an iron plate from corner to corner in the line of the draught. The ' reft as in the harrows mentioned above. The fize, however, is not invariable. The cleaning harrow ought to be larger or lefs according as the foil is ftiff or free.'

For a more perfect idea of this harrow, we must refer to the engraved figure in the book.

The chapter on raifing trees by feed, feems to be conftructed en thofe rational principles mentioned in the title-page, and may be of general utility:

The propagating trees by feed is nature's method. One inconvenience it has, that the trees thus raised are not always the fame. with the parent plant: though they are of the fame fpecies, they, copy not always its varieties.

What follows will enable us to judge of the maturity of feed. Seed inclosed in a capsula, in a pod, or in a cone, is ripe when the covering opens by the heat of the fun. The feed of a fruit-tree is ripe when it no longer adheres to the fruit; and where unripe fruit is pulled, the feed ripens with it. In general, feed is ripe when it finks in water to the bottom.

The feed of the Scotch elm ripens before the middle of June. The best way of gathering it is, to thake the tree gently: the ripeft feed falls firtt, which may be gathered in a fheet laid at the root of the tree.

The feed of the afh and of the maple may be put into the ground without being taken out of its capfula.

The best way of opening the cones of pine, fir, &c. is to expofe them in boxes to fun and dew. The drying them in a kiln is apt to destroy the germ. The cones of the larix are at their full fize in autumn; but the feed is not fo early ripe. Delay gathering them till March or April, when they begin to drop from the tree. Cut off a part of the cone next the talk, which will render it eafy to feparate the quarters the ripeft feed falls out upon fhaking the cone

with the hand.

The feed of the birch, the willow, the poplar, the aller, being very fmall, is not eafily gathered: ftir the ground about these trees, and it will foon be filled with young plants. With refpect to the feed of the birch and afh, it is fingular, that when dropt from the tree, no feed takes root fo readily; yet when gathered, and scattered with the hand, it seldom grows.

As for a choice of feed, fmall acorns gathered from large and lofty trees, are preferable before the larget acorns of finaller trees. In general, the feed is always the beft that is procured from the most vigorous trees. But as in extenfive plantations much precision cannot be expected, it ought to be the chief care that the feed be per fectly found.

Next, as to preparing feed for fowing. Trees propagated from feed have all of them a tap root, which pushes perpendicularly downward. The purpose of nature in this root is, to fit trees for growing in the fiffeft foil, and to fecure them against wind; but it proves hurtful to trees intended for tranfplantation. A young oak five or fix years old, when taken up for tranfplanting, has, like a turnip,

but

but this single root, which will be four or five feet long when the ftem is within one foot. Planted in this manner, it feldom lives. This evil is prevented by making the feed germinate in moist earth, and fowing it in the feed-bed after the radicle is cut off. The radicle never pushes more; and instead of it the tree pushes out many. roots, which fpread horizontally. Walnuts, almonds, and other fhell fruit, being long of germinating, ought to be put in moift fand, in order that the radicle may push before the end of April, to be cut off as aforefaid. Acorns, chefnuts, and beech-maft, will germinate timeously in dry fand. In wet fand or moit earth, they would, before the time of fowing, not only germinate, but push out long foots, which would ruin all. As this method is too troublesome for fmall feeds, fow them in beds as gathered: pull them up the fecond year: cut off the tap-root: and plant them again at the diftance from each other of three or four inches. Two years after, they may again be tranfplanted wider; there to remain till they be fit for the field. Some imagine, that to deprive a tree of the tap root prevents its growth. But experience vouches the contrary; and fo does reafon. It is obfervable, that the roots next the furface, being accelible to fun and moiflure, are always the most vigorous, and are farther fpread than thofe below. A tap root is deprived of fun and air, and even of water, unlefs where it happens to glide below the furface: how then can it equal a horizontal root in nourihing the tree?

