alteration of colour or perfection This surface-Mould is the best and sweetest being enriched with all that the Air Dews Showers and Celestial Influences can contribute to it For 't is with good Earth as with excellent Water that 's the best which with least difficulty receives all external qualities for the fatness of this Under-turf Mould being drawn up by the kindly warmth of the Sun to its superficies spends but little of its vigour in the Grass and tender verdure which it produces and easily nourishes without dissipating its virtue provided no rank Weeds or predatitious Plants consummating their Seeds be suffered to grow and exhaust it but maintains its natural force and is therefore of all other uncultivated Earths the most grateful to the Husbandman Now as the rest of incumbent and subjacent Earths approach this in virtue so are they to be valued and of these there are several kinds distinguishable by their several constitutions The best of which is black fat yet porous light and sufficiently tenacious without any mixture of Sand or Gravel rising in pretty gross Clods at the first breaking up of the Plow but with little labour and exposure falling to pieces but not crumbling altogether into Dust which is the defect of a more vicious sort Of this excellent black Mould fit almost for any thing without much manure there are three kinds which differ in hue and goodness The next layer in series to this is usually mixt with a sprinkling of Stones somewhat hard yet friable and when well aired and stirred is not to be rejected the loosness of it admitting the refreshment of showers renders it not improper for Trees and Plants which require more than ordinary Moistures Declining from this in perfection is the darkish-Gray or Tawny which the deeper you mine rises vein'd with yellow and sometimes reddish till it end in pale and if you penetrate yet farther commonly in Sand and a gritty stone Of a second Class is Mould of an obscure Colour also more delicate grain tender chessum and mellow clear of stones and grittiness with an eye of Lome and Sand which renders it light enough yet moist of all other the most desirable for Flowers and the Coronary Garden To this we add a yet more obscure and sandy Mould accompanied with a natural fattiness and this though rarer is incomparable for almost any sort of Fruit-Trees A third participates of both the former fattish yet interspersed with small Flints and Pebbles not to be altogether neglected A fourth is totally sandy and that of divers colours with sometimes a bottom of Gravel now and then Rock and not seldom Clay and as the foundations are so is it more or less retentive of moisture and tolerable for Culture But all Sand does easily admit of Heat and Moisture and yet for that not much the better for either it dismisses and lets them pass too soon and so contracts no ligature or retains it too long especially where the bottom is of Clay by which it parches or chills producing nothing but Moss and disposes to Cancerous infirmities But if as sometimes it fortunes that the Sand have a surface of more genial mould and a fund of Gravel or loose stone though it do not long maintain the virtue it receives from Heaven yet it produces as forward springing and is parent of sweet Grass which though soon burnt up in dry weather is as soon recover'd with the first rain that falls Of pure and sheere-Sand there 's white black blewish red yellow harsher and milder and some meer dust in appearance none of them to be desired alone but the grey-black and ash-colour'd and that which frequently is found in heathy Commons or the travelling kind volatile and exceeding light is the most insipid and worst of all I do not here speak of the Sea-Sands which is of admirable virtue and use in mixtures and to be spread on some lands because it has of all other good things it seems they do not acquaint us with above eight or nine eminently useful to our purpose and truly I can hardly yet arrive at so many Such as I find naturally and usually to rise from the Pit I shall here spread before you in their order The most beneficial sort of Mould or Earth appearing on the surface for we shall not at present penetrate lower than is necessary for the planting and propagation of Vegetables as it consists of a mixt body is the natural as I beg leave to call it under-turf-Earth and the rest which commonly succeeds it in strata's or layers 'till we arrive to the barren and impenetrable Rock be it fat or lean Loam Clay Plastic Figuline or Smectic as Chalk Marle Fullers-Earth Sandy Gravelly Stony Rock Shelly Coal or Mineral with the Sun and Wind most of them pernicious and untractable The unctuous and fatter Clay frequently lyes upon the other having oftentimes a basis of Chalk beneath it but neither is this worth any thing 'till it be loosened and rendred more kind so as to admit of the air and heavenly influences I had almost forgotten Marsh-Earths which though of all other seemingly the most churlish a little after 't is first dug and dryed when it soon grows hard and chaps may with labour and convenient exposure be brought to an excellent temper for being the product of rich Slime and the sediment of Land-Waters and Inundations which are usually fat as also the rotting of Sedge yea and frequently of prostrated Trees formerly growing in or near them and in process of time rotted at least the spray of them and