With regard to white crops, there are many practitioners of liberality and sens::: yid-10 reject this practice, although, with respect to potatoes, cabbages, beans, and often turnips also, it is admitted by them to be unexceptionable. On a soil, how ever, in which the drill machine can move with freedom, there appears no reason, and it may- be almost said no excuse, for the rejection of the modern system, which, indeed, however recently it may have been introduced into this country, is practised in every part of China, and is used also by the inhabitants of the Carna tic, and, from the decided aversion of these nations to innovation, may naturally be supposed to have been their practice for a vast succession of ages. Tobacco, cotton, and the castor-oil plant, are culti vated by it, as well as every species of grain.
The Culture of Grain and Roots.
Of the various plants raised for the nou rishment of man, wheat is of the chief importance. To prevent the disease so fatal to this vegetable, called the smut, steeping its seed from twelve to twenty four hours in a ley of wood ashes, in lime water, and in a solution of arsenic, is completely efficacious, even although it should have been extremely affected by the disease. A less time is insufficient. On cold, wet, and backward soils, the best season for putting this grain into the earth is September, particularly if the weather he rainy, as wheat should never be sown in a dry season. On dry and warm soils the sowing may be best post poned till October. In proportion to the earliness of the sowing, a less quantity of seed is sufficient. The best prepafation for it is by beans. Clover forms also an excellent preparation for it : and on a farm dry enough for turnips, and rich enough for wheat, the Norfolk practice of turnips, barley, clover, and wheat, is perhaps the most eligible that can be adopted.
By the dibbling of wheat, for a fort night before which the land must be ploughed, and rolled down with a heavy roller, the seed is deposited in the centre of the flag, and the regular treading which the land receives presses down the furrows, and gives it a most valuable de gree of firmness. The chief attention required in dibbling is, to make the holes deep enough, and to see thatthe children drop the seed equally, without scattering. After this dropping is completed, hush harrowing follows. The quantity of seed should be about six pecks in two rows in a flag. If the drill-machine be used, the preparation of the land by ploughing, harrowing, and rolling, must be extreme ly accurate, whether for one stroke of the machine, or fora bout of it, and the quantity of seed should be the same as that used in dibbling. In February,
slight dressings are with great advantage spread over the green crop of this grain ; and if the fanner has his choice for this purpose, he can never hesitate about tak ing them from dung; as dungs of all sorts are excellent, and no other manures, like these, are universally applicable. In the drill-husbandry, the practice of hoeing is of the first importance, and has been already mentioned. If horse-hoeing be not employed, the hand-hoe may be used to great advantage, and should be per formed, first, early in March, and the se cond time in the beginning of April. A scarifier is by many employed instead of the hoe, with the same object and effect Whatever the operation, employed with this view, may be, the bottom should, with respect to wheat, be left firm and untouched. This is of particular import ance.
A mild and open winter is far from being favourable to this grain, pushing it forward with too rapid vegetation, and also cherishing those weeds which be come its most injurious enemies. No weather is so injurious to wheat in the ground as wet. If, however, it have a good blooming time, though the rest of the summer, both before and after this period, may be unkindly, little apprehen sion for the crop need be entertained from any state of the weather.
If wheat he attacked by mildew, which is most likely to occur in the month of July, the only effectual application is the sickle, which ought not to be delayed for a moment, though the ear be perfectly green.
Barley requires a mellow soil, and when sown upon clay, therefore, extraor dinary care is required to stir the land im mediately after the removal of the previ ous crop; and, with this view, the prod: tice of rib-ploughing, which exposes the greatest possible quantity of surface to the air and frost, has been employed by many. This object should, at all events, be gained, whichever method be adopted for it, of the many which have been sug gested, and are indeedpractised. Scari fication, with Mr. Cooke's machine for this purpose, instead of ploughing, is found to he an excellent method In pro portion to the tenaciousness of the soil must be the extent of this operation, which is easily dispatched, even when repeated, leaving the lands, or stiches, in excellent order for the drill-machine to advance and perfect its work.