258 
Desirable Agricultural Experiments. 
year by year, and the “ Sutherland Plough ” was gradually im- 
proved, until it became a strange-looking instrument indeed, 
but a perfectly efficient tool for the performance of work which 
no engineer would have considered within the compass of 
machinery ten or a dozen years before. 
The plough is furnished with a single huge turn-furrow, and 
to prevent the implement burying itself in the spongy land it is 
canned on four broad wheels, or, rather, rollers. Two of these, 
forming the land wheels, are cylindrical in shape, while the two 
furrow wheels are great cones. The conical form is necessary 
for pressing the newly turned furrow-slice into its place ; other- 
wise the tough sward would roll back into the furrows. The 
coulter consists of a steel disc, placed vertically in front of, and 
cutting the soil below, the sock. When this disc meets with a 
landfast stone or stump, which it can neither stir nor split, it 
rolls over it, and lifts the plough clear of the obstruction. 
Behind the plough proper, and pivoted to its framework, hangs 
the “ Duke’s toothpick,” a huge iron hook, like the fluke of an 
anchor, which is brought into work by the action of the tail 
rope, and stirs the subsoil to the depth of from 8 to 18 inches. 
When the coulter rolls over obstructions, then the “ toothpick ” 
attacks them, the gear being strong enough to pull the engines 
up before anything gives way, and, where his Grace’s persuader 
fails, dynamite is the only resource. 
Dan. Pidgeon. 
DESIRABLE AGRICULTURAL 
EXPERIMENTS. 
Until Nature has divulged all her secrets — if such a consum- 
mation is to be expected in the remote future — there will be 
unsolved problems in connection with Agriculture. By the aid 
of Science, and by means of experiments and ordinary experi- 
ence, man has advanced in knowledge of the principles of his 
oldest art ; but the progress has been slow, and, I venture to 
think, much slower than it would have been if more systematic 
efforts than have ever been made had been put forth with the 
object of throwing light upon questions which are either alto- 
gether obscure, or enveloped in a greater or less degree of 
uncertainty. There are points, indeed, of the most essential 
importance to farming as a business, which might be decided 
with at least a sufficient approach to exactness, to elucidate 
