very borders of the polar regions, this constant friend endures the scorching beams, or braves the northern blasts, and comes, a golden gift, alike to the sun-burnt fainting African and the snow-wrapt Muscovite. Seeing that it bears such extremes of climate, spreading from zone to zone on the globe, it is not wonderful that it sustains better than any other corn the inclemencies of our own changeful skies, and the disadvantages of our most unfavourable seasons. Wheat may be compared to a very sensible person, who likes and enjoys good things as well as any one, but can put up with bad circumstances better than most other persons. It thrives in a temperate climate, a fine shining season, a rich soil, and under good management; yet, when all these are reversed, so that other things perish, this hardy plant will live, produce its seed, and supply, in some

measure, the table of even the least worthy husbandman.

Wheat, for the main crops, is always sown in the autumn, and on land which has been a fallow the preceding season, or which has produced some different crop, and been well manured. It was the general practice of the ancients, and has been of the moderns, to steep the seed in liquors of a briny kind, before sowing; some, however, think that water alone is just as good; the benefit being rather, by means of a fluid, to separate faulty seeds, which swim at the top, and are easily skimmed off, than to impart additional powers of growth. The land having been prepared by the plough and harrow, in the manner before explained, the seed is to be sown. There are three principal methods of performing this operation; —namely, by broadcast, by dibbling, or

by the drill. The first is, no doubt, the most ancient way; and considerable skill is required from and practised by the husbandman, in performing this part of his duty. His walk, his throw, his grasp, must each be accurately timed and measured, or his ground and seed would be greatly wasted, by having some spaces scarcely supplied, and others so overdone that the plant would fail for want of room. He steps along the furrows with great regularity, and flings at such intervals, and in such quantities, as will ensure the designed allowance, which varies a little according to circumstances about two bushels to the acre is usual. It is afterwards harrowed in, and sometimes even ploughed; and in a few days or weeks appears the tiny tender blade, which has to endure the utmost rigour of our winter

season.

Nothing but experience could persuade us that this is the best way to ensure the ensuing harvest. Wheat of a certain sort is, indeed, sown in the spring; but this is apt to produce straw, rather than corn. The previous growth of the root is needful, to sustain the productive ears. The slender and blackened appearance of the blade in winter does not much discourage the farmer. In this state he frequently subjects it to the trampling of men and horses, and to the apparently crushing influence of the timber roll: for he considers it of more consequence to break the clods, and close them about the roots, than to care for the blade which then appears.

Wheat that is dibbed, or dibbled, is dropped, two or three kernels at a time, into holes, made by a man with a pointed instrument in the shape of a T. This he holds by the cross

piece, and thrusts the longer leg, which is pointed with iron, into the ground, at the distance of a few inches, with considerable quickness as he walks. Children usually follow, and drop the seed into the holes which he makes.

The drill is too complex a machine to be accurately described, or understood here. It is a sort of box, containing the wheat, borne on two wheels, and drawn by horses. The wheels, as they go round, give motion to a sort of cylinder within the box, in which are fixed instruments, like tea-spoons, at proper distances. Underneath are cutting irons, which form grooves, or drills, to receive the seed, as it is delivered from the spoons; and the process is thus completed with mechanical precision, such as pleases the eye, when the plant issues from the soil. However, the advantages of this contrivance, on the whole, are