[94]One Bunch of natural Grass, transplanted by the Plough into a treble Row of Wheat, will destroy almost a whole Yard of it.
The Six-feet Ridges being Eleven, on Sixty-six Feet, which is an Acre’s Breadth, ought to be made Lengthways of the Field, if there be no Impediment against it; as if it be an Hill of any considerable Steepness, then they must be made to run up and down, whether that be the Length or Breadth of the Piece; for if the Ridges should go cross such a Hill, they could not be well Horse-ho’d; because it would be very difficult to turn a Furrow upwards, close to the Row above it, or to turn a Furrow downwards, without burying the Row below it; and even when a Furrow is turn’d from the lower Row, enough of the Earth to bury that Row will be apt to run over on the Left-side of the Plough; unless it goes at such a Distance from the Row, as to give it no Benefit of Hoeing.
These Ridges should be made strait and equal: And to make them strait[95] all good Ploughmen know how; and they will, by setting up Marks to look at, plow in a Line like the Path of an Arrow: But to make the Ridges equal, ’tis necessary to mark out a Number of them, before you begin to plow, by short Sticks set up at each End of the Piece; and then if one Ridge happen to be a little too broad, the next may be made the narrower; for if the Plough comes not out exactly at the second Stick, the Two Ridges may be made equal by the next Plowing, or by the Drilling; but if many contiguous Ridges should be too wide, or too narrow, ’twill be difficult to bring them all to an Equality afterwards, without levelling the whole Piece, and laying out the Ridges all anew.
[95]But if the Piece be of such a crooked or serpentine Form, that the Ridges cannot well be plow’d strait the first Time, ’tis best to drill it upon the Level; and then the marking Wheels may direct for making the Row all parallel and equidistant; which will guide the Plough to make all the Ridges for the next and all the subsequent Crops, as equal.
The exact Height of Ridges, which is best, I cannot determine[96]: A different Soil may require a different Height, according to the Depth, Richness, and Pulveration of the Mould. As Wheat covets always to lie dry in the Winter, so there is no other way to keep it so dry as these Ridges; for when they are, after the first Hoeing, about Eighteen Inches broad[97], with a Ditch on each Side, of almost a Foot deep, the Rain-water runs off such narrow Ridges as fast it falls, and much sooner[98] than ’tis possible for it to do from broad Ridges.
[96]I find by measuring my Wheat Ridges in the Spring, that none of them are quite a Foot high; and some of them only Six Inches; but I know not how much they have subsided in the Winter; for they were certainly higher when first made.
[97]This is the Breadth the Ridges are generally left at, when the Furrows are hoed from them, and thrown into the Intervals.
[98]Water, when it runs off very soon, is beneficial, as is seen in water’d Meadows; but where it remains long on, or very near the Bodies of terrestrial Plants, it kills them, or at least is very injurious to them.
And the deeper the Soil, the more occasion there commonly is of this high Situation; because such Land is wetter for the most Part than shallow Land, where we cannot make the Furrows so deep, nor the Ridges so high[99], as in deep Land; for we must never plow below the Staple. I see the Wheat on these ho’d Ridges flourish, and grow vigorously, in wet Weather, when other Wheat looks yellow and sickly.
[99]If we should make our Ridges as high on a shallow Soil, as we may on a deep Soil, there would be a Deficiency of Mould in the Intervals of equal Breadth with those of a deep Soil.