The feeds of the white thorn fown without preparation, rife not till the fecond year. If buried under ground in a heap till the pulp be rotted off, and fown in the fpring following, they will germinate that very year. Instead of burying them under ground, a more approved method is, to lay them in an heap at the end of a barn, mixed with earth. By that method, a greater number will germinate than in the ordinary way. I made an experiment. One bed was fown with haws prepared in the ordinary way; and one with haws prepared in the other way. Upon the latter bed fprung a double quantity of thorns, and more vigorous. I made another experiment upon elm feed. Of a quantity gathered when ripe, the half was immediately fown; the other half was carefully dried in the fhade, and fown a fortnight after. The latter produced a greater number of plants, and more vigorous. Thorns are propa gated ftill more expeditiously by cuttings from the root. When thorns are taken from the nursery to be planted in a hedge, the roots that are either wounded by the fpade, or too long, must be cut off. Let thefe be shred into fmall parts, and fown in a bed prepared for them they will produce thorns that very year. The feed of the afh feldom germinates till the fecond year. When gathered in the month of October, let it be put in pots with earth, and fown in the fpring it will germinate immediately. The ordinary way of raif-. ing hollies, is to fow the berries entire; which is wrong every berry contains four feeds; and the plants that fpring from them are fo interwoven, as not to be feparable without injury. A better way is, to gather the berries in December, the later the better if they can be faved from birds. Throw them into a tub with water, and between the hands rub them carefully in the water till all the Rev. Jan. 1778. E pulp

pulp fall off. The good feed will fink to the bottom, which, after the water is poured off, must be laid upon a cloth to dry. Mix them with dry fand, which will preferve them all winter. Sow them in March or April, and cover them with earth about three-quarters of an inch thick.

With respect to the time of fowing, the beft rule is, to imitate nature, by fowing when the feed is ripe; provided the tree be of a hardy kind to endure the froft of winter. By this rule, the feed of Scotch elm ought to be fown in June; the feed of pine and fir in April, at which time their cones open. Acorns, chefnuts, and beech maft, ripen in autumn, which is the time of fowing them. If they ripen later, it is more safe to fow them in the fpring following; because the young plants cannot refift froft, if before winter they have not acquired fome degree of vigour. There is another reason for ftoring up these feeds till fpring; which is, that the longer they lie in the ground, the greater risk they run of being destroyed by vermin. As the white thorn vegetates early, the haws ought to be fown the first dry weather in February, after being feparated by a wire fieve from the mould with which they were mixed. Avoid fresh dung, which is injurious to them. Sow the feed of the larix when taken out of the cone in March or April; for though in the cone it will and good for years, yet it does not long retain its vegetative quality when feparated from the cone.

Next as to the manner of fowing feed. Nature drops feed upon the furface of the ground. We must depart from nature in this infance, upon the following account, that after much expence and trouble in procuring feed, the far greater part would perish, partly by vermin, and partly by an inclement air. This is not regarded by nature, which is profufe in the production of feed. All feeds therefore ought to be covered with earth, birch-feed alone excepted, which ought to be preffed down with the back of the fpade, but left open to the air without covering. Small feeds must be flightly covered, as having lefs vigour to push upward. In ftrong foil, the covering ought in every cafe to be flight. The depth is pretty much arbitrary, because the fame feed will thrive at different depths. But it must be attended to, that a flight covering expofes the feed to drought; and therefore the ground ought to be watered if the feafon be dry. Where the ground fown is too extenfive for watering, a crop of barley will preferve the tree-feed from the fun, and alfo prevent weeds. The tree-feed and the barley may be fown alternately in lines. If trees are intended to remain where their feed is fown, it is proper to fow thick, partly for fhelter, partly to keep down weeds. M. Buffon declares against weeding the ground upon which the feed is fown: "For," fays he, "weeds fhelter the young plants from the fun, keep in the dew, and preferve the plants warm in winter." In Scotland nothing is more hurtful to plants than weeds, which choke them, and exclude the air. A better way, even in France, is to fow barley with the feed, which will protect the young plants from the fun, and admit the air.

The best way of preferving feed is in dry fand, which fucks in the moisture from the feed, and prevents muftinefs. It withal retains fo much moisture as to prevent the feed from withering. This me

thod

1

51 thod is chiefly useful in preferving during winter feeds that require fpring-fowing, and in the conveyance of feeds to a diftance. The efficacy of dry fand appears in preferving oranges and citrons, which in the air dry and wither: if to prevent withering they be laid in a moist place, they never fail to turn mutty. There is one exception, that feed which lies long in the ground before it germinates, ought to be preferved in moiit earth. The feed of the fenfitive plant will keep entire for twenty years; of a melon for nine or ten. There are many feeds that will not keep entire longer than two or three years; which is the cafe of flax-feed, though remarkably oily: fome feeds require to be put in the ground as foon as ripe.

To prevent young plants in the feed bed from being spewed out by froft, cover the beds with leaves of trees, to be removed when the fevere frosts are over.

