Farming of the Norih Riding of Yorkshire. 
501 
If ii dry season occurs, so much is lost In evaporation, or possibly 
much is never brought into a state of" solution, and consequently 
many descrijitions of artificial manures are found nearly useless. 
The safest mode, it is considered, is to hoc them in, or at least 
to pass the harrows over the land, which is not found to injure 
the plants, but rather the reverse. 
The smut, once such a pest to the cultivator, is nearly banished. 
If it makes its appearance at all, it is on some very neglected or 
ill-cultivated spot. The most usual mode adopted to prevent its 
ravages is to steep the seed in brine, and to drug it with quick- 
lime; but the most certain preventive is a solution of arsenic or 
sulphate of inm, mixed sometimes with salt, applied to the seed, 
and dried with quick lime. 
The next process to which the wheat is subjected is that of 
rolling, in the spring, with Crosskill's clod-crusher, where the 
means and extent of holding will admit of its being employed. 
The frosts of winter always so lighten the soil that some process 
of this kind is necessary to afford consolidation sufficient to effect 
a seed-bed firm enough to bring the wheat-plant to maturity. 
Many parties hoe the corn in the month of April or May, which 
keeps down the annual weeds, and exposes a new surface to the 
action of the air. The practice, however, is not quite general. 
The harvest operations are carried on with much more rapidity 
than formerly. The wheat is harvested much greener — a larger 
number of hands is employed — the whole, or nearly so, is mown 
by the scythe — -and hence, from its being more rapidly cut, and 
laying much more open in the sheaves than it formerly did when 
shorn, it is much more readily secured. Six or seven days is as 
much fielding as is usually given, and the samples are found to 
be much improved by early 
cutting, even while a degree of 
greenness exists in the straw, 
for the last process of the plant 
in ripening is doubtless the 
formation of a thicker coat of 
bran. The takers- up follow 
the mower, and the wheat is 
invariably covered with " hood- 
sheaves," or the ears of the 
corn are covered over by two 
inverted sheaves. This pro- 
cess is by some carried to such 
perfection that it is asserted a 
month's rain will not penetrate the upright sheaves. VVe may 
mention the Messrs. Outhwaite, of Bainesse — whose entire ope- 
rations are conducted in the most perfect manner conceivable, 
' Stock " of Corn. 
