thick will doe the same but rather by an actual heat which it creates by its fermentation than by the power of single principles as in the former instances but the excess of it is harmful being laid in such quantities as it may heat and certainly burns the root of any ordinary Vegerables that grow near it Sheep-dung Fog-dung likewise and all Soyl and Litters of Cattle by reason of their Dung Urine and heat of their Bodies lying thereon have a warmth in them and are fit for cold Lands on that account and by reason of their moisture for dry Lands also for it is to be observed that many Grounds are dry and cold too in all parts of the North and North-west as England lies and in England many of our Wood-lands especially and so all hot and moist soils are most proper for them Burning and beaking is in many places very successfully used to this effect The actual fire heating the ground and the ashes of Fern Brake Heath c. of like nature yielding a salt very profitable for and expedient to joyn with the other principles in the ground to cause a fermentation and fruitfulness 'T is a general rule that there is nothing in animal Bodies but will turn to excellent Manure Their Horns Bones Hair Hesh both of Beasts Fish and Fowl are very rich and those that know the vertue of them buy at Cities for the purpose rags which are made of Wool Sheep-trotters stincking Fish or other Offal of Animals which must either be mixed with other Dung or not laid over thick But it is to be observed That where moisture is rather required then heat there floating by Land-floods the dirt and mud of Ponds and High-ways is most proper where warmth and heat is a greater need there soyl that is made by a mixture of the Offal of Animals will be more to the purpose and advantage of the Husbandman Lastly 'T is probable that any thing that has active parts in it if it be not just of the nature of the ground will raise improvement Heterogeneous things upon their meeting ordinarily causing than stir which is thought by most Naturalists now to have great influence upon Vegeration N. 3. The ways of Improvement of dry light sandy gravelly flinty Lands by floating Marl Chalk Lime Drynesse is generally a great cause of barrennesse and is an usual annoyance in Sandy and gravelly grounds more especially in regard that they retein not the rain-rain-water so well as clay or Land of a mixt soil The proper remedy for this defect is artificial watering which tempers the ground most properly for the improvement of the growth of the most useful Plants Grain and Grass For first Water in its own nature and property is a soil and has an exceeding agreeableness with the Bodies of most Vegetables as appears by the experiments of their growth in water onely And secondly There is a very considerable accrewment to dry sandy and gravelly Earth by the fatty soyl and wash that is carryed both in Land-floods and other Water that having passed through Cities Roads or other places of like nature are drawn over the ground for the salt and other the mixt earth that was carryed in the Flood being apt to reside to the bottom is left generally behinde upon the Land and the salt diluted in the Water easily enters the Turf and carries with it other Particles thither where by the heat of the Sun they being in conjunction with the Sand Gravel or other Bodies Heterogeneous and unlike to themselves they cause by their mutual fermentation as is supposed or some other way that temper of ground which is most fit for the growth of all Grain Grasses and other Vegetables of general use For drawing the water over Land the use is that by the eye or level which is easily made to help the eye First Discovery be made where the water may be conveighed over the most Land Then Mr. Blith advises to cut our the Master Trench or Water-course to such a bigness as may contain all the Land-flood or at least be able to bring it within the Land intended for this improvement When the water is brought thither carry it along in a foot broad Trench or lesser all along the level If the level be too dead the lesser stream will follow so that a convenient descent must be minded to give the water a fair passage If there be discovered in this lesser Trench any mistake or failing it may with ease be amended by going higher to or lower from the level and the first Trench be stopt up again for this Trench need be no deeper then the thickness of the upper Turf This done the Water-course must be cut out which must be large enough to contain the whole Water which is intended for the enrichment of the Land which largeness ought to consist in breadth and not in deepness for a shallow Trench about a foot deep is best for this work When the Trench is brought near to the end of the Land it is to be drawn narrower and narrower Further directions the Author gives the Improver in these words As soon says he as thou hast brought the Water upon the Land and turned it over or upon it be sure thou take it off as speedily as possibly and so fail not to cut thy work so as unlesse thy Land be very sound and thy Land-flood very rich thou must take it off the sooner by a deep draining Trench Therefore I prescribe no certain breadth betwixt floating and draining Trenches but if the Land be sounder and dryer or lieth more descending thou maist let it run the broader and as the Land is moist sad rushy or level let it run the lesser breadth or compass and for the draining Trench it must be made so deep that it goe to the bottom of the cold spewing moist Water that feeds the Flag and Rush for the wideness of it use thine own liberty but be sure to make it so wide as thou maist goe to the bottom of it which must be so low as any moisture lieth which moisture usually lieth under the upper and second swarth of the Earth in some Gravel or Sand or else where some greater Stones are mixed with Clay under which thou must goe half one Spades graft deep at the least Yea suppose the corruption that feeds and nourisheth the Rush or Flag should be a yard or four foot deep to the bottom of it thou must goe if ever thou wilt drain it to purpose or make the utmost advantage of either floating or draining without which thy Water cannot have its kindely operation The truth is otherwise the benefit might happen to be no greater then the Patients who incurr'd a Dropsie in his cure from a Fever whereas by this means there is a double benefit the first whereof comes by the commodity of watering the second by the dreining Trenches necessarily annexed thereunto And whereas the aforesaid Author commends watering
best sowed where you sow your Barly or Oates upon that very husbandry or tilth about the middle of March and may grow up among the Corn because it groweth not fast the first summer but after the Corn is cut it must be preserved it requires a rich and warme soil This plant is of great use to Dyars and coloureth the bright yellow or lemon colour It abates the strength and superrichnesse of land and may prepare for Corn in land of its own Nature too rich which is as Mr. Blith observes sometimes a fault though not so frequently as the contrary extreme Beans require a low deep ground and Waterish not dry sandy or gravelly soyle This is true of feild beanes though I first Tooke notice of the great difference in our London Gardens where the labourers for their own eating would give one part in three more for a measure of beanes from the former than from the latter soyl who assured me that from the same seed and care garden beans have much more meale pulpe or kernell and thinner skins in the moist than in the dryer and lesse waterish ground N. 4. The Generall observations for the manner of sowing Besides the Examples aforesaid I shall adde some rules such as by Gardiners are usually observed This is generall that all seeds must be covered with the earth which is done either by sowing the ground and turning the seed in under the furrow or by drawing trenches in the soyle and then drawing the earth over them with a hoe or sowing the beds ready drest and hacking in the seed with the same instrument or by harrowing raking with a rake or drawing bushes over the sowed ground to cover the seed or to set the single seeds with a stick or lastly to sow the ground and afterwards to sift or strow fine mould thereon The two laste wayes are for choice seeds when the workeman desires to loose none for want of burying the sowing under furrow is for such seeds as must endure the winter the depth of ground being part of their security against the winter colds nor are all seeds of strength to shoot their germen through so so much earth The sowing intrenches is used for Pease there being thereby spaces left between the rowes of half a yard more or lesse to gather them as they ripen and roome whence to draw mould to the roots which frequently done is very advantageous to them It is likewise handsome for Spinach Endive Thyme Savory or other garden herbs to grow in rowes after this manner of sowing Moisture is absolutely necessary for the growth of all plants two or three dayes after a great rain is accounted a good season in dry weather two dayes after rain say the London Gardiners agreably to that of Ferrarius Nec tamen simulac magnis imbribus terra permaduit seres sed tantisper expectabis dum pluvius ille mador modice exsiccetur ne madenti limosoque in solo statutae radices exputrescant de Fl. cult l. 3. c. 1. Seeds that are apt to run to a Muscilage are unfit to endure moisture upon that account as els where I noted I prescribe nothing concerning the observation of the faces of the moone because I much doubt of any effect therefrom Neither doe Gardiners that work nor Authors that write prescribe alike rules but contradict each other in their direction for the particular observation of this Planet as to any intended production Nor is it agreeable to my reason that the moones being in the full at the first explication of the two dissimilar leaves or germination of the plant should cause a double flower this germination according to this present History differing little from other augmentations of the same plant in opposite quarters immediately ensuing so that if a full moone be proper I see no reason why it may not be effectuall by vertue of the same phasis the third as the first or the twelveth as the sixt day of the seedlings augmentation The meliorating of ground belongs to the head of Improvement here I shall only observe that where ground is very light as in some London and Kentish gardens it is found profitable after sowing to tread in the seed Some steep all garden seed before they sow them to make the germination the more speedy but seeing there be no better wayes of infusion than in Farth and Water why the same bosome of a well watered ground should not be most fit for this operation I see not In seeds that are long in coming up the seed bed is not to be digged up the first winter For I know diverse seeds that will for a great part of them ly under ground the first year and come up the second of this Nature is the Ash-key sometimes the Peach Malecotone and some Plums N. 5. Of variety of kindes different in colour taste smell and other sensible qualities proceeding from some seeds and what plonts they are that bring seeds yeild-such va riety In Carnations you have seeds that give admirable Variety from the Orange-tawny Carnation and all his strip't kinds that are double and keepe their tawny in them in any measure The white Tawny and