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WN INCLOSING LAND

may cover the points of the young plants, that they may feelthe influence of the sun and weather, and be permitted togrow. They must afterwards be kept free from weeds, twiceevery year at first, till they acquire some strength, after whichonce yearly may suffice. After two or three years, the faceof the young hedge may be switched or dressed up yearly, oronce in two or three years, by a sharp pruning-knife or lighthedging-bill. By some it is also considered to be a good ex-pedient, to reduce the shoots on each plant to one uprightleader *.

In consequence of repeated wcedings, a considerable por-tion of the best soil of the mound is necessarily removed fromthe roots of the young thorns, leaving them bare, and partlyfilling up the ditch. To remedy both, it becomes necessaryto scour out the ditch, and to replace the earth about theroots of the thorns. The latter part of this operation is term-ed tabling the hedge. After a thorough weeding, a shelf orscarcement is formed by the spade below the thorn roots,and one or two courses of sods are laid on this shelf, in frontof the elbow of the thorns, where the upright stems and ho-rizontal roots unite at an angle. The cleanest of the earthprocured in scouring the ditch is now filled in behind andupon the sods, among and over the thorn roots, and theclap-dike restored to its original form by the remainingscourings of the ditch.

After the thorns have acquired considerable strength, it isproper to dress the hedge into a regular form, such as ismeant to be afterwards preserved. Some persons cut themover, when the fields they surround are under a course of til-lage, either close to the ground, or at three feet high. Otherscut the full grown thorns at fence height, between four and ahalf and six feet high, and dress up both sides close to thestems, continuing to dress up both sides yearly in the formof a sharp wedge, three or four feet wide at the bottom. In

f Anderson’s Essay on Agriculture.