CULTUEAL PEEPAEATIONS. 17 



produce abundant crops. The fact that heavy soils are expensive 

 to cultivate as arable is an additional reason -why they should be 

 laid down to grass. Again, if there be the choice of two fields, 

 one sloping to the north and the other to the south, preference 

 should be given to the former, because it will be less liable to 

 burn in a hot summer. 



Drainage is a matter of the utmost consequence, and this fact 

 is enlarged upon in the preceding chapter. If the land is natu- 

 rally well drained, there will be a fortunate saving of expense, 

 but otherwise this operation should be preliminary to all else. 



Beyond question, the very best preparation for a spring 

 sowing of permanent grass seeds is a bare fallow in the previous 

 summer. This affords the opportunity of destroying successive 

 crops of indigenous annual weeds, and it is important that these 

 should be got rid of by scarifying and dragging rather than by 

 ploughing, for the plough is only too certain to bring to the sur- 

 face a fresh stock of weed seeds ready to germinate in the follow- 

 ing spring. Many influences may aid or hinder the work of 

 preparation, which depends not only upon the character of the soil 

 and the previous cropping, but also upon the atmospheric condi- 

 tions which prevail while the operations are in progress. Here 

 the advantage of a bare fallow is realised, because the cultivator 

 has the whole summer and early autumn in which to accomplish 

 the task. 



Deep ploughing should be carried out first, and if subsoiling 

 is considered necessary there is all the greater reason for doing it 

 early. Then, by means of the scarifier and the roller, the soil can 

 be cleaned and so far prepared to receive the seeds that in the 

 following spring only one or two turns with the harrow will 

 be necessary to perfect the seed-bed. There are good reasons 

 for insisting on a thorough preparation of the land in the first 

 instance. Careless and half-hearted work wastes both seed and 

 labour, and the necessary operations have to be attempted a 

 second time under great disadvantages. Causes entirely beyond 

 human control may sometimes render it needful to re-sow, even 



