Their Chief Manure Is Seaweed, Which, When They Lay It
To Rot Upon The Field, Gives Them A Better Crop Than Those Of The
Highlands.
They heap sea shells upon the dunghill, which in time
moulder into a fertilising substance.
When they find a vein of
earth where they cannot use it, they dig it up, and add it to the
mould of a more commodious place.
Their corn grounds often lie in such intricacies among the craggs,
that there is no room for the action of a team and plow. The soil
is then turned up by manual labour, with an instrument called a
crooked spade, of a form and weight which to me appeared very
incommodious, and would perhaps be soon improved in a country where
workmen could be easily found and easily paid. It has a narrow
blade of iron fixed to a long and heavy piece of wood, which must
have, about a foot and a half above the iron, a knee or flexure
with the angle downwards. When the farmer encounters a stone which
is the great impediment of his operations, he drives the blade
under it, and bringing the knee or angle to the ground, has in the
long handle a very forcible lever.
According to the different mode of tillage, farms are distinguished
into long land and short land. Long land is that which affords
room for a plow, and short land is turned up by the spade.
The grain which they commit to the furrows thus tediously formed,
is either oats or barley.
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