Carnations darkly spotted Ferrarius commends for producing variety of colours and stripes Kernells of divers Apples and Peares bring variety of kinds different in taste smell colour and hardnesse and are as often promoted to better as the degenerate to worst as I am very credibly informed by persons that professe themselves to have seen the experience The kernells of the Burgundy Pear has brought a noble alteration and produceth a pear farre beyond that excellent kind Peaches and Malecotones doe ordinarity the like so that by seed is thought to be their best propagation Our Gardiners in choosing the seed of stock-Gylli-flowers to make them bring double stocks take their seed from such tops as bring fine leaves in their flower of ecially if it be one strip't but Mr. P. sayes those that bear double seeds cannot be distinguished from the other and I have reason to beleive him for such as chuse their seed this way doe not find that it answers their expectation For Tulips that are early or Praecoces the purple says Mr. Parkinson I have found to be the best next thereto is the purple with white edges and so likewise the red with yellow edges but each of them will bring most of their own Colours For the Media's take those colours that are light rather white then yellow and purple then red yea white not yellow purple not red but these again to be spotted is the best and the more the better but withall or aboveall in these respect the bottome of the flower which in the precox Tulipa you cannot because you shall find no other ground in them but yellow for if the flower be white or whitish sported or edged and straked and the bottome blew or purple which is found in the Holias and in the Cloath of Silver this is
poleson a hill and both the sun and plow may have free passage between them those that have less ground make lesse distances and toyle their garden with the spade and put but three poles to a hill whereas such as plant 9 or 10 foote distance use four at the least if not five In planting which is thought to be best done when the frosts are past some prescribe April for the season there is nothing required but that they be set about the center of the place intended for the Hill upon the plain surface of the ground in good mould about three four or five in number according to the bigness of the Hill intended and ordered with the usuall care of offsets besides this particular that as the sets grow the hill must be raised to their heads Saffron delights in a reasonable good and dry light ground not extreamly soyled or moist 't is planted chiefly in some parts of Essex Suffolke and between that and Cambridge at Saffron-Walden They are set in the manner of bulbous roots being taken when the bulbe is at the fullest commonly about Midsummer the bulbs are set by a line that the beds may be weeded with a hoe and that either with a setting stick or by trenches made in the manner of those wherein garden pease are usually sowed This beares in the middle of the flower three chives which is the Saffron to be gathered every morning early and dryed for use every second or third year at the furthest the beds must be replanted and the offsets drawn away The generall way of this propagation is to take the offsets that rise from the bulbous and tuberous rooted plants as Tulips Anemones Narcisses Crocus's c. the suckers which from the roots of poplars Elmes Nuttrees Peares Burts Nursgardens Kentish Codlings Gooseberryes Roses Ruscus Calamus Aromaticus are very plentifully are drawn and more or less from all mentioned in the Catalogue N. 1. Chap. 2. and to replant them in the seasons of setting which are related in the proper chapter for that operation into proper beds and in convenient distances for their future education and growth N. 3. Variety of colours in what flowers from what offsets Our Gardiners respect most the roots of widdowes for that they find by experience that they multiply the variety of Tulips not only from seeds but from the offsets of these widdows I my self have seen admirable declensions of them from their naturall purple and white The royall Crocus striped gives now and then very pretty variety from its offsets as sometimes I have seen on the same roote an ordinary striped Crocus and another of a perfect flame colour though the variery here be not so great as in Tulips Concerning the manner of growth by Offsets there is little to be spoken particularly their roots being actually made while they remaine upon the mother plant and their growth being like that of other well rooted vegetables CHAP. 3. Of propagations by stemmes cuttings or slippes N. 1. A Catalogue of plants this way propagable Abrotonum Vnguentarium Balsamita Barberyes Basil Basilmint Bay Baume Box. Brooklime Burts and generally all such plants as break out into protuberances like warts upon the bark Bugle Cornelian Cherry Many Crowfootes Donas his woodwort being cut off neer the roote Elder Evergreen-Privet Germanders Gilliflowers Hyssope Jasmine Kentish Codlings Knotgrasse Lavander Lawrell Marjerome Marsh-mallowes being taken up neer the roote Mastique Mulberyes Nursgardens Penny-royall Periwincle Pincks Polium monstanum Prunella or Selfe heale Quinces Some Roses as the ever-green Rose Rosemary Rue Sage both English and French Savory Savin in moist ground and shadowy Scordium Southernwood Spearmints Strawberies and generally all plants that have joynts upon creeping strings Thime Tripolium Veronica erecta Vines Violets Wall flowers Watercresse in water Withy Willow Woodbine N. 1. Explication of the Manner of propagation by stemmes cut off from the Mother-plant or slip't by example and Rules for particular direction For example I shall chuse to instance in Gilliflowers or Carnations for which flowers observe this order Seeke out from the stemmes such shoots onely as are reasonable strong but yet young and not either too small or slender or having any second shoots from the joynts of them or run up into a spindle cut these slips off from the stem or roote with a knife either close to the maine branch if it be short or leaving a joynt or two behind if it be long enough at which it may shoote anew when you have cut off your slips you may either set them by and by or else as the best Gardiners use to doe cast them into a tub of water for a day or two then in a bed of rich and fine mould first cutting off your slip close at the joynt and having cut away the lowest leaves close to the stalke and the uppermost even at the top with a litle stick make a little hole in the earth and put your slip therein so deep that the upper lease may be wholly above the ground some use to cleave the stalk in the middle and put a little earth or clay or chickweed which we more use within the cleft this is Mr. Hills way in Sir Hugh Plat but many good and skilful Gardiners doe not use it then close the ground unto the stemme of the plant As for the time If you slip and set them in September as many use to doe or yet in August as some may think will doe well yet unlesse they be the most ordinary sorts which are likely to grow at any time and in any place the most of them if not all will either assuredly perish or never prosper well the season indeed is from the beginning of May to the middle of June at furthest Ferrarius Lib. 2. c. 15. sayes that from the moneth of February to the middle of March viz in the time of their germination is the best time to slip this flower He neither will have them slipt nor twisted in the Roote nor Barly put under them to raise adulterous fibres but only advises that they be cut off in a joynt The truth is both the Spring and Autumne are good Seasons for makeing out Roots the latter requires that the slip be so early set as that they may have time enough to take Roote before the coldness of winter The former that the plant set in the spring may have taken Roote before the Sun rises to emit violent and parching heats which are generall Rules for Vernall and Autumnall settings Woody plants that bear leaves must be taken off planted some time between the fall of the leafe and the spring some preferre the planting them in the beginning some at the going out of the winter about the beginning of February Immediately when the great frosts breake at the first towardnesse to spring is a good season according to generall beleife Experiments made of the succcsse of the cuttings off diveâ—s plants set in water Because in
the place of conjuncture it is there forc'd to undergoe a total corruption and lapse into the Bed of its first matter from whence by a new generation there arises a new sap begot in the Tree by a specifick faculty which in a Pear graff may be call'd a Pear-sap-making-power and so in all the rest And for the commendation of this last way of Resolution I must express this its excellency that it is equally applyable to all things in the world each thing being made and the cause as easily believed by some such thing-making power Or it might not be amiss to entitle Diva Colchodea the grand-general form-making-intelligence to the production of all these effects and in Romantick guise to place her as it were in a non-erring chair sitting in the very place of conjuncture of Cyon and Stock and working by ways and arts belonging to her own Trade and therefore as her proper mysteries not to be revealed to the forming in most occult and admirable maner of the appearing effect CHAP. VI. Of the ways for and Seasons of setting Plants ALl Trees and Shrubs of Woody substance that have Bodies able to endure the cold are best set before the Winter assoon as the Leaves begin to fall A Quickset of this season will far outgrow the like planted in the Spring Artichocks and Asparagus Roots do exceeding well being planted at this Season if set in a rich warm mould and well defended in the ensuing Winter from the violence of the frosts Artichokes are with us set above an Ell distance and thereby in the Winter a Trench being made between the rows the Mould is cast up on ridges for the defence of the Roots and in the Summer Cole-flowers or other Garden-stuff is set in the distances For Herbs and choice Plants especially those that are set without Roots it is most fit and usual that they be set in the Spring as Hysope Time Savory Marjerome Wall-flowers Pincks Gilly-flowers and Carnations with this Caution That by how much more tender each Plant is in regard of cold the later it requires to be set and in the warmer place For all bulbous and tuberous rooted Plants it is accounted the best way for their preservation and improvement that they be taken up every year out of the ground and kept some time out of the ground The Universal and Catholick order of all Bulbous Plants says Laurembergius is that about St. James cyde they be taken out of the ground and put in a place cold and dry of a free air not in the Sun nor covered with Sand or Earth or accessible to Mice let them abide so a Moneth or thereabluts then set them again when they are taken up cut off the Fibres that grow from under the head nor need any thus take them up every year unless it be for the transplantation of the off-sets by which forbearance the stock of Tulips is very much increased Ferrarius more particularly forbids the abiding of Anemones in the Earth all the Summer as being found prejudicial to them by his experience But Fritellaries and Peonies and the Crown Imperial he will not have removed from their Beds unless into a Cellar in a pot of Earth Nor are all