We proceed from the feed-bed to the nursery. Plants form very different roots, according to the foil they grown in. In stiff foil, the roots are commonly few, but ftrong and vigorous, for overcoming the refiftance of fuch a foil. Roots multiply in proportion to the richness and mellowness of a foil. An oak, for example, has a frong tap-root, which fits it, more than any other tree, for growing in a ftiff foil. This root diminishes in ftrength and fize in a loam, and still more in a fandy foil. When it grows in water, it has a multitude of roots, but not the least appearance of a tap-root. Hence it follows, that the foil of a nursery ought always to be light and free fuch a foil produces a multitude of roots; and the vigour of growth is always in proportion to the number of roots, the fmaller the better. But it alfo follows, that in transplanting trees from fach a nursery, the foil about them ought to be made as mellow and free as poffible, in order to encourage the fmall roots. When these are enlarged in fo fine a foil, they will be able to overcome the stiffnefs of the natural foil of the field. Avoid dung in a nursery. If any be admitted, it ought to be thoroughly putrified, and digefted into a fort of rich mould. Green dung makes the roots ill conditioned, and encourages a large white worm, which lives on the bark of the roots. Neither the walnut nor horfe-chefnut fucceed in a nursery the plants require to be placed at a distance from each other; and the earth about them must be stirred feveral years. Aquatics that are intended to be propagated by large cuttings, ought firit to have the benefit of a nursery; because they thrive belt when planted out with the roots. Avoid a mixture of different trees in the fame bed, for the flow growers will be oppreffed.

:

The true feafon for tranfplanting from the feed-beed to the nursery is about the fall of the leaf. Catch the time when the earth is fo moift as to fuffer the plants to be drawn without tearing the roots. All evergreens ought to be tranfplanted in fpring; and alfo all other trees that fuffer by froft.

'Where trees are fo young as that an interval of five or fix inches along the rows is fufficient, there must be an interval of a foot at leaft between the rows, in order to give accefs to clean the ground of weeds; and this interval is fufficient, even when the plants are fo large as to make an interval of a foot along the rows neceffary.

E 2

Where

Where the distance along the rows is made eighteen inches, or two feet, the intervals between the rows ought to be no lefs, for the fake of the trees, though unneceffary for the fake of weeding. Yet fuch is the influence of cuftom, contrary to common fenfe, that from the original pofition of young plants in a nursery, the interval between rows is always made double of the interval along the rows. Thus if the latter be eighteen inches, the former is always made three feet; and four feet where the fize of the trees requires an interval of two feet along the rows. The fame influence of custom occafions trees to be planted in rows in the field, where they are to ftand; and yet they make a much better figure when, in imitation of nature, they are fcattered as at random.'

The fecond part of this work is more philofophical and abftracted; yet it is not, on that account, lefs interefting, or lefs inftructive. It is a curious and fcientific difquifition of the primary operations of nature in the department of vegetable life. And here natural philofophy begins where natural history ends; the latter having given her detail of effects, the former explores their causes. It is from analogous facts only that we can make reasonable inductions, or obtain any supportable idea of the leading laws of nature and it is on thefe that our Author has refted his ingenious inquiries. Our limits, however, will not admit the fubftance of them here, and we muft refer our Readers to his book-affuring them that, though they may encounter fome few errors, they will meet with many fenfible obfervations and intelligent precepts.

น. *Some farther obfervations on this work, by an ingenious CORRESPONDENT, are come to hand, and will appear in a future

Review.

ART. X. Mr. Anderfon's Efays relating to Agriculture and Rural Affairs, concluded: fee our laft Month's Review.

IN

N the fecond volume, our rural philofopher drops the ftile of a preceptor, and affumes the more engaging character of an humble inquirer. He now becomes our fellow-traveller in purfuit of knowledge, and his inquiries have a continued tendency to roufe our attention, and to induce us to examine many objects that would perhaps have otherwise escaped our notice.

This effay, which is entitled, "Mifcellaneous Difquifitions, Doubts, and Queries, relating to Agriculture," forms, we are told, only a very inconfiderable fragment of a large work intended by the Author to have been completed upon a more perfect plan, which we are forry he has not found leifure to execute. It is the Author's profefled defign, in this tract, to point out defiderata in agriculture; but he ufually accompanies thefe defiderata with hinte that indicate pretty clearly the man

ner