34 



HOT-BEDS 



[chap. 



heated again sufficiently ; and then it should be turned once more, 

 especially if there be a great proportion of long litter in it. If the 

 dung be very dry, and the weather be dry also, and especially if 

 it have a large portion of long littery stuff in it, it should be 

 watered with a watering-pot, when it is first mixed up, a watering 

 being given all over the heap at every foot of height that the heap 

 rises to. This is necessary to cause that fermentation without 

 which there cannot be a hot-bed ; but, generally speaking, this is 

 not necessary, for dung is seldom flung out with so large a por- 

 tion of clean straw as to prevent it from heating when thrown up 

 in a heap. 



50. It is as well to consider it to be a general rule, scarcely 

 ever to be departed from, that the dung should ferment three seve- 

 ral times during the space of nine days, before it be put into a hot- 

 bed. Unless this be the case, the heat of the bed (unless the dung 

 be very short at the beginning) will not be lasting, and will never 

 be regular ; nor will the bed be solid and uniform. It will sink 

 more in some places than in others, and will be hotter in some 

 places than in others ; therefore, it is useless to be impatient, since 

 the thing cannot be done well without this previous preparation. 



5 1 . The dung being duly prepared, you make the bed in the fol- 

 lowing manner, having first made the ground on which it is to 

 stand perfectly level. If the general surface of the ground round 

 about be on the slope, you must take care so to change the situa- 

 tion of that part of the ground on which the bed is to stand as to 

 make that part perfectly level. It is not sufficient that you have 

 the top of the bed level. The bottom must be level also, or else 

 the sinking on one side, or at one end, will be greater than on the 

 other side, or at the other end ; the frame will stand unevenly ; the 

 slope of the lights will be too steep, or not steep enough ; the bed 

 will sometimes crack ; the water will run off and not sink into the 

 earth ; and, in short, without a perfect level whereon to place the 

 bed, the inconveniences are endless. 



52. Having got the level spot, you are to make a bed as nearly 

 as possible of the dimensions of the frame ; and the best pos- 

 sible way is to take the frame itself, put it upon the ground 

 where you intend the bed shall stand, put up a straight piece 

 of wood on the outside of each corner of the frame, while it is 

 standing upon the ground ; then take the frame away ; then put 

 a thin board edgeways upon the ground on the back, and on the 