taken at the same time as he seems to intimate for Narcisses and Crocusses are commonly taken up first generally when the flower is gone the leaf withered and the Bulb full it is the best season to take them up some keep them out of the ground longer as till Christmass or after as this year being in London my best Tulips Anemones and Ranunculus's were in the House till the beginning of February and yet did well enough But commonly we re-plant them about Michaelmass or thereabouts some great Florists keep them out of the ground no longer than till they grow dry some replant them in June some in July or August some take not up their Ranunculus Roots at all Those Gardiners whose Beds are apt to be over-flowed or soaked with cold water in the Winter the later they set I believe their Bulbous and Tuberous Roots will prove the better The ordinary time to plant Anemones says Mr. Parkinson is most commonly in August which will bear Flowers some peradventure before Winter but usually in February March and April few or none abiding until May But if you will keep some Roots out of the ground un-planted till Febr. March April and plant some at one time and some at another you shall have them bear Flowers according to their planting those that are planted in Febr. will flower about the middle or end of May and so the rest accordingly thus you have the pleasure of these Plants out of their seasons which is not permitted to be enjoyed by any other that I know Nature not being so prone to be furthered by Art in other things as in this yet regard is to be had that in keeping your Anemones out of the ground for this purpose you neither keep them too dry nor too moist for sprouting or rotting and in planting them you set them not in too open a Sunny place but where they may be somewhat shadowed N. 2. Of the setting of Woods Fruit-Trees and Plants uncultivated Concerning Plants that are ordinarily set abroad and are not cultivated in Gardens or Orchards few observations can be made that are not very vulgar 't is greatly his interest that mindes the thriving of his Trees that they be set that the Roots may run just under the Turf in the surface of the Earth the higher the better if they are kept moist at the root with wet straw or the like and defended from injuries the first year I have seen soom plants so buried in a depth of thick clay or gravel that they could not shoot for many years a sprig of a Span long whereas others set orderly in the same place did thrive abundantly And those that think to amend the matter by digging a hole a yard deep or more and putting in the Tree with a little good earth do but cheat themselves for the Tree would thrive as well upon a Stone Wall that is washed with rain Water as in that hole when once the Root is come to the sides thereof This I speak generally and not of such particular Trees as delight in a fingular Minera of Earth And for Orchards it is a very necessary requisite that the Roots of Fruit-trees stand above the Gravel Clay or Rock if any such be provision for which I have known made two ways the usual and most common is to plant with such Standards which have no down-right Roots which may be gotten in any well ordered Nurseries for in such the Seedling Plants are taken up the second year and the down-right Roots being cut off short they are set in beds for grafting and by this means shoot their Root rather in compass then directly downwards The second way is a more unusual experiment viz. To set the Fruit-Tree on the top
of the ground without any hole dig'd to lay a load of such dirt as is found in streets to the root upon the Turf yet so that the rain may abide and not by reason of the banck run from the root of the new set fruit-tree For Wall-Trees it is convenient the Roots be set at such distance from the foundation of the Walls that they may have room in the Earth for their roots a foot is a convenient space generally for then the heads will without difficulty be drawn to the Wall and the Roots not be prejudiced Those Wall-Fruits that are set abroad as Vines c. being-kept shorn in their Branches and not suffered to climb become good bearers especially if they are set near the reflection of Gravel-Walks or upon other Ground kept bare from Weeds For the planting of Woods in general for increase of under Wood Mr. Blith's way is generally approved to cast up double Dirches and plant any sorts of Wood in the form of a Quick-set Some sow seed on the Bancks in orderly rows and set likewise on the top as well as both sides of the Bank The time is assoon as the Leaf is fallen in any Weather or Season The Plants in a more sound ground are Ash Oak Elm Sycamore Maples Crabs Thorns in a more moist Ground as a drained Bog Poplar Willow Sallow Osier which grow by Truncheons In which watery soils the way of raising Ditches is most necessary For neither Willow Sallow Osier nor any other Plant will grow in a Bog without soundness of ground What Plants grow by cuttings what by laying for the more ready thickning of Woods may be seen above in the proper Chapter There is a story freely defended and frequently both in discourses Printed and spoken that the chips of Elm being sowed will grow but that is somewhat like Kirchers experiments before-mentioned in the Chapter of cuttings and not a whit more true otherwise to sow those Chips would be a good profitable and frugal way for thickning Woods The cause of the Countrey mans mistake for I suppose not that this error arose from Philosophers I imagine to be this At the felling of great Elms many chips must needs be scattered and flie round about the Tree and be covered in Grass thereabouts now the next year after the fall there arise generally great numbers of Suckers from the Toots of the old Tree which roots must emit all the sap they gather up into these Suckers the great Trunck being removed And these Suckers are easily mistaken to arise from the chips because they always come upon the felling of Elms where chips are found and grow at such distance as chips are ordinarily scattered N. 3. Whether any Vegetables may be set so as to grow in the Air. There is a question now-adays frequently proposed Whether there be more Soils then the ordinary Turf or surface of the Earth tempered with some water soyl being meant for the ground in which things may be set to grow I need not speak much upon it as to Water which by Experiments related in the Chapter concerning Propagation by cuttings appears to have a property to elicite Roots and make them where they were not and nourish the Plants by them after they were made to which I must adde this circumstance not before mentioned that Periwinckle and divers others continued their growth by this nourishment alone from year to year not dying in the Winter How long they might have continued I can't assert for being absent this Winter and no fires being kept near the water in the Glasses was so raryfied by the Frost that the sides could not contain it but were forced asunder thereby and so the Plants perished whereas otherwise they being set in a â—oom over my Laboratory I question not had many of them continued till now Some put forward that the Air might have the faculty of nourishing Vegetables ascribed to it And no wonder when Paracelsus makes it a sufficient nourishment for men and brings instances for the proof of his assertion But I finde That Onions Tulips and all Bulbous Roots though they shoot out a green leaf yet do very much lessen in their weight and it appears that this growth is but the motion of the same parts or some few of them to settle and gather in another place and another order or scituation in relation to each other for the Onion particularly hath the thicker coverings of the Bulb very much stretched out and each covering as it increaseth in length and breadth by rising into a leaf so the thickness considerable while it covered the Bulb onely decreaseth proportionably and is molden into a thinner and more largely extended Vestment I have hung up divers Sedums Orpines Tithymalls and other such Plants which I imagined most likely to grow by the Air onely and to encrease and be augmented thereby and found that by all my endeavors though the Plant grew well yet they always lost weight and never got the fourth part of a grain Aloes likewise though being hang'd up in the air with a cloath dipped in Sallat Oyl it sends forth for many years new leaves yet it always grows less and less in weight till at last the oldest leaves falling off and new coming up it grows to nothing CHAP. VII Of the means for the Improvement and best culture of Corn Grass and other Vegetables belonging to Husbandry and of the ways for removing the several annoyances that usually hinder such advantage Num. 1. Of the Annoyances to Land and the Impediments that usually distemper it to the disadvantage of the Husbandman THe Impediments that with us hinder the Husbandmen from making the greatest advantage of their ground are either the distempers of the ground it self or some evil accidents that occasionally happen thereto or to the vegetables growing thereon The distempers are generally caused either by the abounding of water above all other principles which causes coldness and a Dropsical disposition in the Earth or by the abounding of a dry Earth or Mineral and the want of moisture and saltness and that Spirit which should cause that motion in the insensible particles of the Earth which is proper for the exciting the Seeds of all things and so stirring the ground that the several particles may be at liberty to enter the Bodies of Vegetables fit for them the accidents come by blasting Winds rapacious Fowls Vermine and Weeds Fearn Heath Broom and other improfitable Vegetables of these and the usual remedies against them somewhat and the best that at the present occurs I shall speak in this Chapter N. 2. Of the remedies proper to cure the excessive coldness and moisture in Lands and the ways of Improvement thereby in Grounds subject to these distempers by draining Pigeons and Poultry dung Urine Soot Ashes Horse and Sheep dung Of Ground cold and dry and how these Soyls may be applyable thereto Bogginess and obstruction of Springs more or less is generally the cause of
