mangel wurzel grew to a prodigious size * in 

 some of those banks, while the intervals were bear- 

 ing corn crops. 



The general advantages to l)e obtained from this 

 jilan, ]NIr. Radcliffe states to be (and in his opinion 

 he is strongly supported by the flattering a])probation 

 of the veteran agriculturist, Sir 3o\\\\ Sinclair, who 

 has written a complimentary letter to him on the 

 subject of his discovery,) the collecting on the spot 

 a great quantity of the choicest manure, producing 

 valuable crops, while it is rotting ; the clearing of 

 the land from weeds ; the saving of a ploughing to 

 one-sixth part of the field, which of itself will pro- 

 duce more a])undantly than the remainder that is 

 cultivated in the best manner, and the bringing into 

 action a body of fresh earth, enriched by manures 

 washed into it during the preceding years. 



* ToEACf:o will flourish surprisingly in these banks, if a 

 small (juantity of rich compost be laid under each plant, pro- 

 vided that the wire or cut worm does not remain in them, 

 otherAvise, the tobacco plants will be eaten through the stems 

 as fast as they are planted. 



