On the Use of the Reaping Machine, and the Root-Crops in 18G0. 551 
3. — Letter from C. Lawrence, Esq., on the Use of the Reapimj 
Machine, and the Root-Crops in 1860. 
Dear Sir, — In reply to your inquiry as to the result of my experi- 
rienco during this exceptional season in the use of reaping machines, 
and my cro2)s of kohl-rabi and mangold, I have to obsei"ve first, as 
resi^ects reaping machines, that 1 use tliat made by Burgess and Ivey. 
I reaped with this all my wheat, oats, and beans, and nearly all my 
barley. The land was for the must part in as unfavourable a state 
as it will ever be found during the season of harvest for the work- 
ing of these machines, from the prevalence of rain antecedently. 
This involved an increase of power ; and that difiSculty was met by 
the emplojTnent of three powei ful horses, the leader ridden by a boy, 
changed every three hours. At the turns the wheels sunk so deeply 
into the soft ground, that care and the occasional aid of a lever 
were required. The crops stood up fairly for such a season. They 
were successfully cut throughoiit without any material interraption, 
and without one shilling cost for any damage or repairs to the 
machine. Having seen in print, and heard accounts, of misadven- 
tures in the use of these machines during the present season, I 
think this testimony due to the manufacturers, the more particu- 
larty as it was the first season in which any of my people had 
handled a reaping machine. 
With respect to kohl-rabi, I measured out a seed-bed, and sowed 
the quantity of seed on it directed in the paper of Messrs. Lavvson, 
which appeared in the Society's .Journal. I should recommend a 
seed-bed of double the area given, and the use of about half the 
allowance of seed, to be sown thinly in drills a foot apart. My 
plants so closely covered the ground that they were much drawn and 
weak ; and though the seed was sown early in March, the plants 
were not fit to plant out till towards the end of May. About 1 5 per 
cent, threw out flowering stems ; but as the land was kept filled up 
as any plants died, we have a fair crop of useful feed, on which we 
folded our lambs the beginning of November. The land planted 
is a light stone-brash lying over the oolite. The manuring con- 
sisted of 10 loads per acre of superior dung from the feeding-boxes, 
ploughed in in the autumn, bouted up in ridges before planting, 
and 2 cwt. of superphosphate, mixed with 30 bushels per acre of 
burned ashes and pig-dung, and theii- urine from the boarded pig- 
boxes in the previous autumn ; in fact, the same manuring we give 
to mangold and swedes, &c. This mixture was inserted in the tops 
of the ridges by the ordinary manure-drill, after removing the seed- 
coulters before setting the plants. 
My mangold Avas sown quite as early as usual, and under exactly 
the same circumstances, as respects manuring and other treatment, 
as in former years ; and in three fields, each diflering from the 
other more or less in the characters and natural fertility of soil ; 
but the crop in each was at least 60 per cent, under our average 
produce. A dry, warm summer produces mangold of the heaviest 
weight and of the best quality. An excess over the average fall of 