now converted into mould becomes very profitable Land But whether I may reckon this among the natural Earths I do not contend Of Loams and Brick-Earths we have several sorts and some approaching to Clay others nearer Marle differing also in colour and if it be not too rude mingled in just proportion with other Mold an excellent ingredient in all sorts of Earth and so welcome to the Husbandman and the Gardner especially as nothing does well without a little dash of it Of Marle of a cold sad nature seldom have we such quantities in Layers as we have of the forementioned Earths but we commonly meet with it in places affected to it and 't is taken out of Pits at several depths and of divers colours red white grey blue all of them unctuous of a slippery nature and in goodness as being pure and immixt it sooner relents after a shower and when dryed again slackens and crumbles into dust without induration and growing hard again Lastly Chalk which is likewise of several kinds and colours hard softer fine courser slippery and marly and apt to dissolve with the weather into no unprofitable Manure Some of them have a Sandish others a blacker and light surface and there is a sort which produces sweet Grass and Aromatick Plants and some so rank especially in the Vallies of very high Hills as to feed not only Sheep but other Cattel to
make good your highest expectations And to this belongs Sr. Hugh Platts Contrition or Philosophical Grinding of Earth which upon this exposure alone without manure of Soile after the like revolution of time will as he affirms be able to receive an exotie Plant from the farthest Indies and cause all Vegetables to prosper in the most exalted degree and to speak magnificently with that Industrious Man to bear their fruit as kindly with us as they do in their natural Climates But a little to abate of this modestly we may say that this Culture easy and simple as it is will be found effectually able to render the Soil of a most extensive Capacity for the entertainment of foreign and uncommon plants For to enumerate some of its perfections such as refuse Dung and violent applications have here pure Earth and such as require aid a mellow and rich mould impregnated with all the blessings which the Influences of the Heaven and efflorescence of the Earth can contribute to it fitted as it is for Generation and yet so restrain'd from it as greedily to receive the first Seeds which are committed to it with a passion and fervency as it were of animal love What high and sublime things are spoken more upon this I forbear to prosecute but in Sir Kenelme Digby's discourse of Sympathetic Powder he affirmes that the Earth in the years of repose recovers its Vigor by the attraction of the Vital Spirits which it receives from the air and those superiour irradiations which endow simple Earth with qualities promoting fermentation And indeed such a vegetative activity I have often observ'd in the bare exposure of some Plants but for a few hours onely as has rais'd my admiration particularly in the Aloe and other kinds of Sedums which when to all appearance shrunk and shrivel'd up have fill'd themselves in a moment set out in the Air when a very few drops of water at the same that is Winter time would certainly have made it rot and turn to a mucilage as to my cost I have experienc'd And these Ferments of the Earth by this amity and genial intercourse with the Air are innumerable to concoct digest accelerate and restore equal to yea beyond any artificial enforcements of Dungs and compost whatsoever But to return to dust again by the toil we have mention'd 't is found that Soil may be so strangely alter'd from its former nature as to render the harsh and most uncivil Clay obsequious to the Husbandman and to bring forth Roots and Plants which otherwise require the lightest and hollowest moulds In other cases and affections the Earth may be likewise fertiliz'd as from without so from within by more recondite and central Causes and agitations whichif if in excess may be allay'd with some feminine or other mixture since often times qualities too intense rather poyson dry and cholerick grounds than conduce to their advantage as we shall come to shew and that which makes a cold and moist ground fertile will destroy the contrary as we see it in too free applications of salt and therefore it requires no ordinary dexterity to be able to direct where and what remedies are to be administred since we find it the same in Vegetable productions as in the Animal where Complexions should be suited for want of which care through avarice and other sordid Circumstances Noble Families themselves are manytimes rendr'd Childless which might else have multipli'd and been perpetuated To illustrate this by our present subject We find that a thin seifing or sprinkling of Ashes has enriched all the higher Pastures when where 't was strew'd too thick it became totally barren sometimes again defect of sufficient depth may be cause of sterility and so it frequently happens that the proper remedy of some hungry and shallow surface is to superinduce and lay more Earth upon it and to find out the medium by diligent tryals of some degrees of depths in the same Soil but solitary single or over-hasty Experiments before the Earth be prepar'd by some of our foremention'd Essays may prove discouraging and unsufficient as my Lord Bacon has oft advertis'd us