the chill or coldness that lies upon Lands and breeds the Rush and other incommodities and therefore the foundation of the cure and improvement thereby must be to remove this internal cause by laying the ground dry and dreining the Bog In the relation of which operation and many more of this Chapter I shall ease my self by giving you Mr. Blith's observations and directions thereabouts who was both a Practicer himself and questionless a very faithful and true Reporter of his experience In cold rushy land says he the moisture or cold hungry water is found between the first second swarth of the Land and then oft-times you come immediately unto a little Gravel or Stonyness in which this water is and sometimes below this in an hungry Gravel and many times this Gravel or Stonyness lieth lower But in boggy Land it usually lieth deeper then in rushy but to the bottom where the spewing Spring lyeth you must goe and one spades depth or graft beneath how deep soever it be if you will drain the Land to purpose And for the matter or Bog-maker that is most easily discover d for sometimes it lieth within two foot of the top of the ground and sometimes and very usually within three or four foot yet some lie far deeper six eight or nine foot and all these are feazable to be wrought and the Bog to be disovered but until thou come past the black Earth or Turf which usually is two or three foot thick unto another sort of earth and sometimes unto old Wood and Trees I mean the proportion and form thereof but the nature is turned as soft and tender as the Earth it self which have lain there no man knows how long and then to a white Earth many times like Lime which the Tanner White-Tawer takes out of their Lime-pits and then to a Gravel or Sand where the water lieth and then one Spades depth clearly under this which is indeed nothing else but a Spring that would fain burst forth at some certain place which if it did clearly break out and ran quick and lively as other Springs doe your Bog would die but being held down by the power and weight of the Earth that opposeth the Spring which boils and works up into the earth as it were blows it up and filleth the earth with winde as I may call it and makes it swell and rise like a Puff-Ball as seldom or never you shall finde any Fog but it lieth higher and rising from the adjacent Land to it so that I believe could you possibly light of the very place where the Spring naturally lieth you need but open that very place to your Quick-Spring and give it a clear vent and certainly your Bog would decay by reason whereof it hath so corrupted and swoln the earth as a Dropsie doth Mans Body for if you observe the mould it is very light and hollow and three foot square thereof is not above the weight of one sollid foot of natural Earth Clay or Land whereby I conceive that how much soever this mould is forced from the natural weight or hardness of solid Earth or Clay so much it is corrupted swoln or increased and blown up and so much it must be taken down or let forth before ever it be reduced I therefore prescribe this direction Go to the bottom of the Bog and there make a Trench in the sound ground or else in some old Ditch so low as you verily conceive your self assuredly under the level of the Spring or spewing water and then carry up your Trench into your Bog straight through the middle of it one foot under that Spring or spewing water upon your level unless it rise higher as many times the Water or Spring riseth as the Land riseth and sometimes lieth very level unto the head of the Bog unto which you must carry your Drain or within two or three yards of the very head of it and then strike another Trench overthwart the very head both ways from that middle Trench as far your Bog goeth all along to the very end of it still continuing one foot at least under the same and possibly this may work a strange change in the ground of it self without any more Trenching Or thus you may work it somewhat a more certain way but more chargeable viz. After you have brought a Trench to the bottom of the Bog then cut a good substantial Trench about the Bog I mean according to the form of your Bog whether round square or long or three or four yards within your Boggy ground for so far I do verily believe it will drain that which you leave without your Trench at the depth aforesaid that is underneath the spring-Spring-water round And when you have so done make one work or two just overthwart it upwards and downwards all under the matter of the Bog as is aforesaid and in one years patience through Gods blessing expect your desired Issue And if it be in such a place as will occasion great danger to your Cattle then having wrought your works and drains as aforesaid all upon straight lines by all means prevent as many Angles Crooks and Turnings as is possible for those will occasion but stoppages of the Water and filling up of Trenches and loss of ground and much more trouble then otherwise Then you must take good green Faggots Willow Alder Elm or Thorn and lay in the bottom of your Works then take your Turf you took up in the top of your Trench and plant them thereupon with the Soard downward and then fill up your works level again until you come to the bottom or neither end of your work where your Trench is so shallow that it will not endanger your Cattle or rather take great pibble Stones or Flint Stones and so fill up the bottom of your Trench about fifteen Inches high and take your Turf and Plant it as aforesaid being cut very fit for your Trench that it may ly close as it is laid down and then having covered it all over with Earth and made it even as the other ground wait and expect a wonderful effect through the blessing of God but if you may without eminent danger leave your works open that is most certain of all Other and second remedies for all cold Land are Figeons Dung Dung of Poultry which abound in heat and volatile salt these are onely sowed by the hand for fear of burning the Com in the chitting of the Grain I have observed where these Dungs have been over plentifully laid that the place bare no Corn at all when as in other places where it was moderately strawed the Crop was exceeding great The same effect there is in Urine and Soot from the same principles viz. much eager spirit and volatile salt and therefore the same caution is to be had in their use I have seen half the Trees in a Codlinghedge killed by watering them over-much with Chamber-lye Horse-dung if not rotten lying
good a crop of Wheat as ever was seen in England and afterward three Crops a year of Clover exceeding good one whereof was equal in value to a Crop of Wheat This being matter of Fact I believe it as to improvement by fertility because the Brine works very considerably in small proportion and Lime in this juncture may do well both to fertility and defence of the Grain against Grubs and Insects and Worms that abide in the Earth but surely as to blasting and Crows and Birds that spoil the Corn in the Ear it has no influence Moles by watering are drowned or driven up to so narrow a compass that they may be easily taken I have known them to have been forc'd to leave their holes to run upon the Turf to save their lives from the Water-flood Mr. Blith relates That one Spring about March one Mole-catcher and his Boy in about ten days time in a ground of ninety Acres being just laid down from Tillage took about three Bushels old and yong they were not to be numbred most of them being yong and naked and this he onely did by casting up their Nests which are always built in a great heap of double bigness to the rest most easily discerned and then the old ones would come to look their yong which he would snap up presently also At another Season then March which is their time of breeding such success is not to be expected In other times the best way is if there be any Hedges near to set the Gins or Traps there for their ordinary roads are in such Hedges and other places they cast up are but of uncertain use as when they intend forage for one time though it may be that they minde the use of that passage no more at all Bellonius advises to bury Moles in those places whence you would drive the rest of that Vermine and there may be somewhat in that remedy For many living Bodies have a great dislike to and antipathy against the putrified Bodies of their own kinde Thus Worms putrified at the Belly of a Childe outwardly and the powder given inwardly are esteemed as Medicines destructive to the Worm in the Belly though the latter way is by some thought to breed more then it kills Nay in Vegetables 'tis agreed That a yong Orchard will not thrive among the Roots of an old rotten Orchard the reason whereof some suppose to be the antipathy of the yong against the old putrifying Roots but of this effect other reasons may be as probable There be some other remedies for the same annoyances as particularly for the destruction of Fearn the Author named gives this prescription In the Spring when the Fearn begins to grow a little above the Grass while it is yong and tender take a crooked Pole or piece of Wood about six foot long coming in at one end like a Bow or made like a blunt Sithe with this strike off all the heads of the Fearn as low as you can even to the ground if possible do this the second or third time and it proves generally a certain remedy The reason as I suppose is the putrefaction of the Fearn it being a very moist Muscilaginous Plant by its own juice and the moisture of the Earth by which the very Roots themselves come to be corrupted or else the deprivation of all the Buds that germinate from the Root by cutting off the Sprouts so unseasonably For Ant-hills to destroy the Insects and take the hills down this manner is prescribed Divide the upper Turf into five or six parts then take it down with a turfing Spade to the bottom of the Banck the Turf being cut as thin as can be under the roots of the grass then take out the Core of the Bank that when the Turf is returned to its place it may lie there lower somewhat than the surface of the Earth that the moisture which will be a certain destruction of the Ants may a little reside there This must be done in November December or January that the Roots of the Grass may the better take to the ground before hot weather comes in the Spring Among Mr. Speeds notes there are these Recipts take red Herrings and cutting them in pieces burn the pieces on the Mole-hills or you may put Garlick or Leeks in the Mouthes of their Hills and the Moles will leave the ground I have not tryed these ways and therefore refer the Reader to his own tryal belief or doubt I had almost forgot to mention the change of Seed from grounds of a contrary nature which by the experience of Husbandmen is found very advantagious and is thought to prevent smootiness 'T is the custom in Buckinghamshire for those of the Vale to buy their Seed from the Chiltern on this account and this experiment is found profitable in Wheat Barley Pease and all Field Grains and not so onely but also in Garden Plants For the preserving early or late sowed Corn or the same when it begins to corn in the Ear from Crows Rooks or Jack-Dows Mr. Blith has invented this Scare-Crow You must says he kill a Crow or two and take them into the Field where they haunt and in the most obvious plain perspicuous places make a great hole of two foot over and about twenty Inches deep on the highest ground in the Field which hole must be stuck round about the edges with the longest Feathers the bottom must be covered with the shortest and some part of the Carkass and that Turf or Earth that is digged out of the hole being laid round upon a heap you may stick round with Feathers also One Crows Feathers will dress two or three holes and about six or eight holes will serve for a Field of ten or twelve Acres The Feathers will remain fresh a Moneth unless store of Rain or Weather beat them much and then if needful they must be renewed CHAP. VIII Of the Means of Improvement and best culture of such Plants or Flowers as are usually cultivated in Gardens or Orchards and of the ways used for the removing of such annoyances as are commonly incident to them Num. 1. Of the annoyances in general incident to Garden Plants THe Politician speaks it to be a part of as great skill and prowess to defend a place already gotten and to improve it to the benefit of the Prince and Inhabitants as it was at the first to arrive at the Conquest this is alike true in the Gardinets Province It is no easie thing with him to raise a stock of choice Plants by the several ways of propagation above mentioned and as hard to preserve them being propagated from destruction by foreign and intestine violence For either the sharpnesse of cold the torridness of the Sun Vermine or other accident from without or want of convenient and nourishable soyl of earth and water and other Elements proportionable to the plant will be such internal deâ—â—ciencies as to cause utter destruction or the
