The writings of George Washington; being his correspondence, addresses, messages, and other papers, official and private, selected and published from the original manuscripts; with a life of the author, notes and illustrations. By Jared Sparks.

ArppENDIX.] AGRICULTURAL PAPERS. 379
EXTRACT FROM AN AGRICULTURAL DIARY.@
Atpril 7th, 1785. - Cut two or three rows of the wheat (Cape
wheat) within six inches of the ground, it being near eighteen
inches high, that which was first sown, and the blades of the
whole singed with the frost.
8th. - Sowed oats to-day in drills at Muddy Hole with my barrel
plough. Ground much too wet; some of it had been manured,
but had been twice ploughed, then listed, then twice harrowed before sowing; which, had it not been for the frequent rains, would
have put the ground in fine tilth. Ploughed up the turnip patch
at home for orchard grass.
10th. - Began bricklaying to-day. Completed sowing, with
twenty-four quarts of oats, thirty-eight rows at Muddy Hole ten feet
apart, in the ground intended for corn.
11th. — Sowed twenty-six rows of barley in the same field at
Muddy Hole in the same manner, with the drill plough, and with
precisely the same workings the oats had adjoining thereto. This
was done with twelve quarts of seed. After three ploughings and
three harrowings,- sowed millet in eleven rows three feet apart,
opposite to the overseer's house in the Neck. Perceived the last
sowed oats at Dogue Run, and those sown in the Neck, were
coming up.
12tl. -Sowed sixteen acres of Siberian wheat, with eighteen
quarts, in rows between corn, eight feet apart. This ground had
been prepared in the following manner. 1. A single furrow; 2.
another in the same to deepen it; 3. four furrows to throw the
earth back into the two first, which made ridges of five furrows.
These, being done some time ago, and the sowing retarded by
frequent rains, had got hard; therefore, 4. before the seed was
sown, these ridges were split again by running twice in the middle
of them, both times in the same furrow; 5. after which the ridges
were harrowed; and, 6. where the ground was lumpy, run a spiked
roller with a harrow at the tail of it, which was found very efficacious in breaking the clods and pulverizing the earth, and would
have done it perfectly, if there had not been too much moisture
remaining from the late rains. After this, harrowing and rolling
where necessary, the wheat was sown with the drill plough on
the reduced ridges eight feet apart, as above mentioned, and har* It was his custom for many years to keep a record of the daily proceedings on the farms. This is an extract from a diary of that description for
one week.