72 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
tilt open furrows. Tlie operation of cleaving is of constant occurrence in 
the summer fallow and other cleaning processes of tillage. When we 
wish to level a ridge, we cleave it. 
There are two variations to he rioted in the practice of cleaving. Either 
the two first slices are laid close together, in which case the open furrows 
of the former ridges become the centres, and the former centres the open 
furrows, in the manner shown in the last figure; or a certain distance is 
kept between the two first slices, and so the open furrow is preserved. 
In this case, each ridge is split into two ridges, and the number of open 
furrows is doubled, thus: 
The next method 
of ploughing, is cross- 
■ploughing This, as the 
name denotes is plough- 
B C E C G jng in a direction cross¬ 
ing that of the former ridges and furrow's. 
In cross-ploughing, the workmen place themselves at equal distances 
from each other, as thirty or forty yaids, at the side of the held at which I 
they are to begin to plough. Each then runs a straight furrow across the 
field, as lrotn A to G, from B to E, from 
Fig. 9. C to F. Each then returns as from D 
-'*• r to A, from E to B, from F to C, laying 
always the successive furrow-slices to- 
D wards the right hand, until each man ar¬ 
rives at the tt- 1 minali n of his allotted 
x space xx, xx, xx, xx. There has been 
thus formed by each workman one great 
E ridge, but so extended that it maybe 
said to be without curvature. The 
x ploughmen, we perceive, turn from left 
to right around the first furrows AG, BE, 
F CF. But they may also turn from rigid 
to left. Thus in going from B to E, the 
^ x ploughman lays his first furrow-slice to 
the right hand When he arrives at £, 
he may turn his horses left about, and proceed to O, and returning from 
D to A, lay his first furrow slice to the right hand towards OA. 'Turning 
left about then at A, he proceeds in the direction BE, and so on, always 
turning left about until he has arrived at the middle space o, when the 
whole space between AG and BE will have been ploughed. 
Sometimes, for convenience and the saving of distance, he may plough 
in the first place round the central line BE, by turning liom 1 elt to light j 
and then plough the remainder of the interval by turning from right to left. ( 
These are matters of detail somew hat difficult peihaps to be described 
clearly, but so simple in themselves that they need only be seen in the 
field to be thoroughly understood. 
The first operation, we have seen, is striking the furrow’s previous to 
forming the ridges. This is done by layingoff, by means of furrows, first 
the lines of the head-lands, and then the parallel lines corresponding to the I 
future centres of the lidges to he formed. 
The next operation is forming the ridges. This is done by beginning at ! 
the centre, and ploughing towards it till each ridge is formed. 
When ridges are lormed they may be subsequently ploughed in differ¬ 
ent ways. 
First. They may be gathered; in which case, beginning at the crown, 
the ridge is ploughed, and an increased elevation given to it. 
Second. They may he cast; in which case two ridges are ploughed to¬ 
gether, and either for ;ied into one large ridge, or, by keeping the open 
furrows clear, retained in two ridges. 
Third. They may he cloven; in which case,beginning at the open fur¬ 
rows, the half of each adjoining ridge is laid together. The first two lur 
row-slices may either he laid close together, or the open turrow may be 
kept clear between them. In the fiist case, each ridge will have been so 
cloven as that the open furrow shall have become the crown, and the 
crown the open furrow. In the second case, each ridge will have been 
cloven into two, and the number of ridges and open (arrows doubled. 
In the original laying out. of the ridges, the lines have been described as 
running straight through the field; but it is frequently expedient, on ac¬ 
count of the inequalities of he surface or other cause, to change the di¬ 
rection of the ridges at some part of the field, so as to facilitate the dis 
charge of the water. 
The application to this case of the principle of striking the furrows is 
easy. The ploughman makes a furrow where the change < f direction is 
to take place, straight or curved as ciicumstances may require. The one 
set of ridges terminate at this part, and the other are laid off from it in the 
new direction to he given. The ploughman, by means ol his poles, as be¬ 
fore, strikes his first set of furrows terminating them at the fuirow where 
the change of direction is to take place From this furrow he strikes his 
second set of furrows, in the direction in which they are to run. The part 
where the opposite sets of furrows meet may be made an open furrow ora 
raised up ridge or head-land, as circumstances may require. 
The direction of ridges must generally be regulated by the sloping o. 
the fields, and the lying of ditches and fences, so that they may promote 
Fig. 8. 
the main purpose for which they are formed, the carrying off of surface 
water. But, other circumstances being alike, they should be made to lie 
as much as possible north ana south, and as rarely as possible east and 
vest- for, in the tatter case, w hen the ridges are much rh vated, the north 
side has a somewhat less favorable exposure than the south side. 
