[64]The French call them, les Herbes Sauvages, & les mechantes Herbes.
Besides, their Seeds never all come up in one Year, unless the Land be very often plow’d; for they must have their exact Depth, and Degrees of Moisture and Heat, to make them grow; and such as have not these, will lie in the Ground, and retain their vegetative Virtue for Ages; and the common usual Plowings, not being sufficient to make them all, or the greatest Part, grow, almost every Crop that ripens increases the Stock of Seed, until it make a considerable Part of the Staple of such Land as is sown without good Tillage and Fallowing.
The best Defence against these Enemies, which the Farmer has hitherto found, is to endeavour their Destruction by a good Summer-fallow: This indeed, if the Weather be propitious, does make Havock of them; but still some will escape one Year’s Prosecution. Either by being sometimes situate so high, that the Sun’s Heat dries them, or sometimes lying so deep, that it cannot reach them; either way their Germination, which would have proved their Death, is prevented.
Another Faculty secures abundance of them, and that is, their being able to endure the Heat and Moisture of one Year without growing; as[65] wild Oats, and innumerable other Sorts of Weeds, will do; for gather these when ripe, sow them in the richest Bed, water them, and do all that is possible to make them grow the First Year, it will be vain Labour; they will resist all Enticements till the Second; that is, if you gather them in Autumn, you cannot force them to grow until the next Spring come Twelve-month; and many of them will remain dormant even to the next Year alter that, and some of them longer.
[65]I have not try’d wild Oats by sowing them in a Bed myself, but have been so informed by others; and my own Experience hath frequently shewn me, that they will come up, after lying many Years in the Ground; and that very few Sorts of Weeds will come all up the first Year, as Corn doth: If they did, the Tillage of one Year’s Summer-fallow might extirpate them.
By this Means, One Year’s Summer-Fallow can have no Effect upon them, but to prepare the Soil for their more vigorous Growth and plentiful Increase the next Year after; and very rarely will the Farmer fallow his Land Two Years successively; and often the Dung, which is made of the Straw of sown Corn, being full of the Seeds of Weeds, when spread on the Fallows, incumbers the Soil with another Stock of Weeds, as ample as that the Fallowing has destroy’d; and tho’ perhaps many of these may not grow the next Year, they will be sure to come up afterwards.
The other old Remedy is what often proves worse than the Disease; that is, what they call Weeding among sown Corn; for if by the Hook or Hand they cut some Sorts (as Thistles) while they are young, they will sprout up again, like Hydras, with more Heads than before; and if they are cut when full-grown, after they have done almost their utmost in robbing the Crop, ’tis like shutting the Stable-Door after the Steed is stolen.
Hand-weeders often do more Harm to the Corn with their Feet, than they do Good by cutting or pulling out the Weeds with their Hands; and yet I have known this Operation sometimes cost the Farmer Twelve Shillings an Acre; besides the Damage done by treading down his Wheat; and, after all, a sufficient Quantity of them have escaped, to make a too plentiful Increase in the next Crop of Corn.
The new Hoeing-Husbandry in Time will probably make such an utter Riddance[66] of all Sorts of Weeds[67], except such as come in the Air, that[68] as long as this Management is properly continued, there is no Danger to be apprehended from them; which is enough to confute the old Error of equivocal Generation, had it not been already sufficiently exploded, ever since that Demonstration of Malpighius’s Experiment. For if Weeds were brought forth without their proper Seeds, the Hoeing could not hinder their Production, where the Soil was inclined naturally to produce them. The Belief of that blind Doctrine might probably be one of the Causes that made the Antients despair of finding so great Success in Hoeing, as now appears; or else, if they had had true Principles, they might perhaps have invented and improved that Husbandry, and the Instruments necessary to put it in Practice.
[66]A very pernicious, large, perennial Weed, like Burrage, with a blue Flower, infested a Piece of Land, for Time out of Mind: Hoeing has destroyed it utterly; not one of the Species has been seen in the Field these Seven Years, tho’ constantly till’d and ho’d.