THE farmer’s manual. 
57 
just drawing a little earth over, and pressing it light- 
ly upon the seed, in order to make it vegetate quick- 
ly, before the earth became too dry. In this method, 
four pounds of seed sowed 7 acres. Two men sow- 
ed the whole 7 acres in two days. 
“ Broad-cast sowing will however generally be pre- 
ferred ; but when 1 have spoken of the after culture, 
I shall compare the two methods, that the reader may 
decide for himself.” 
After Culture. 
“ When the plants were fairly up, we went with a 
small hoe, and took out all but one in each 10 or 12 
inches, and thus left them to stand single. We next 
went with a hoe, and hoed the tops of the ridges, about 
6 inches wide on each side of the rows of plants, 
and then horse-hoed between the rows with a common 
horse-plough, after the manner of tilling Indian-corn, 
or potatoes ; by first turning the earth from the plants, 
and next towards the plants, at the second boeing. 
There is no ground lost in these wide intervals, for 
the lateral roots of the large turnip, as well as the 
Ruta Baga, will extend 6 feet from the bulb of the 
plant ; and my crop of thirty-three tons, or thirteen 
hundred and twenty bushels to the acre, taking the 
whole field together, had the same intervals -, and less 
than this, as was practised by my neighbours, always 
diminished the crop. Wide as my intervals were, the 
leaves of some of the plants would nearly meet across 
the rows, and 1 have had them frequently meet, in 
England. 
“ Now 1 think no farmer can discover in this process 
any thing more difficult, or more troublesome, and ex- 
pensive, than in the process absolutely necessary to 
the obtaining a good crop of Indian-corn ; and yet 
I will venture to say, that in any land capable of 
bearing fifty bushels of Indian-corn upon an acre, 
more than one thousand bushels of Ruta Baga may, 
in the above described process, be obtained. 