Earth is also sometimes improv'd by mixtures of Fearn rotten leaves and the pourriture of old Wood the haulm of beans pease and other legumina which heates and accelerates Concoction for which and all other Medications the nature of the Mould is carefully to be examin'd that application be made accordingly as for instance If it be sandy or other light mixed Earth to imbody it with something of a fatter nature as Lime or Marle for I yet forbear the touch of ordure or animal Composts as the least natural and be sure so to stirr and lay it especially if with Lime that it may not sink too deep and suddainly as 't is apt to do and so desert the surface-mould where it should do the feat and therefore it is to be the oftner renew'd But Marle enters as properly here and so does Mudd Slub of slimy Waters especially if the soil be gravelly and mixt which it will sadden and impinguate and consequently combine but if the Gravel be wet and cold Lime is preferable Wherefore the nature of the mould should be well examin'd before the application as here arenous and sandy Earth wants ligature and besides consisting of sharp and asperous angles wounds and galls curles and dwarfs our Plants without extraordinary help to render the passages more slippery and easy and therefore relenting Chalks or Chalk-Marle is also profitable with Calcinations of Turfe or Sea-Wrack where it is at hand and if the Soil be exceeding bibulous spread a Layer or Couch of Loame discreetly mingl'd at the bottom to entertain the moisture In the mean time there are yet some Plants which thrive almost in nothing so well as in Sand alone or with very little mixture nor that of any Dung So Melons are said to grow in Jamaica and some vast Timber-trees have little or no mould adhering to their roots such is that beautiful stranger the Japan-Lilly call'd by those of Garnsey from whence we onely have them La belle de nuit and a certain Palm of the same Japan which shrinks and drys at the least touch of Water as if it were layd before the fire which is it seems the onely remedy that restores it or the suddain replanting it in Scales of Iron or the most burning Sand But what if Sand it self however vulgarly reputed be not so hot or interiourly ardent as 't is given out to be Indeed for being of an open and loose contexture 't is apt to put forth a forward spring as more easily admitting the solar rayes but it does not continue and is an infirmity which may be remedied with Loam which not onely unites it closer for the present but is capable in time to alter and change its very nature also so as too hot a Compost be no ingredient with it Here I take notice that Husbandmen observe a too clean
to carry the preeminence with his Lordship as the most pinguid rich and least over-heating next to this Sand as the most abounding in salt chalk more heating and therefore proper for Clay cold and spewing grounds being suffer'd to lye a competent time to resolve before you turn it in earth on earth that is I suppose he means the under part upon the upper or the second spit on the first as we have all along directed at the breaking of fresh ground with the spade Another mixture he commends and which we have likewise newly touched of substances which are not meer Earth as Soot Ashes not the hard and dry Cinders of Sea-coal which we are too busie with about this Town where the ground is naturally too hot and dry but such as is apt to relent and even the sprinkling of Salt where it is wisely sown A third is the permitting Vegetables abounding in fixed salts to dye into the ground as Peasehalm Bracks all sorts of Stubble cast on about the beginning of Winter So leaves of Trees mingled with Chalk and proper compost of dungs to heat and preserve the ground from sowring with them when they are us'd alone A fourth is what we have also touch'd heat and comfort procur'd by Calcinations the burning of Ling Heath Sedge covering the ground with bushes for a time enclosures of walls and mounds when the land lies in the eye of the weather and in other cases meridian exposures and the warmth of the woolly fleeces of sheep as well as manure folded or pastur'd And to this we may add the very grazing of Cattle which in some cases has succeeded better than the best dungy compost especially for old and decay'd Orchards which have been observ'd to recover to admiration when mowing has been pernicious for even the biting of Cattel gives a gentle loosening to the roots of the herbage and makes it to grow fine and sweet and their very breath and treading as well as soil and the comfort of their warm bodies is wholsom and marvellously cherishing But this is to be understood of places where the stems are of full growth and where the beast cannot reach to crop Lastly Irrigation and watering both by admitting and excluding moisture at pleasure And certainly this has since his Lordships time been found one of the richest improvements that ever was put in practice especially where they have the command of fat and impregnate waters without grittiness or being over-harsh and cold whether it percolate through rich ground or which is better descending from eminences and moderate declivities from whence we find the Vallies so luxurious and flourishing To this belongs the cure of wet and boggy Lands by cutting Trenches deeper than the cause of the evil which proceeds from some conceal'd springs hinder'd from