ground. Full, plump, sound, and healthy seed, free from weeds, is chosen or reserved by the farmer. The soil on which the seed-corn has been reared, and the greater or less likelihood of its thriving on the land in which it is about to be sown, are considerations not overlooked by practical men; indeed there is an art in the choice of seed which experience only can teach, and which is more important than many farmers seem to imagine. But however fair this well-chosen seed may appear to the eye, it is yet advisable to use some precaution before it is placed in the earth, to preserve it from a disease which may possibly attack it during the ensuing summer, and render the crop almost worthless. This disease is called smut, from the sooty appearance of th the ears infected with it. Now it may seem strange that anything done to the dry grain, before it is laid in the ground, should be able to preserve the young plant from this disease; but so it is. Although many persons, and even some few farmers, affect to despise the means employed, and to consider the benefit merely fanciful, yet the majority are decidedly in favour of it, and never think of omitting the simple precaution, which is this: to steep the grain in brine, or some other strong liquor, and afterwards to sift over it some newly slaked lime. Steeping is, therefore, one of the preparatory steps to sowing, and is generally conducted in the straw-barn, where tubs have been set for two or three weeks previously to contain the steep. Although some persons use strong brine, and various other steeps, nothing is more effectual or more generally used than chamber-ley. When this has been kept a proper time, and is giving off its ammonia freely, the operation is conducted somewhat in the following manner. A basket, holding about half a bushel of wheat, is filled with corn, and lowered by a pair of handles (which stand upright on its rim) into the tub far enough for the steep completely to cover the corn without reaching the hands of the operator. It is held in this manner about two or three seconds and then lifted up and placed upon two sticks over an empty tub to drip, until another basketful is REAL SIZE OF MESHES IN ready. The first basketful is then poured out upon the clean floor of the barn, while the second is placed to drain. Meanwhile, a person stands with a barn wheat riddle near the heap of grain, and shakes over each basketful, as it is poured out, a little slaked caustic lime. Some farmers allow their wheat to remain a bushel at a time in the tub of ley for five minutes, or upwards, stirring it up, and skimming off light grains that float on the top. But they do not ever exceed ten minutes, because the steep is of so BARN SHOVEL. powerful a nature that it would destroy the vegetative power of the grain. When the whole heap of pickled and limed wheat is lying on the floor of the barn, it requires thorough mixing, until the whole mass appears uniform. Two men, provided each with a barn shovel, now stand opposite each other, and make their shovels meet on the floor underneath the heap, turning the grain repeatedly, until the lime is fully incorporated with it. The pickled grain is then put in clean sacks, and carted at once to the field, only a sufficient quantity for the day's use being pickled at once for fear of injury to the grain. Thus does the farmer prudently supply his ground with seed on which every precaution has been bestowed to ensure its fertility. "Seed well prepared, and warm'd with glowing lime, The value of this practice of steeping wheat is proved by numerous testimonies. In the Northumberland Report an instance is given of a farm where wheat was annually grown to a large extent for a period of more than forty years with only one case of smut, and this was when the seed was not steeped. In another case, in the same county, experiments were tried with grain infected by smut. One-third of this grain was steeped in chamber-ley, and limed; one-third was steeped and dried, but not limed; and the remainder was sown without steeping or liming. Of these, the first and second were almost entirely free from smut, while the third was strongly infected, and had abundance of smutty Some experiments made in Derbyshire show that brine may be employed with equally good effect. A peck of very smutty wheat was taken, one half sown as it was, the other half washed in three waters, and then steeped for two hours in brine strong enough to float an egg. The unwashed seed produced a wretched crop, twothirds at least being smutty; the washed and pickled seed, on the contrary, produced a perfect crop, without a single ear of smut. ears. We said that the pickled wheat must be taken to the field in clean sacks. If this be neglected, and the grain be put into sacks which had before held smutty grain, the pickling will have been of very little service. A trial of the infectious nature of smut was made by placing a quart of fine wheat for two days in a bag where some of the black dust was left on being sown this grain produced a smutty crop. This, perhaps, * Bloomfield. explains the reason why some persons complain of the little benefit they have found from pickling their wheat. Doubtless their sacks or their barn floors have communicated infection to the seed. It is a good practice to wash the walls of the barn with lime-water, and to steep the sacks in the same. The only disadvantage with pickled wheat is, that the lime acts on the skin of the sower's hand, causing it to shrivel. The lime also rises in fine dust, especially in windy weather, and irritates the eyes and face. Any ill consequence may be prevented by first moistening the face and hands with milk, and then washing them with warm water and soap. It is also a good plan to rub in a little butter on the back of the right hand, and on the eyelids before going out to sow. This, of course, applies to the old method of sowing by hand, which is still extensively practised, though it is every year giving way to the more general introduction of machinery. There is scarcely a greater instance of skill in the whole round of rural labour, than that displayed by an expert sower. To an ordinary looker-on there is something truly wonderful in the exactness with which he regulates the quantity of seed to an acre, and distributes it equally over every part of the ground in measured casts, step and hand always keeping pace with each other. At his left side is a sowing basket holding the grain, suspended from his neck, or across his shoulders, by a piece of girthing; or perhaps he wears the wooden seed-lip, being a box of peculiar form, which is suspended in a similar manner. Keeping the hand low, taking up the seed firmly, and making at the same time short steps in advance, he casts forth the seed with every step, making it fly in a curve in front, by a sharp turn of the hand, and a free opening of the fingers towards the end of the cast. Thus he has great command over his work, even in windy weather, while a person who takes long steps, DIFFERENT METHODS OF SOWING. 39 holds the seed loosely, and makes high casts, generally wastes the grain, and makes bad work in the wind. Some sowers use both hands at once, and for this purpose have the seed-lip strapped round the waist, and made in a curved form to suit the shape of the body and extend from the right to the left side: but there are few men who can sow well double-handed, as it rarely happens that the left hand acts with equal power to the right. In Ireland and Scotland sowers use a piece of linen sheeting cut into a peculiar form, and slung across the right shoulder. This is called the sowing-sheet, and is often literally nothing more than a common square sheet knotted together at three corners; but when properly shaped and sowed it is more convenient for use. Although extensively used, the sowing sheet is inferior to the seed-lip, because it does not allow the sower to measure the handfuls so accurately. The difference between the work of an experienced and of an inexperienced sower is plainly revealed when the young wheat begins to spring up. In the one case the regular appearance of the crop satisfies the eye, and defies it to trace the particular casts; in the other every cast made by the sower can be distinctly traced, the seed not being equally spread, but in some places sown too thickly, while in others it is comparatively |