shall well be content with thin water Sun'd But Kitchin ground is best improved by fat water wherein Ordure has been washed And some caution is to be had that by too much water you do not chill or over-glut the ground often and little is the best use and in the Spring and Autumn when Frosts are feared 't is better watering in the Morning then at Night in Summer the Night I esteem the better Season There is a pretty way of watering choice Plants by wetting a streiner and so letting one end of it hang over a Vessel of water which will draw up the moisture from the Bason and let it gently fall down the streiner to the Root of the Plant. N. 4. Examples of the best Culture of Hops and ways of ordering them after they are first set taken out of Mr. Blith When says he your Hops are grown two foot high binde up with a Rush or Grass your springs to the Poles as doth not of it self winding them as oft about the Poles as you can and winde them according to the course of the Sun but not when the dew is upon them your Rushes lying in the Sun will toughen says he but surely better in the shade And now you must begin to make your Hills and for that purpose get a strong Hoe of a good broad bit and cut or hoe up all the Grass in the borders between your Hills and therewith make your Hills with a little of your Mould with them but not with strong Weeds and the more your Hills are raised the better the larger and stronger grows your Root and bigger will be your fruit and from this time you must be painful in your Garden and be ever and anon till the time of gathering in raising your Hills and clearing your Ground from Weeds In the first year suppress not one Cyon but suffer them all to climb up the Poles for should you bury the Springs of any of your Roots it would die so that the more Poles are required to nourish the Spring But after the first year you must not suffer above two or three stalks to grow up to one Pole but pull down and bury all the rest Yet you may let them grow four or five foot long and then choose out the best for use As soon as your Pole is set you may make a circle how broad your Hill shall be and then hollow it that it may receive the moisture and not long after proceed to the building of your Hills And where you began or where your Hops are highest there begin again and pare again and lay them to your Hops but lay the out circle highest to receive moisture be alway paring up and laying it to the heap and that with some Mould until the heap comes to be near a yard high but the first year make it not too high and as you pass through your Garden have a forked Wand in your hand to help the Hops that hang not right Now these Hills must the next year be pulled down and dressed again every year Some when their Hop binde is eleven or twelve foot high break off the tops which is better then they that have their Poles so long as the Hop runs But if that your Hop by the midst of July attain not to the top of your Pole then break off the top of the same Hop for the rest of the time will nourish the branches which otherwise will loose all it being no advantage in running up to the stoâ—k or increase of the Hop In April help every Hill with a handful or two of good Earth when the Hop is wound about the Pole but in March you will finde unless it hath been tilled all Weeds but if you have pull'd down your Hills and laid your ground as it were level it will serve to maintain your Hills for ever but if you have not pulled down your Hills you should with your Hoe as it were undermine them round till you come near the Principal Root and take the upper or yonger Roots in your hand and discerning where the new Roots grow out of the old sets of which be careful but spare not the other but in the first year uncover no more but the tops of the old sets but cut no Roots before the end of March or beginning of April The first year of dressing you must cut off all such as grew the year before within one inch of the same and every year after cut them as close to the old Roots those that grow downward are not to be cut they be those that grow outward which will incumber your Garden the difference between old and new easily appears you will finde your old sets not increased in length but a little in bigness and in few years all your sets will be grown into one and by the colour also the main Root being red the other white but if this be not early done then they will not be perceived And if your sets be small and placed in good ground the Hill well maintained the new Roots will be greater then the old if they grow to wilde Hops the stalks will wax red pluck them up and plant new in their places N. 4. Mr. Parkinsons way of ordering the seedlings of Tulips grown After the Tulip seed is sowne the first yeares springing bringeth leaves little bigger then the ordinary grasse leaves The second yeare bigger and so by degrees every year bigger then other The leaves of the praecoces while they be young may be discerned from the Media's by this note which I have observed â—he leaves of them do stand above ground shewing the small foot-stalkes whereby every leafe doth stand but the leaves of the Media's or Serotines do never wholy appear out of the ground but the lower part which is broad abideth under the upper face of the Earth Those Tulips now growing to be three yeares old yet some at the second yeare if the ground and aire be correspondent are to be taken up out of the ground wherein you shall find they have run deep and be new planted after they have been a little dry'd and cleansed either in the same or another ground again placing them reasonable neere one to another according to their greatnesse which being planted and covered over with earth again of about an inch or two thicknesse may be left untaken up again two yeares longer if you will or else removed every yeare after as you please and thus by transplanting them in their due season which is still at the end of July or at the beginning of August or thereabouts you shall according to the seed and soyle have some come to bearing in the first yeâ—â— after their flowering some have had them in the fourth but that hath been but few and none of the best or in a rich ground some in the sixth and seventh and some peradventure not untill the eighth or tenth yeare But remember that as the roots grow
the Autumne but I have seen it with good success sowen in the Spring and harrowed in after the manner of sowing Barley the crop being as good as any other times upon the same ground after the usual country procedure Some seeds must be sowen dry not after raine or watering Of this kind is Myrrhis seed Basil Scorzonera and all such as being wet run to a Muscilage Many times they sow divers seeds in a Bed together as Radishes and Carrots that by such time as the Carrots come up the Radishes may be gone Upon beds newly set with Licorice they sow Onions or Radish or Lettice if their Licorice plants or ground be but weak so as not quickly to cause a shadow with their leaves London Gardiners sow Radish Lettice Parsley Carrots on the same bed gathering each in their seasons and leaving the Parsnips till the Winter before which time they are not esteemed good or wholsome Note that where your grounds are very warm by reason of hedges hot beds dunghils c. that may abate the power of the frost seeds may be ventured into the ground much sooner than otherwise in ordinary places Cabbage seeds and Coleflowers are sowed in August or so timely as to be exactly well rooted plants before winter and this is the best way Or are sowed after so that they are transplanted in the time of cold This way is hazardous in the winter by reason of the nipping Frosts and chargeable in that they require much attendance and covering and uncovering which those plants that are confirmed before winter doe not Secondly they are more subject to Caterpillars in the Summer but the way of raising of them by hot beds in the Spring for Cabbages is the worst way of all and most subject to the peril of that vermine Those Plants of the Spring sowing that you sow later than ordinary require to be the more watered and shadowed from the heat Those in the Spring that are sowed earlyer than ordinary require the more to be defended from the cold Those in the Autumne that you prematurely sow are to be watered and shadowed the more Those which you sow late are to be better defended from the Winter till they have gotten strength N. 4. Examples of Sowing with some particular directions for some choice Vegetables Examp. 1. From Mr. Parkinson directing skillfully the ordering of Tulips in their propagation by seed The first example I shall give you out of Mr. Parkinson The time sayes he and manner of Sowing Tulip-seed is thus you may not sow them in the Spring of the year if you hope to have any good of them but in the Autumne or presently after they be through ripe and dry yet if you sow them not untill the end of Octob. they will come forward never the worse but rather the better for it is often seen that over-early sowing causeth them to spring out of the ground over-early so that if a sharp spring chance to follow it may goe near to spoile all or most of the seed We usually sow the same years seed yet if you chance to keep of your own or have of others such seed as is two years old they will thrive and doe well enough Especially if they were ripe and well gathered you must not sow them too thick for so doing hath lost many a Peck of seed for if the seed lie one upon another that it hath not roome upon the sprouting to enter or take root in the earth it perisheth by and by Some use to tread down the ground where they mean to sow their seed and having sowen them thereon doe cover them over the thickness of a mans Thumb with fine fifted earth and they think they doe well and have good reason for it For considering the nature of young Tulip roots is to runne down deeper into the ground every year more then other they think to hinder their quick descent by the fastness of the ground that so they may increase the better This way may please some but I doe not use it nor can find the reason sufficient for they doe not consider that the stifness of the earth doth cause the roots of the young Tulips to be long before they grow great in that the stiffe ground doth more hinder the well thriving of the Roots then a loose doth and although the roots doe runne down deeper in a loose earth yet they may easily by transplanting be holpen and rais'd up high enough I have also seen some Tulips not once removed from their sowing to their flowering but if you will not loose them you must take them up while their leaf or stalk be fresh and not withered for if you doe not follow the stalk down to the root be it never so deep you will leave them behind you The ground also must be respected for the finer softer and richer the mould is wherein you sow the seed the greater shall be your increase and variety Sift it therefore from stones and rubbish and let it be either fat naturall ground of it self or being muckt let it be throughly rotten some I know to mend their ground doe make such a mixture of grounds that they mar it in the making Ferrarius bids that the seed be sowen in Septemb. as soon as rain shall make the ground fit half a fingers breadth in good Garden mould not to be removed in two years after at which time they are to be removed and placed in severall beds according to their seveâ—all bigness where in 4 or 5 years they will bear their flowers Example 2. Of Anemone's Within a moneth after the seed of Anemone's is gather'd and prepared in August saies Ferrarius or three dayes before the full Moon in Septemb. it must be sown for by that means you shall gain a year in the growing over that you should doe if you sowed it the next spring If there remain any Wooliness in the seed pull it asunder as well as you can and then sow your seed reasonably thinne upon a plain smooth bed of fine earth or rather in pots or tubs and after the sowing sift or gently strew over them some fine good fresh mould about one fingers thickness at the most for the first time and about a month after their springing up sift or strew over them in like manner this is a necessary circumstance another fingers thickness of fine earth and in the mean time if the weather prove dry you must water them gently and often and thus doing you shall have them spring up before winter and grow pretty strong able to abide the sharp winter in their Nonage in using some little care to cover them loosly with Fearne furze or Bean-straw or any such things which must neitherly close to nor too farre from them The next Spring after the sowing or which is better the next August you may remove them and set them in order by Rowes with sufficient distance one from another where they may abide until