emerging forth by the sluggish incumbent earth This makes the ground to heave and swell but not giving vent to stagnate and corrupt both the water and the mould about it And though it lie loose and hollow yet it gathers no vigour from above but remains cold and insipid The remedy is opening the ground till you meet with a sound bottom and cutting your Furrow upwards to the Bog about a foot beneath the spewing water This is to be done in several places and when the drains appear to have wrought the effect you may fill them up again with sprag and bavine great and rough flint brick-bats tileshards horse bones or any other rubbish which will remain loose and hollow and cover them with the grassy side of the turff which you pared off and laid apart on that throw your other Mould which being cast up in heaps for some time will be much improv'd with spreading lastly sow it over with hay-seeds But the Cure is yet easier if the Land lye considerably sloping and if it happen to be a planted Ground then cut your Trench deeper than the roots of your Trees and apply the foresaid rubbish to intercept the moisture About the latter end of October trench the Ground all over for near a foot and a half in depth and when you are come within three or four foot of the stemm cut off all their larger roots sloping inwards sparing only the fibers and such of them as you find tender and about as big as your finger leaving also the more perpendicular to keep the Tree steady This done castin some rubbish of brick-bats limestone not chalk and other materials that the Mould may lye easie about them and with a mixture of good Earth plenty of rotten stubble or other soil apply it near the Root and fill your Trench with the rest and if your Ground require it as being too cold it commonly does add to your compost the Dung of Sheep Pigeons or Poultry very well consum'd And because Moss is oftner caused by starving and wet Grounds than by hot and over dry for both produce it the Cure is likewise to be effected by Ablaqueation and baring the Roots as above and for the latter by a mixture of Loame with the scouring of Pond or ditch-Earth which of it self is the most excellent manure and the planting your Trees at greater intervals for admission of Air and Sun since the scraping of it off which may also be done in wet weather is but temporary and if nothing else be perform'd it will be sure to grow again Lands which are cold and dry are as we have hinted to be improv'd by contraries namely by application of composts which are hot and moist as Sheeps-dung burning and calcining of the Earth with the Vegetables on it and the like to excite heat and fermentation but which is not to be effected without repugnant remedies and such as are of heterogeneous parts to stir and lift up the Mould and render it less unactive If it be cold and clinging as frequently 't is found there lime rubbish sea-coal-ashes a moderate sprinkling of sand with some proper compost may perform the Cure Hungry Grounds require to have the cause well look'd into the water turn'd as above directed or if it want such as is well enrich'd Lands that are hot and burning allay with Swines-dung as say some the coldest or with Neats which will certainly refresh it For Earth which is too light there 's nothing better than Pondmudd after a winter has pass'd upon it Earth over-rank for there may be some too fat as well as too lean sand and ashes will take down but still with regard to what you design to plant upon it neither the Almond nor the Hasel will indure a wanton Mould and though it seem a Paradox that any Soil should be too rich upon which some Critics have suspected the Text in Theophrastus Lib. 2â— Cap. 5 6. which asserts it twice in two successive Chapters 't is yet a Truth indubitable and holds as well in Plants as Animals which growing very fat are seldom prolific Some on the contrary are so emaciate and lean dry and insipid as
hands of the profoundest Philosopher since it requires a more than superficial knowledge and penetration into causes We know indeed that the Earth is without any Artificial Auxiliaries indu'd with a wonderful prolific virtue but this for being possible to be lost and decay at least for a longer time than our necessities can support and from some grounds never to be expected without such helps it may be worth our while a little to consider by what expedients of digestion or other wayes the desir'd effect of perpetuating its vigour might best be accomplish'd That the secret we enquire after and which does most apparently seem to evirtuate towards this end is some Salt I suppose is generally agreed For Salt it is which gives ligature weight and constitution to things and is the most manifest substance in all Artificial Composts 'T is the Salts which intice Roots to affect the upper and saline surface of the Earth upon which the Nitrous Rains and Dews descend and the cause that some Plants the most racy and charg'd with juice of all other for such is the Vine thrive so well amongst Rocks and Pumices and in whatever best maintains this vital pickle 'T is Salt which makes all cover'd and long shaded Earths to abound in fertility and renders the dung of Pigeons Poultry and other Salacious Corn-fed Birds so eminently effectual before the soil of Horses and other Beasts in which it less abounds as having less virtue to attract it 'T is Salt that gives such vigour