110 
CARTER AND CO.’S GARDENER’S VADE MECUM FOR 1862. 
only what is soluble in water tlmt is useful to the growing 
plants; and thus fertility bears a very important rela- 
tion to the quantity of the land — the quantity not merely 
considered as so many cubic yards, but rather as furnishing 
so much internal surface on which water operates as 
it passes by. Drainage increases fertility by inducing 
this passage of the water, and tillage increases fertility 
by facilitating this passage, and by multiplying the sur- 
face by which it passes. 
And this is true, notwithstanding that some tillage 
processes seem to act in other ways than by loosening the 
ground. Ploughing, harrowing, and scarifying the land 
act apparently as dividers and looseners of the soil, while 
rolling and pressing, also important tillage operations, 
seem to harden it. It must oe remembered, however, 
that the object of cultivation is not merely, in general 
terms, to provide constant and liberal supplies of food for 
vegetable growth ; the object of the cultivator is to pro- 
cure a crop of a certain plant; the particular habit of 
growth which nature has conferred upon that plant has 
therefore to be consulted, as well as the laws affecti ng 
vegetable growth in general ; and hardening of the soil 
may be required in particular cases, as that of wheat, 
while a looseness of the soil, as in that of turnips, &c., may 
be desirable in others. We must accommodate ourselves in 
this to those wants of the plants we cultivate, which must 
be taken as ultimate facts resulting from the character they 
have inherited. 
Rolling nevertheless has this in common with the strictly 
tillage operations, that it reduces clods and masses into 
particles and powder; it breaks old contacts and effects 
new ones within the soil, and so, like plbughing, harrowing, 
and stirring, multiplies the active surface within the soil. 
And thus it. does m fact stimulate that chemical action 
within the soil on which fertility depends, just as much as 
that is done by stirring it with plough and harrow. 
But let us leave the definitions and explanations of the 
theorist, and hear the purposes of his tillage operations 
from the practical man. He 6ays, “ I plough to cut off 
from the general mass of matter a definite layer on which 
I can afterwards operate more efficiently ; and the purpose 
of these subsequent operations is to remove the natural 
growth of the land, and so far to reduce the soil in which 
it grew to powder, as that rain shall easily permeate the 
whole without clogging it together. I plough to bury the 
manure which I lay upon the surface so prepared. I 
plough to lay up the land for exposure to that most effi- 
cient of all tillage processes, the alternate rain and drought, 
warmth and frost of weather. I harrow in order that the 
clods may be broken which previous operations may have 
failed to break, and in order that the weeds and filth may 
be dragged to the surface which previous operations may 
have failed to remove. I roll, too, in order to break surface- 
clods, in order to keep-in moisture, in order to level the 
surface for the even action of other implements, the cul- 
tivator, the reaping-machine, or scythe ; in order to con- 
fer that hardening of the land which some plants require. 
The object of my t illage operations is to remove all weeds, 
to bury manure, to prepare a seed-bed, to have a softened 
soil in which my plants can swell with unrestricted growth. 
The seeds I sow need to be in contact with air and moist- 
ure in order to their permeation, and they must therefore 
be covered with particles of moistened earth smaller than 
themselves ; and thus the smaller seeds, as those of Grass, 
of Clover, of the Turnip, need a finer tilth than the larger 
seeds, as those of Barley. And as after germination 
the young plants need scope for the ready extension of 
their roots and stems, so tillage operations are needed 
deeper before seed-time than the mere act of germination 
would demand ; and they are needed after germination, 
especially in the case of large-stemmed plants, as the 
Turnip, the Potato, or the Mangold Wurzol, in order to 
permit the easy enlargement of those parts whose growth 
I want. But, from the beginning to the end of the annual 
tillage of my land, one object of all my tilling operations 
is the destruct ion of weeds.” 
A writer on Bare Fallow some years ago, evidently taking 
his cue from the report of the mere labourer as much as of 
the intelligent practical farmer, enumerates all the supposed 
objects and effects which the chemistry of those days sug- 
gested, as the aim and end of the results of cultivation 
which the process involves, only to exclaim, in derision of 
them all, “The sole purpose of fallowing is to destroy 
weeds!” The destruction of weeds is an object of tillage 
operations certainly, and if they cannot be destroyed year 
by year under good farm management, the gradually in- 
creasing accumulation requires this periodical bare fallow 
to effect their destruction, and so far the Reviewer was right 
in his assertion ; nevertheless the main object of tillage 
operations is not to destroy, but to produce, to increase the 
quantity of food within the land in order to its conversion 
into food for man and beast by plants upon its surface. 
It is plain that the practical and the theoretical accounts 
of the matter are perfectly consistent, and tillage opera- 
tions have at once the effect of forming the seed-bed, of 
loosening land to enable unrestricted growth within it 
and upon it, and of destroying any plants but those wo 
wish to grow ; at the same time that the soil, by the re- 
duction of its substance, is thus enabled to present within 
a given bulk a greater quantity of surface, so as to act as 
feeding- ground for plants and as a warehouse of their 
food. Both farmer and philosopher will thus agree in 
the effects of deep and thorough tillage of the soil. 
As to the practical methods to be adopted in order to 
attain the condition which we call tilth, it is only neces- 
sary to refer to the fact that in the course of half-a-dozen 
years arable land generally receives a dozen ploughings, 
twenty to thirty liarrowings, besides sundry scarifyings 
and horse-hoeings, and repealed uses of the roller both in 
drought and directly as a tillage implement, in order to 
prove how cumbrous' a process tillage generally is. The 
increased nse of the scarifier as compared with the plough, 
and the extension of Autumnal culture, seem to be the 
principal moves towards simplifying the process of late 
years. Add to this, the adoption and extension of steam 
culture, and the improved drainage of the land as facili- 
tating all these operations, and it will be admitted that 
progress hitherto has not been small. Great economy is 
obtained by properly timing the uses of all these opera- 
tions. Besides the need of fitting what is done in the 
field to the actual weather of the day, there is the need, 
especially on clay soils, of fitting the great tillage opera- 
tions of the year to the average weather of the season. 
There seems an advantage on clay soils in the deep and 
thorough tillage of the stubble when dry in Autumn, 
which is so remarkably greater than the advantage of the 
same processes at any other time, that some special expla- 
nation seems almost to be needed. The explanation pro- 
bably, however, is no other than that which ordinary 
tillage operations receive, the greater effect arising from 
its being done in the dry, and followed by the frost. 
Whatever the explanation may be, the fact is unquestion- 
able, and any means of cheapening Autumn tillage, or 
of increasing our power at that season of the year, will be 
welcome to all clay-land farmers. These means exist in 
the application of steam power to cultivation. Whether 
by Fowler’s or the Woolston apparatus, it may now bo 
generally believed that by steam power land can be better 
ploughed and better cultivated, more cheaply ploughed 
and more cheaply cultivated than by horses. 