or floating as an help to boggy rushy quagmiry Land I suppose no benefit but hurt would arise thereby to such Lands if these dreining Trenches did not open the passages of the obstructed Springs original causes of the Bog or Rushiness as well as let out the Water newly introduced by the floating The time of the operation for this improvement must be when the Grass is all off the ground for else the soil will stain it that comes along with the Flood Often watering is good but to keep it long in a place breeds the Rush By this very Husbandry Mr. Blith brings precedents of improvement of Land from Eighteen pence to Thirty shillings an Acre and Mr. Plat from One shilling to Five pounds Another remedy for dry and light ground such as abound in Sand and Gravel is Marl an Earth most commonly slippery or greasie to the touch sometimes blew sometimes grey otherwhiles yellow now and then red always fryable so that it will slack after a shower and not grow afterwards hard or crusty as Clay doth but easily resolves to a dust or powder It saddens Land naturally and so will turn Rye Land as to make it fit for Wheat Barly and Pease and therefore must not be used twice or thrice together without some other more rarifying compost to intervene such as ordinary Dung is if you lay it down from Tillage 't is requisite that all Marled Land be first well dunged Chalk also I have seen used with very good success in Hampshire upon the Downs there which are of so dry a nature that it is grown Proverbial there that their Ground requires a shower every day in the Week and on the Sunday two and Mr. Blith affirms that in Hertfordshire by Chalk the Improvement is made on Barren Gravelly and Flinty Lands Mr. Blith reports thus of Lime that it is a suitabler Soyl for light sandy Earth then for a warm Gravel 't is improper for a wet and cold Gravel but for a cold hungry Clay worst of all for says he Lime being once slacked and melted is of a cold nature and will sadden exceedingly contrary to its nature in the Stone for it turns light Land into such a capacity that it will bear exceeding good Lammas Wheat or mixed Corn About twelve or fourteen Quarter of Lime serves an Acre it may as well be over as under-limed after Liming till not long but return to Pasture Num. 4. Remedies for accidental annoyances and hindrances of Improvement particularly the ways to destroy Fern Heath Ant-hills Moss Rushes Rest-harrow Broom or any such Weed or Shrubs that infect the ground Whether liming of Corn prevents blashing the effects of that and Brine in Improvement Concerning Moles and the ways to destroy them or drown them a way of Antipathy as to this effect in Animals and Vegetables to the Bodies of their own kinde when they are in the way of corruption Mr. Blith's way of preserving Corn from Crows Rooks c. When any Land runs to Fearn Heath or Ant-hills Mossiness Rushes coldness or any other Weeds or Shrubs as Goss Broom Furz c. The most proper and improving remedy is to plow it three or four year and then lay it down in good heart In which operation care must be had to plow up the Weeds clean and burn the Roots of them in heaps which warms the ground and to give it convenient dunging every year for so the greater shall the improvement be This Land must be cast into Furlongs that the Furrows may convey the Water one to another into a general Trench that it lie not upon the Land If the Land be cold and moist lay it the higher on ridges if hot and dry sandy or the like let it lic flat that it may better retain the Rain water Be sure you Plow up the Rushes Brakes or other annoying Weeds and for fail let some body with a Spade follow the Plough to root up such as are left after the Culter and Plow-share Harrow this new broken ground with weighty sharp and long tined Harrows such as 't is a Teems work to draw that uneven places may be torn up and good store of mould raised Cover your Seed with two or three sorts of Harrows each Harrow having tines thicker then the other some put weights upon the Harrows in the first and a Thorn under them in the last operation After four years Tilth lay down your Land and that upon a Crop of Wheat or Rye not on a Summer Corn for so the Soard will come the sooner especially if the Crop be sowed thin and as early as may be If you will double or treble the Improvement the Husbandry of sowing Clover-grass spoken of in the first Chapter will here come in most properly This last Plowing regard that the Ground be laid down smooth yet on ridges if the Land be cold and unless the Land be of exceeding strength fail not to manure it by dung or otherwise this last season of plowing Mr. Blith reports and Mr. Hartlip likewise That the natural helps to preserve Corn from blasting is the steeping of it in thick fat water or Lime water Urine or Brine or the mixing of Lime or Ashes with Corn well wet and moist that so it may cloath it self with the finest of the Lime or Ashes c. so as it may fall cloathed all over to the Earth and so be covered therewith But I believe he was mistaken in the applying of the Medicine to the prevention of the right and proper disease I have heard such who practiced these Medicines affirm that they have generally and with reasonable good success used those remedies to prevent smootiness but the very last year it was observed that where those means were used the blast did as much harm as on the adjoyning Lands where there were no such Applications made to the Seed And blasting being the perishing of the tender Kernel by reason of a Wind which from the effect is sometimes called a red Wind that too sharply and it may be with some Venome breathes on it at its first beginning I see no reason that such infusions or applications should be any defence for it comes from an outward violence and therefore it is most usually seen that not half a Tree onely but half a bough shall be blasted while the other half of the same that grows by one and the same nourishment remains free sound and well coloured There is a procedure mentioned among Mr. Speeds notes for Liming Corn that carries a good probability of advantage with it First The Grain was steeped in strong Brine of Salt that would bear an Egge twenty four hours and then being laid S. S. S. with Lime that is there was laid a layer of Corn first and then a layer of Lime and then again a layer of Corn c. the Lime cleaved to the Wheat and was sowed on Ground not worth Two shillings an Acre the effect was That it bare as
nastiness and premature or on the contrary the tardy and slow germination thereof will hinder its excellency or weeds or other vegetables may grow up to its hinderance and many other impediments there are which with their several remedies as they shall suggest themselves to my thoughts I shal propose in the present Chapter the last of this discourse N. 2. Of defences for choice plants from cold One great annoyance to all choice flowers and tender plants arises from the violence of the Winter cold the defence against which you shall have as far as I am able to give you and can think of in the following directions Let those Bulbous Roots that are tender such as the great double white Daffodill of Constantinople and other fine Daffodills that come from hot Countries the Ornithagolum Arabicum purple Montain Moly c. be planted in a large Tub or pot of earth and housed all the Winter that so they may be defended from the frosts or else which is the easier way keep the Roots out of the ground every year from September after the leaves and stalkes are past untill February in some dry but not hot or windy place and then plant them in the ground under a South-wall which are Mr. Parkinsons directions Alsoe the late Pine-aple Moly the Civet Moly of Mompelier the litle hollow white Asphodill which though its roots are not glandulous as to be capable of the last way yet they are well preserved many yeares if by housing they shall be defended from the winter wett and cold Rose-bay Mirtles the Indian Gelsimines Jucca Indica Orange trees must be housed in the Winter so likewise the Cypresse Bay Piracantha Mirtle Pine-tree Rose-bay with Spanish seed or at the least must be cover'd with straw or Ferne or bean-hame or such like thing layd upon crosse-sticks to bear it up from the plants till they are two or three yeares growth and fit to be removed to their places Arbutus or the Strawberry tree Sea-Ragwort the Pomegranate and the Indian Figge require the same care Ferrarius commends a Garden house with Walls of thick mosse as good and so without question it is against the Winter cold and Summer heat Some defend their Mirtles Pomegranates and such other tender plants either by houses made of straw like Bee-hives or of boards with inlets for the Sun by casements or without them Litter of Horse-stables being layd in very cold weather about the houses of defence It was a custome in Italy to make such fences for Myrtles especially when young as appeares by Virgills Verse Dum teneras defendo a frigore Myrtos The Roots of the Marvaile of the World Mr. Park has preserved by art a Winter two or three for they 'l perish being let out in a garden unlesse it be under a house side or such dry place because many times the year not falling out kindely the plants give no ripe seed and so Gardiners would be to seek for seed to sow and Roots to set if this or the like art to keep them were not used T is thus Within a while after the Frosts have taken the plants that the leaves wither and fall dig up the Roots whole and lay them in a dry place for three or foure dayes that the superfluous moysture on the outside may be withered and dryed which done wrap them up severally in two or three browne papers and lay them by in a box chest or tub in some convenient place of the house all the winter time where no wind or moist air may come unto them