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Let the plant have peace to grow till it has acquired a considerable degree of natural strength—to acquire which state it will take a longer or shorter time according to the circumstances in which it is placed—acquiring it in the shortest time in deep sandy loam, the most useful of all soils, and taking the longest in poor thin clay on a tilly subsoil—let it, I say, have peace to grow, and let it be afterwards judiciously pruned, and I will give you the assurance of experience, that you will possess an excellent fence and a beautiful hedge in a much shorter time than the usual practice of hedgers will warrant."—(Vol. ii p. 564.)
Upon cutting down hedges the following remarks are excellent:—
"Hedges are wofully mismanaged in the cutting in many parts of the country. Without further consideration than saving the expense of a paling to guard a new-cut-down hedge, or in ignorance of the method of making a dead-hedge from the refuse of the old, the stems of an old hedge are often cut over about three and a half feet high, to continue as a fence. The consequence is just what might be anticipated from a knowledge of the habits of the thorn, namely, a thick growth of young twigs where the hedge was cut over, the ultimate effect of which is, a young hedge standing at three and a half feet above the ground upon bare stakes. The wise plan, therefore, to preserve the value of the old hedge is to cut it near the ground, and form a dead-hedge of the part cut off."—(Vol. ii. pp. 569, 570.)
We have seen hedges occasionally dying out by degrees on the road-sides, where the banks were cut close to the roots of the thorn plants. The following acute observation will in some cases, no doubt, account for it:—
"I observe that some farmers remove the hedge-bank behind a thorn-hedge, to make compost of; but such a practice is highly injurious to the hedge, even after it is grown up, by exposing its roots, which chiefly lie under the bank, to cold and frost. If a hedge is cut down whose bank has been treated in this manner, and no means are used to protect the roots when exposed on the removal of the branches, it is possible that a few nights of severe black frost may kill every root that lies nearest the surface. I have no doubt that particular plants of old hedges are killed in this manner, without the cause being suspected by the farmer."—(Vol. ii. p. 576.)
The planting of potatoes, as we should expect in a practical work of this kind, is treated of in considerable detail and with much judgment. Upon seed-potatoes, which have these last two or three years attracted so much attention, we have the following passage:—
"I have no doubt, in my own mind, that were seed-potatoes securely pitted until they were about to be planted,—not over-ripened before they were taken out of the ground,—the sets cut from the crispest tubers and from the waxy end,—the dung fermented by a turning of the dunghill in proper time,—led out to the field, quickly spread, the sets as quickly dropped on it, and the drills quickly split in the manner represented in fig. 411, and described in (2411,) there would be little heard of the failure even in the driest season,—at the same time, the precaution of obtaining seed frequently from an elevated and late district compared to where the seed is to be planted, should not be neglected."—(Vol. iii. pp. 672, 673.)
These recommendations are correct, we believe, and judicious as far as they go; other things, however, are within the powers of the skilful farmer; but, to all, we would especially recommend a more careful construction of their potato-pits. This subject is again treated of in Vol. iii. p. 1121. The raising of seed-potatoes should be made more an object of special care than has hitherto been the case; for we doubt if the cure recently propounded as infallible on the faith of one or two successful experiments—that of leaving the potatoes covered up during winter in the field where they grew—will be in all cases followed by the wished-for results. We hope, however, that many will try it.
Of horses we could have wished to say something had our space permitted; but we can only refer to what is said of the rearing and intelligence of the horse towards the beginning of the second volume, and to the chapter on breaking in young draught horses, in p. 691 of the same volume.