26 HISTORY OF AGRICULTURE. Parr f.

stone that will burn into lime, make charcoal of the wood, and burn in the corn-fields the twigs and small branches that remain.” Palladius says,‘‘ that lands which have been

D= 2 e p 5: OF 8 1 manured by ashes of trees will not require manure for five years.”(Lib.i. 6.) Stubble was very generally burned, asit was also among the Jews. Lime was used as a manure, especially for vines and olives. Cato gives particular directions how to form the kiln andburn it. He prefers a truncated cone, ten feet diameter at the bottom, twenty feet high, and three feet diameter at the top. The grate covers the whole bottom; there is a

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it below for the ashes, and two furnace-doors, one for drawing out the burnt stone, and pit belo)? D>? the other for admitting air to the fire. The fuel used was wood or charcoal.(Cap. 38.)

130. Marl was known tothe earlier Roman authors, but not used in Italy. Itis mentioned by Pliny as having been* found outin Britainand Gaul.”<* Itis a certain richness of earth,” he says,“ like the kernels in animal bodies that are increased by fatness.’ Marl, he says, was known to the Greeks,“ for is there any thing,” he adds,“ that has not been tried by them? They call the marl like white clay leucargillon, which they use in the lands of Megara, but only where they are moist and cold.”(Nat. Hist. lib. xvii. cap. 5—8.) But though the Romans did not use marl, because they had not dis- covered it in Italy, they were aware, as Varro and others inform us, of its use.‘* When [marched an army,” says Varro,“ to the Rhine, in transalpine Gaul, I passed through some countries where I saw the fields manured with white fossil clay.” Qisibsmi cap. 7.)‘This must have been either marl or chalk.

131, Sowing was performed by hand from a basket, as in modern times; the hand, as Pliny observes, moving with the step, and always with the right foot. The corns and leguminous seeds were covered with the plough, and sometimes so as to rise in drills; the smaller seeds with the hoe and rake.

132. In reaping corn, it was a maxim, thatvit is‘better to reap two days too soon than two days too late.”” Varro mentions three modes of performing the operation; cutting close to the ground with hooks, a handful at a time; cutting off their ears with a curved stick, and a saw attached; and cutting the stalks in the middle, leaving the lower part or stubble to be cut afterwards. Columella says,‘* Many cut the stalks by the middle, with drag-hooks, and these either beaked or toothed: many gather the ears with mergas, and others with combs. This method does very well where the crop is thin; but it is very troublesome where the corn is thick. If, in reaping with hooks, a part of the straw is cut off with the ears, it is immediately gathered into a heap, or into the nubilarium, and after being dried, by being exposed to the sun, isthreshed. But if the ears only are cut off, they are carried directly to the granary, and threshed during the winter.”(Col. lib. ii. cap. 21.) To these modes, Pliny adds, that of pulling up by the roots, and remarks generally that

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“« where they cover their houses with stubble, they cut high, to preserve this of as great a length as possible; when there is a scarcity of hay, they cut low, that straw may be added to the chaff.””(Nat. Hist. lib. xviii. cap, 30.)

133. A reaping-machine is mentioned both by Pliny and Palladius, used in the plains of Gaul, which is thus described by the latter.‘* In the plains of Gaul, they use this quick way of reaping, and, with- out reapers, cut large fields with an ox in one day. For this purpose a machine is made, carried upon two wheels; the square surface has boards erected at the sides, which, sloping outwards, make a wider space above; the board on the fore part is lower than the others; upon it there are a great many small teeth, wide set in a row, answering to the height of the ears of the corn, and turned upwards at the ends; on the back part of this machine, two short shafts are fixed, like the poles of a litter; to these an ox is yoked, with his head to the ma- chine, and the yoke and traces like- wise turned the contrary way: he is well trained, and does not go faster than he is driven. When this ma- chine is pushed through the standing corn, all the ears are comprehended by the teeth, and heaped up in the hollow part of it, being cut off from the straw, which is left behind; the driver setting it higher or lower, as he finds it necessary; and thus, by a few goings and returnings, the whole field is reaped. This machine does very wellin plain and smooth fields, and in places where there is no necessity for feeding with straw.’(Pai. lib, vii. tit. 2.) A conjectural delineation of this machine(fig. 16.) is given by Lasteyrie, in his Collection des Machines,&c. j

134. The Romans did not bind their corn into sheaves, as is customary in northern cli- mates. When cut it was in general sent directly to the area to be threshed; or if the ears only were cropped, sent in baskets to the barn. Among the Jews, Egyptians, and Greeks, the corn was bound in sheaves; or at least some kinds were so treated, as appears from the story of Ruth‘ gleaning among the sheaves;” of Joseph’s dream, in which his‘sheaf arose;” and from the harvest represented by Homer, on one of the