and thus shall you have these Roots to spring afresh the next yeare if you plant them in the beginning of March as Mr. P. has by his own relation sufficiently tryed but some have tryed to put them up in a barrell or firkin of sand and ashes which also is good if the sand and ashes be throughly drye but if it be any thing moist or if they give again in the Winter as it is usuall they have found the moisture of the Roots or of the sand or both to putrifie the Roots The same Author takes notice that t is one great hurt to Gilly-slowers in the Winter and to all other herbs to suffer the Snow to lye upon them any time after it is fallen for it doth so chill them that the Sun doth though in Winter scorch them up shake therefore off your snow gently not suffering it to lye on a day if you can There is the like inconvenience from Frosts which corrupt the Roots and cause them to rot and breake for prevention take straw or Litter of an horse stable and lay some thereof about every Root of your Gilly-flowers especially the best sorts close unto them upon the ground being carefull that none lye upon the green leaves or as little as may be Let it lie till March with its winds is past The generall Remedy for these and all flowers is to be covered with mats which are removeable at pleasure The choicest of all are put in pots and housed Num. 3. Of shades requisite to sundry Plants especially when young for their defence from the Sun and Winde All sorts of Carnations Gilly-flowers and Plants that are tender and yong especially your April and May Seedlings are to be preserved and defended from the violent heat of the Sun and blasting Winds I have seen whole Beds of divers sorts of young Seedlings utterly burnt up at their first appearing by the violence of two or three hot days Nor do Seedlings onely require this but all Plants that are not altogether wild of how woody substance soever that are newly growing from cuttings or parts without actual Roots Shades are commodious if not absolutely necessary to many Plants even when they are well rooted as Bays Lawrel Savin and most Wood-plants a mixture of Shade and Sun to Straw-berries so that the Lord Bacon wittily advises to sprinkle a little â—orrage-seed on the Strawberry-bed for that the Straw-berries under those Leaves grow far more large then their fellows The best shades are made by thin well pruned Hedges drawn through the Garden or Nursery or by Mats laid over them and underpropt by a frame of light Poles But all Seedlings Flowers or other Plants that are kept in Pots are readily removed into convenient shade at pleasure Of watering Watering with water that has stood two or three days in the Sun is absolutely necessary for all Stringy Roots that I know at their first removals and at any time when any Trees or Plants are weak by reason of Drought All manner of Layers must be specially regarded for matter of watering and those Plants which are to be propagated by the circumposition of a Basket of Mould to make Dwarf Plants as they call them are specially to be watered in dry times All maner of Gourds Melons Cucumbers even in ordinary weather require this help although already firmly rooted But there is this difference in Plants Those that require an hungry ground
greater that in the planting you give them the more roome to be distant one from another or else the one will hinder if not rot the other The seed of the Precoces do not thrive and come forward so fast as the Media's or Serotines nor do give any off-sets in their running down as the Media's do which usually leave a small Root at the head of the other that is run down every yeare and besides are more tender and require more care and attendance then Media's and therefore they are the more respected This is a generall Rule in all Tulips that all the while they beare bud or leafe they will not beare flower whether they be seedlings or the off-sets of elder Roots or the Roots themselves that have heretofore borne flowers but when they beare a second leafe breaking out of the first it is a certain signe that it will then bear a flower unlesse some casualty hinder it as Frost or Raine to spoile or nip the bud or other untimely accident befall it To set or plant the best and bearing Tulips some what deeper then other Roots I hold it the best way For if the ground be either cold or lye too openly in the cold Northern aire they will be the better defended therein and not suffer the frost or cold to peirce them so soon for the deep frosts and snowes do pinch the Precoces cheifly if they be too neer the uppe most crust of the earth and therefore many with good successe cover over their ground before winter with either fresh or old rotten dung and that will marvellously preserve them The like course you may hold with seedlings to cause them to come on the forwarder so that it be after the first yeares sowing and not till then To remove Tulips after they have shot forth their Fibres or small springs which grow under the greater round Roots that is from September untill they be in flower is very dangerous for by removing them when they have taken fast hold in the ground you do hinder them in the bearing out their flower and besides put them in hazard to perish at least to be put back from bearing a while after as often I have proved by experience but when they are now risen to flower and so for any time after you may safely take them up if you will and remove them without danger if you have any good regard to them unlesse it be a young bearing Root which you shall in so doing much hinder because it is yet tender by reason it beareth now the first flower but all Tulip Roots when their stalke and leaves are dry may most safely then be taken out of the ground and be so kept so that they lye in a drye and not in a moist place for six moneths without any great harme yea I have known them that have had them nine moneths out of the ground and have done reasonable well but this you must understand withall that they have not beene young but elder Roots and have beene orderly taken up and preserved the dryer you keep a Tulip Root the better so as you let it not lye in the Sun or the Wind which will pierce and spoile it Num. 5. Of annoyance by Plants growing too thick and neer together and of the remedy thereof and improvement by pruning Trees and setting them at great distances plucking off the yong Germens of Garden-flowers to make the rest more fair of the sizing of Turneps Carrots Parsneps of Weeding There is no greater hindrance to the growth and thriving of all Vegetables than to be so crowded together that their Roots Branches and Leaves interfere one with another and therefore in all Orchard and Garden-plants whose Fruit and Flowers you require fair and whose growth you would have considerable provide that they keep their distances Apple-Trees Pear-Trees Plum-Trees Cherries and other Plants are of diverse statures both in regard of one another and of their own kinde Some Apple-Trees grow to much greater growth than some other Pears to a greater growth then Apples so that it is hard to appoint a certain distance for Trees in an Orchard twenty Foot is space little enough for Standards of common Apples or Pears but a certain rule is to provide that one Tree shade not another and therefore let the lowest Trees if you intend to make the most of your ground be set South and the highest Pear-trees stand to the North for should the higher Trees stand South they would cast their shade over the rest of the Orchard This Doctrine of setting Trees at such distances the Husbandman hates for two reasons one is Because it takes too much of his pasture from his Cattle and the other is That by this means he can have but little Fruit in his Orchard for many years Therefore to gratifie his covetousness I shall propose him this practicable way of following and prosecuting my intention to the utmost profit without putting him to the mentioned grievances For first I shall order that he plant his Orchard full of Trees within three yards distance one of another or somewhat nearer if he please these shall bear him after a year or two as many apples as a well grown Orchard usually carries then let him set this ground to a gardiner that it may be digged and dunged seasonably to bring Kitchin Plants for from this Culture the Trees will receive great advantage When the Trees are big enough with the defence of a strong stake and some Bushes to be secured from Cattle let him transplant them into Pastures of the best Soyl where they may stand at great distances to be shelter to Cattle and no prejudice to the Grass One Tree at such distance shall bear as much as ten in some Orchards and thus continue removing as your Trees grow big enough I count five or six inches about to be a good Size the bigger they are the more care must be taken in their removal that the Root be transplanted entire as may be without much dis-branching it or cutting away the spurs And it is convenient that in the heat of the first Summer wet Straw be laid upon the ground about the Root If you have no pasture to transplant into sell your Trees to those that have or set your Standards of strong Trees at twenty foot distance and fill up the rest of the ground with Kentish Codlings Nurse Gardens Burts which are cheap Plants being propagated by Suckers or with dwarf Trees made by Circumposition which may be cut down when the other Orchard thickens too much and in the mean time are very plentiful bearers Pruning Trees is used likewise chiefly to this intent that the Rays of the Sun may have passage to all parts of the Tree so that 't is a good way for the Pruner to look upward from the North side of the Tree upon the South and East and to cut off or rather make thin such boughs which he findes so thick as to