Sometimes ridges are altogether dispensed with, either when the land 
is very diy, or when it is wished to keep it in grass and give it the aspect 
of a park or lawn. In this case, the ploughs may either follow each other 
round the entire field, and terminate at the centre, or they may plough in 
large divisions, as in the case of cross-ploughing. 
In ploughing very steep land, it is frequently laid in ridges diagonally 
across the slope, for the purpose of rendering the labor more easy, and of 
lessening the danger of torrents carrying away the surlace. 
The precaution to he observed in this case, is to make the ridges slope 
upwards from the right hand, as from A to B in the following figure, and 
not to the left hand, as 
from C to O. Forinthe 
first case, when tire la¬ 
boring cattle are ascend¬ 
ing the steep, the plough 
is throwing the lurrow- 
slice down hill; whereas, 
in the other case, when 
the cattle are ascending, 
they are raising the furrow-slice up hill, by which their labor is greatly 
increased. 
Besides the open furrows of the ridges, which act as channels for car¬ 
rying off the water, it is necessary, where there are hollow' places where 
w ater may stagnate, to form open furrows or channels. This is done by 
drawing a furrow with Hie plough in the direction most convenient for the 
purpose. A workman then follow wfith the spade or shovel, and can fully 
opens all intersections with other furrows, so that there may be a free 
communication between them. 
Sometimes it is necessary that the furrow made by Ihe plough he fur¬ 
ther deepened by the spade, so as to form a channel sufficiently large; 
and wherever head-lands intercept the run of water, channels must lie 
cut through them to the ditch or outlet, so that none may stagnate upon 
the ground. Attention to these details in piaetice is essential in all cases 
of tillage; and it manifests a want of skill and industri >us habits in a tann¬ 
er to suffer his lands to be injured by the stagnating upon it of surface 
water. 
Miscollan cons. 
PLEASURES AND PROFITS OF AGRICULTURE. 
(Continual from page Gl.j 
The prejudices of farmers against all innovation upon their established 
habits are as old as agriculture itself. In the dark ages of superstition, a 
man who by any improved method connived to glow larger crops titan 
his fellows, was supposed to use supernatural means; and if lie escaped 
prosecution as a wizzard, w as at least shrewdly suspected of dealings with 
a power whom his more pious neighbors carefully avoided On the in¬ 
troduction of hops into tins country, the city of London petitioned against 
their use, lest they should injure the beer; and with equal wisdom the 
Kentish farmers, w hose land was overtun with coppice, and who are now 
so largely hem fitted by their cultivation, objected to their grow th “ be¬ 
cause they occasioned a spoile of wood for poles.” New implements 
have been opposed upon much the same principle as the objection made 
about a century ago in Scotland, and so humorously as well as truly relat¬ 
ed by Sir Waiter Scott, to the use of the winnowing machine;* and at 
this hour, the farmers in a large midland county assigns as a reason for 
making the hinder wheels of their waggons preposterously larger than the 
fore, ‘that it places the body on a level in going up hill;’ never reflecting, 
that it will have to come down again, or to move upon even ground. 
Among numberless instances of a similar nature, it is told, lhat the late 
Duke of Bedford,—who, in his well-known Zi al for the promotion ot eve- 
rv agricultural improvement, took great pairs to introduce the Norfolk 
manner of ploughing, with two horses abreast,—observing, while riding 
in the neighborhood of Woburn, one of his tenants at work, on that-sandy 
soil, in the old-fashioned mode, with four at length, his Grace dismounted, 
yoked two of the horses together, and held the plough himself, explaining 
at the same time the advantages of the new method; but his disappoint¬ 
ment may be imagined, when the man, instead of being at all convinced 
by his reasoning, replied, ‘ that such a plan might answer with his Grace, 
* “ Your leddyship and the steward hae been pleased to propose, that my 
son Cuddie snld work in the barn wi’ a new tangled machine for digfling tlio 
corn frae the chaff, thus impio sly thwarting the will of Divine Providence, 
by r using wind for your leddyship’s ain particular use by human airl, instead 
of solicit ing it by prayer, or wailing patiently for w hatever dispensation of 
wind Providence was pleased to send upon the slieelirig-lull.— Tales of my 
Landlord , Old Mortality, chap. vii. It was introduced in the year 171b, from 
Holland, by Fletcher of Saltoun, and its use was publicly denounced from 
the pulpit, as impious. 
Fig. 10. 
B D 
