386 
broadcast method greatly economises time and 
‘| labour, and in some rare instances perfectly 
serves all the purposes of the crop as to both the 
produce and the land; but, in general, it is most 
slovenly, wasteful, and pernicious,—occasioning 
a prodigal expenditure of seed, encouraging 
carelessness in tillage, cherishing the growth of 
weeds, preventing all the most useful operations 
of after-culture, and rendering the crop befouling 
and exhausting instead of cleansing and restora- 
tive. 
Dibbling in rows at regular intervals, when 
the process is carefully performed, is a greatly 
superior method to broadcasting ; yet though 
well suited to the cottier and the small farmer, 
it is far less adapted than the drill system to 
fields of considerable extent. It effects a con- 
siderable saving of seed, occasions perfect aera- 
tion to every plant, and induces flowering and 
podding at the lowest possible points of the stem; 
yet, on a large farm, it consumes an amount of 
time and labour, and involves a greatness of risk 
in reference to the vicissitudes of weather, which 
more than counterbalance its advantages. The 
absurd practice formerly prevailed in England of 
paying for dibbling according to the number of 
pecks or bushels of seed deposited; and this in- 
volved a powerful inducement to dishonesty and 
carelessness, and a corresponding risk of serious 
limitation of the crop from paucity of seed. But 
of late years dibbling-machines have been in- 
vented for the speedy performance of dibbling 
work upon a large scale; and these, though in- 
ferior in their mode of acting to hand-dibbling, 
give the farmer a power of greatly accelerating 
the work, and at the same time protect him from 
the consequences of irregular sowing. See the 
article DiBBLE. 
Drill-sowing is effected in two or three differ- 
ent methods, according to the kind of the pre- 
paratory tillage, the nature of the soil, the in- 
tended amount of after-culture, and the character 
of the weather. When a previous spring-plough- 
ing has been given across the ridges of the autumn 
ploughing, the lands or ridges are divided by the 
plough into hollow drills with intervening ridge- 
lets, or one-bout stitches, at intervals of 26 or 27 
inches. When manure is to be applied, the seed 
is first sown, the manure is then drawn out and 
divided in the manner formerly noticed, and the 
high drills or ridgelets are next split out or re- 
versed, by means either of the common plough, 
or of a plough with two mould-boards.—In an- 
other mode of drill-sowing, the manure is spread 
over the surface of the winter furrow, and both 
this manure is ploughed in and the seed is sown, 
simultaneously with a single spring-ploughing. 
Three ploughs start in succession, the second 
immediately after the first, and the third im- 
mediately after the second; a drill- barrow or 
sowing-machine is fixed between the handles of 
the third plough; and the seeds are thus depo- 
sited in every third furrow, and covered by the 
BEAN. 
succeeding furrow-slice. This mode of sowing 
may, of course, be so extended on a large farm 
as to have either six or nine ploughs in simul- 
taneous operation.—Another and better method, 
when manure is applied at seed-time, is to plough 
down the spread manure with a strong furrow, 
and afterwards to draw light furrows for the re- 
ception of the seed. But whichever of the methods 
be practised, the whole field ought, in every ne- 
cessary place, to be carefully and industriously 
water-furrowed, by means of the plough and the 
shovel. The time of sowing is as early as pos- 
sible after the severity of winter is past,—at 
Christmas if the climate, as in the south of Ire- 
land, is very mild,—in February, if possible, 
throughout even the coldest parts of Scotland,— 
and never, in any district, later than the end of 
March. 
Much difference of practice prevails, in both 
the dibbling and the drilling systems, as to the 
distance between each row of seeds. Some Eng- 
lish farmers form their bean-rows at distances of 
9 or 10 inches, others at distances of 15 inches, 
and others in double rows of 4 inches asunder, 
at exterior distances of 18 inches, But in all 
such instances, hand-hoeing alone can be brought 
into requisition in the after-culture; and this is 
comparatively ineficient for eradicating weeds, 
and keeping the soil clean and pulverulent, on 
heavy land. Drill-rows are sometimes formed 
at distances from one another of three yards, and | 
ought never to be formed at smaller distances 
than about 27 inches; for an ample width be- 
tween them, is not only indispensable for the 
important operations of horse-hoeing, but also | 
occasions a healthy and even requisite circula- 
tion of air. 
The quantity of seed considerably varies ac- 
cording to the character of the soil, the condition 
of the tillage, the method of culture, and the 
variety of the seed. But, in average cases, with 
the common horse bean, five bushels per acre is 
a proper quantity broadcast, four bushels when 
sown in drills, and two or at most three bushels 
when dibbled. But in England, in consequence 
of the climate being more favourable for the 
ripening of the bean than in Scotland, the pro- 
per quantity of seed is considerably smaller. A 
thinly sown crop seldom succeeds well in Scot- 
land, except upon very rich soil.— An useful 
practice, in either broadcast or drill sowing, is 
to mix about a bushel of pease or vetches with 
every six bushels of the beans: for the pease 
considerably improve both the quantity and the 
quality of the fodder, and they also serve at har- 
vest for binding up the beans into sheaves. A 
mixed crop of this kind is called, in the agricul- 
tural language of Scotland, a crop of beans with 
a dropping pea.—The depth at which harrowing 
deposits broadcast seed, is necessarily very vari- 
able and quite uncertain; the depth of deposi- 
tion by drilling after the plough, or in what may 
be called ploughing under, is from 3 to 4 inches ; 
ee 