they are set and the usual remedy is to inlarge the five incisions proportionably by cutting them deeper with a Knife or to steep ordinary Beans in Water and then slipping off the outward coat of the Bean to put it the end being taken off upon the head of the Carnation which will keep the five lips together and preserve the Flowers from breaking nor will these Hoops made of the coats of Beans shrink with the heat of the Sun as those made of the rind of Willow slipped off for the same purpose usually doe One Bean is long enough to make two hoops for they need not be above a quarter of an inch in breadth Num. 7. Of improvement and melioration of divers Sallad Herbs by blanching or whiting from the French Gardiner and Mr. P's Observations The Lettuce-Royal being upon removal set at a foot or more distance when you perceive that the Plants have covered all the ground then in some fair day and when the morning dew is vanisht you shall tie them in two or three several places one above another which you may do with any long straw or raw hemp and this at several times viz. Not promiscuously as they stand but choosing the fairest Plants first to give room and air to the more feeble and by this means they will last you the longer The first being blanched and ready before the other are fit to binde If you would blanch them with more expedition you may cover every Plant with a small earthen pot fashion'd like a Goldsmiths Crucible and then lay some hot soyl upon them and they will quickly become white Concerning Succories Thus There are several kindes of Garden Succories different in leaf and bigness but resembling in taste and which are to be ordered alike Sow it in the Spring upon the Borders and when it has six leaves replant it in rich ground about eighteen inches distance paring them at the tops when they are grown so large as to cover the ground tye them up as I instructed you before where I treated of the Roman Lettuce not to binde them up by handfuls as they grow promiscuously but the strongest and forwardest first letting the other fortifie There is yet another fashion of blanching it In the great heats when instead of heading you perceive it would run to Seed hollow the Earth at the one end of the Plant and couch it down without violating any of the leaves and so cover it leaving out onely the tops and extremity of the leaves and thus it will become white in a little time and be hindred from running to Seed Those who are very curious binde the leaves gently before they interre them to keep out the Grit from entring between them which is very troublesome to wash out when you would dress it Remember to couch them all at one side one upon another as they grew being planted beginning with that which is nearest the end of the Bed and continuing to lay them the second upon the first and the third upon the second till you have finished all the Ranges I finde likewise two other manners of blanching them for the Winter the first is at the first Frosts that you tie them after the ordinary way and then at the end of eight or ten days plucking them up couch them in the Bed where you rais'd them from Seeds making a small Trench cross the Bed the height of your Plant which will be about eight Inches beginning at one end In this you shall range your Plants side by side so as they may gently touch and a little shelving this done cover them with small rotten dung of the same bed Then make another furrow for a second range in which order lay your plants as before continuing this order till you have finish'd And last of all cover the whole Bed four Fingers thick with hot soyl fresh drawn out of the Stable and in a short time they will be blanched If you will afterwards cover the bed with some Mats placed aslant like the ridge of a House to preserve them from the Rain they will last a very long time without rotting When you would have any of them for use begin at the last which you buried and taking them as they come draw them out of the range and break off what you shall finde rotten upon the place or that which has contracted any blackness from the dung before you put it into your Basket for the Kitchen A second manner of preserving it is to interre it as before in furrows of Sand in the Cellar placing the Root upmost least the Sand run in between the leaves and you finde it in the dish when they serve it You need not here bestow any dung upon them it is sufficient that the Sand cover the Plant four fingers high and when you take it out for use before you dress it shake it well the Root upmost that all the Sand may fall out from the Leaves Take them likewise as they happen to lie in the Ranges His directions for blanching Endive are that you cover it onely with reasenable warm dung and drawing it out at the first appearance of Frost that you keep it under Sand in your Cellar as you do other Roots but first it must be almost white of it self The whiting of Endive Mr. Parkinson commends when done in another manner After says he that they are grown to some reasonable greatness but in any case before they shoot out a stalk in the midst for Seed take them up and the Roots being cut away lay them to wither for three or four hours and then bury them in the Sand so as none of them may lie one upon another or if you can touch one another which by this means will change whitish and thereby become very tender and is a Sallet for Autumn and Winter Fennel is whited by some in the same manner for the same use To procure the Chard of the Artichocks which is that which groweth from the Roots of old Plants you shall make use of the old Stems which you do not account of For it will be fit to renew your whole Plantation of the Artichocks every five years because the Plant impoverishes the Earth and produces but small fruit The first Fruits gathered you shall pare the Plant within half a foot of the ground and cut off the stem as low as you can possible and thus you will have lusty slips which grown about a yard high you shall binde up with a wreath of long Straw but not too close and then environ them with dung to blanch them Thus you may leave them till the great Frosts before you gather them and then reserve them for your use in some Cellar or other place less cold N. Of Acceleration and Retardation of Plants in respect to their Germination and maturity Acceleration of Plants in their Germination and Maturity is ranked by the Lord Verulam among the Magnalia Naturae and is an operation that
Plants for fear of killing the Root and hereby plenty of Branches and Off-sets or side-Plants will arise from the old Stem Stool or Root Nay 't is observed by our Gardeners as like wise by Ferrarius in his Chapter of the culture of Tulips That if those Flowers are suffered to grow to Seed the Bulb thereby is certainly much emaciated and sometimes utterly perisheth and therefore on all hands it is counted good to gather Tulips as soon as may be Some of the ways of Retardation are generally known as particularly the experiment of plucking off Rose Buds as often as they spring until the time you intend they shall proceed to flower or the making the Pranches of the Rose Tree bare of Shoots once or twice in the Spring for this purpose are not unfrequently practiced And I have been informed by a Person of Credit that at Bristol he saw Raspes sold for four pence the quart at Michaelmas which were thus retarded by setting the Plants late in moist ground the same year All which ways I suppose may well be transferred to other Plants of like nature and this last way is not so common I have before mentioned its use for the retardation of the Flowers of Anemonies There is some use of retardation to all such Plants which so prematurely blossom that they be subject to blasting by Spring-Frosts I know nothing used to prevent this annoyance but the opening of the Root and suffering the Snow and Snow-water to lie thereon and chil the ground but of the benefit or danger of this remedy I have no experience Num. 8. Of melioration by Richness or other convenient Minera in the Soyl for the feeding and better nourishment of several Plants Of artificial Begs and the change of Seed as a means to bring fair Flowers Of Exossation of Fruit or making it grow without Stones The Lord Verulam reckons up the making of rich composts for the Earth among the Magnalia Naturae and most advantagious projects for the use of Man which richness if the modern Hypothesis of Chymists be right consists in good proportions of salt Spirit and Oyl which are principles generally deficient in barren places Dry Earth and cold crude water or these two mixt together every where abounding I say good proportions because it is most certain that no Vegetable will grow in too great abundance of Salt or Spirit or other violently hot and corrosive matter Sut and Pidgeons-dung abound much with volatile Salt and I have this year upon a cold moist Clay seen excellent advantage to the Grass thereby it being onely strewed thin on the Grass before the Spring but of the two the Sut was best upon a dry Sand I should not have expected the like improvement by its mixture and in these composts themselves by reason of abundance of salt without due proportions of other principles mixt nothing will grow for there is no fermentation without mixture of contrary parts or Elements and all dunging is in order to fermentation Hence Columella commends Pidgeon-dung because says he Prae caeteris terram facit fermentare the earth generally abounding in its own nature with coldness moisture so that the richness in Salt or Spirit temper a Soyl well which is deficient in these principles for those Vegetables that require in the ground so sprightful a Fermentation For divers states of ground and various Fermentations are required to different Plants nor can any one Soyl indifferently and equally agree with them all according to that of Virgil. Nec vero terrae ferre omnes omnia possunt Fluminibus salices crassisque paludibus alni Nascuntur steriles saxosis montibus orni Littora myrtetis laetissima denique apertos Bacchus amat colles Aquilonem frigora taxi Aspice extremis domitum cultoribus orbem Eoasque domos Arabum pictosque Gelonos Divisae arboribus patriae sola India nigrum Fert ebenum solis est thurea virga sabaeis c. All Grounds can't all things bear The Alder Tree Grows in thick Fens with Sallows Brooks agree Ash craggy Mountains Shores sweet Myrtle fills And lastly Bacchus loves the Sunny Hills The Yew best prospers in the North and cold The conquered Worlds remotest Swains behold See the Eastern Arabs the Geloni these Countries are all distinguisht by their Trees The blackest Ebony from India comes And from Sabaea Aromatick Gums c. Saffron Tulips Anemones and many other Plants which be propagated by bulbous or tuberous off-sets require for their melioration to be planted in a light Soyl that receives some mixture of fatty earth with it some commend Cow-dung rotted above all other soil to be mixt with other sandy earth for these Plants Boggy Plants require even when they be planted into Gardens either a natural or artificial Bog or to be placed near some water by which there is great improvement to all sorts of Flags and particularly as I have observ'd to Calamus Aromaticus The artificial Bog is made by digging a hole in any stiffe Clay and filling it with Earth taken from a Bog or in want of such clay ground there may be stiffe Clay likewise brought in and laid to line the hole or pit in the bottom or floor and the sides likewise so thick that the moisture may not be able to get through Of this sort in our Physick Garden here in Oxford we have one artficially made by Mr. Bobart for the preservation of Boggy Plants where being sometimes watered they thrive as well as in their natural places However 't is true that there is variety of usuage for Plants of different nature yet for the generality of Plants they are best improved by a fat rich deep moist and feeding Soil and it is highly his interest that intends a flourishing Orchard or Kitchin-garden to improve his ground to the height divers Flowers reap benefit by the same advantage as particularly Carnations and Auricula's though for these and some other Plants the rotten Earth that is usually found in the Bodies of hollow Willow-Trees is thought to be a soyl more specifically proper especially when mixt with other rich Soyl throughly rotten That wilde Plants may be meliorated by transplantation into better Soyl and by being set at greater distances is no more then what was before noted and agrees with that of Virgil Georg. 2. Sponte suâ quae se tollunt in luminis auras Infoecunda quidem sed laeta fortia surgunt Quippe solo natura subest tamen haec quoque si quis Inserat aut scrobibus mandet mutata subactis Exuerint Sylvestrem animum cultuque frequenti In quascunque voces artes haud tarda sequentur Nec non sterilis quae stirpibus exit ab imis Hoc faciet vacuos si sit digesta per agros Nunc altae frondes Rami Matris opacant Gescentique adimunt foetus uruntque ferentem Plants that advance themselves t'etherial Air Unfruitful be but strong they prove and fair Because they draw their nature from