The complete servant / Being a practical guide to the peculiar duties and business of all descriptions of servants, from the housekeeper to the servant of all-work, and from the land steward to the foot-boy. With useful receipts and tables

by servant Samuel Adams; Sarah Adams

In broad-cast sowing, the operator scatters the seed over a considerable breadth of surface, previously prepared by digging, or otherwise being minutely pulverized. The seed is taken up in portions in the hand, and dispersed by a horizontal movement of the arm, to the extent of a semi-circle, opening the hand at the same time, and scattering the seeds in the air, so as they may fall as equally as possible over the breadth taken in by the sower at once, and which is generally six feet; that being the diameter of the circle in which his hand moves through half the circumference. In sowing broad-cast on beds, and narrow’ strips or borders, the seeds are dispersed between the thumb and fingers, by horizontal movements of the hand in segments of smaller circles.

Dry weather is essentially requisite for sowing, and more especially for the operation of covering in the seed, which in broad-cast sowing, is done by treading or gently rolling the surface, and then raking it; and in drill-sowing, by treading in the larger seeds, as peas, and covering with the rake; smaller seeds, sown in drills, are covered with the same implement, without treading.

TO PLANT SHRUBS AND TREES.

Planting, as applied to seeds, or seed-like roots, as potatoes, bulbs, &c. is most frequently performed in drills, or in separate holes made with the dibber; in these, the seed or bulb is dropped from the hand, and covered with or without treading, according to its nature. Sometimes planting is performed in patches, as in pots or borders, in which case, the trowel is the chief instrument used.

Quincunx is a mode of planting in rows, by which the plants in one row are always opposed to the blanks in the other, so that when a plot of ground is planted in this way, the plants appear in rows in four directions.

Planting, as applied to plants already originated, consists generally in inserting them in the soil of the same depth, and in the same position as they were before removal, but with various exceptions. The principal object is to preserve the fibrous roots entire; to distribute them equally around the stem among the mould or finer soil, and to preserve the plant upright. The plant should not be planted deeper than it stood in the soil before removal, and commonly the same side should be kept towards the sun. Planting should, as much as possible, be accompanied by abundant watering, in order to consolidate the soil about the roots; and where the soil is dry, or not a stiff clay, it may be performed in the beginning of wet weather, in gardens; and in forest planting, on dry soils, in all open weather during autumn, winter, and spring.

TO WATER GARDENS.

Watering becomes requisite in gardens for various purposes, as aliment to plants in a growing state, to support newly transplanted plants, for keeping under insects, and keeping clean the leaves of vegetables. One general rule must be ever kept in mind during the employment of watering a garden; that is, never to water the top or leaves of a plant when the sun shines. All watering should be carried on in the evening or early in the morning, unless it be confined to watering the roots, in which case, transplanted plants, and others in a growing state, may be watered at any time; and if they are shaded from the sun, they may also be watered over their tops. Watering over the tops is performed with the rose, or dispenser attached to the spout of the watering-pot, or by the syringe or engine. Watering the roots is best done with the rose; but in the case of watering-pots in haste, and where the earth is hardened, it is done with the naked spout.

Many kitchen-crops are lost, or produced of very inferior quality, for want of watering. Lettuces and cabbages are often hard and stringy; turnips and radishes do not swell, onions decay, cauliflowers die off, and, in general, in dry soils. Copious waterings in the evenings, during the dry season, would produce that fulness of succulency, which are found in the vegetables produced in the low countries, and in the Marsh Gardens at Paris; and in this country at the beginning and latter end of the season.

Watering the foliage of small trees to prevent the insects, and of strawberries, and fruit shrubs, to swell the fruit, is also of importance.