Stifigested Improvements. 
323 
within reach of the plough and of cultivation ; but in such 
soils it will sink by its own specific gravity, and should there- 
fore be applied at twice, with an interval of perhaps five years 
between. At the second application the land will be firmer, and 
not let the chalk in so much. 
Trial has been made of the relative cost and effect of chalk 
and lime. The ordinary calculation throughout the county is, 
that chalk delivered in the field costs 5s. a cart-load, or 5/. an 
acre, if 20 loads are applied. The calculation, made in a par- 
ticular, but not exceptional instance, for lime was, that in the 
field it cost ?>s. per quarter, or 3Z. an acre, if 20 quarters were 
applied. But, though this gives a balance of 2Z. an acre in favour 
of lime, yet such was the superior efficacy of chalk, that the 
experiment resulted in the preference of chalk, notwithstanding 
its gi'eater cost. 
6. Implements. — All over the county, whether on the mainland, 
or on the Island, is to be seen the old-fashioned plough, with 
high moveable carriage or gear. Prejudice is strong in its favour, 
rather among the men than among the masters. Indeed, I know 
an instance of a farmer, fully aware of the inferiority of the native 
implement, yet compelled to adapt a Howard to a high moveable 
carriage, before he could get his ploughman to use it. Men who 
have handled the plough — indeed with it in their hands at the 
time — have given me these two reasons for the preference of 
moveable over fixed gear : 1, if the plough meet with stones — 
and there are many everywhere in the county — it will " give 
somewhat," and not be jerked or thrown out of the ground ; 
2, the turning at the head-land is more easy ; in fact, the 
ploughman has only to lift the plough out of the furrow, and the 
horses will take it round without any trouble on his part. 
To meet these unquestionable advantages of the detached gear, 
the two leading implement-makers in the county, Messrs. Tasker 
of Andover, and Messrs. Wallis and Haslam of Basingstoke, 
have both patented ploughs. The improvements of the former 
are designed, by a peculiar construction of the head and beam, 
which would not be understood by a verbal description without 
a drawing, to effect these advantages : .1, greater facility in turning, 
and simplicity of parts ; 2, freedom from liability to get out of 
order ; 3, adaptation to diversities of soil and locality, the plough- 
man being enabled to use the implement as a fixed headed 
plough on level land, and in hilly and stony ground as a move- 
able headed one. 
But is the machinery sufficiently simple for an implement 
which will be out in all weathers, and subject to rough treat- 
ment, and which ought therefore to be as free from all complica- 
tion as possible ? The action of the contrivance is very nice — 
perhaps too nice to stand rust and dirt. The screwed stumps for 