to places sprinkl'd with urine Soot Ashes c. which have them not diluted and to Bones Flesh Horn Hair Feathers Blood and the rest of those animal excrements And whence those seminal Masses should proceed after Calcination of the Earth when it comes to be expos'd again is hard to divine whence I say they should derive their life and energy without being destroy'd by so powerful an agent as Fire unless they lurk in some vegetant and indissoluble salts volatile fixed or nitrous Earth from whence they Phoenix-like emerge though I do not say without any other specific rudiment But 't is strange what as I remember Dr. Morison affirms of the Erysimum or Irio so seldom seen to grow spontaneously in England before the late prodigious Conflagration of this City when there appear'd more of it amongst the Ruines than was known to grow in all Europe besides it being a curious Exotic to be found most about Naples in the time of Fabius Colonna and but rarely elsewhere 'T is Salt which resuscitates the dead and mortifi'd Earth when languishing and spent by our indulgence to her verdant Off-spring her vigour seems to be quite exhausted as appears by the rains and showers which gently melt into her bosome what we apply to it and for which cause all our Composts are so studiously made of substances which most ingender or attract it 'T is Salt which fertilizes and renders Aegypt so luxuriously fruitful after the inundations of Nile and the Nitrous grounds of Jamaica and other places which cause so stupendious a growth of Plants and Trees 'T is the want of Salt which emasculates the virtue of Seeds too long macerated in hungry water and renders floated wood such unprofitable fuel and to turn into such insipid ashes and whatsoever it be some Plants may appear to affect as to the external differences of appetite some of them seeming to draw in more Air some Earth and others Water in extraordinary measure according to the several contextures of their parts or by whatever Magnetisms and attractives it is still to come at their Salts which doubtless create that inclination compose the various saps and juices which they present us Nay what if I should say that all the several parts of Vegetables were endow'd with their peculiar and distinct Salts through different motions complications and percolations or that so many Earths so many kinds of Salts digested and transported by their different Vehicles and strainers and those also though unlike in quality yet perfectly congruous to what they produce and nourish But what this Vehicle or Menstrue is I contend not 't is evident that Salts unite best with water Vernal and Autumnal Showers and Dews as the most apt to convey their insinuations You know who have dignified Salt with the prerogative of being nam'd Element-earth the vigour and close of all things yea the first and last of Elementated bodies What shall I say quid Divinum the Original of all fecundity nor can I say less since there was nor sacrifice nor discourse acceptable without it And verily upon serious contemplation of the premises and the little experience I have had of their effects in this work of vegetation as far as I am able to penetrate into causes by them I am not displeas'd at the magnificent Epithets which are given it In the mean time I know there be who are so averse to this Doctrine as to prefer Water before it nor contend I with them so they allow the near affinity and friendship which is between them as I have deduc'd it at the entry of this Discourse where I describe my Autoptical observations of the several Earths all that I pretend from hence being only to excite us to make diligent enquiry what may more likely be the cause of Vegetation and whether Salt have not a Dominion almost Monarchical in this great Work of Nature being so absolute an ingredient in all our Dungs and Composts which I am next going to speak of I cannot in the mean time but wonder how a thing so eminently sacred and fertile should come to be the Symbol of Malediction when as the custom was they us'd to sow Salt on Cities they had curs'd there being in all Nature nothing so pregnant and fruitful unless it were to invite the Plow to go there and that the fertility of the spot for Corn and Grain might divert them from rebuilding and covering it again with houses Indeed to apply Salt in excess burns the Earth for a time so as nothing will grow upon it but when once the rains have well diluted it it springs up more wantonly than ever This I daily find by sifting common Salt upon the gravel-walks of my Garden and for which cause I have left it off and we find that the Earth it self over-marl'd and too highly manur'd is as unprofitable as if it were barren for the time and that there is in all things a just proportion to be observed But neither all this while do I pretend much less determine that the Principle I so much celebrate is our common artificial Salt compos'd of Urine and the like which of it self is so burning and destructive till its acidity be qualified by the air and showers from heaven which endows it with a natural magnetism to receive their irradiant virtues but a certain more unctuous spirit or airy Nitre pregnant with a vital Balm which is the thing we endeavour to find in these materials
strike no root by September the leaves desert them certainly at Spring The reason is want of Air not moisture Therefore in all intervals of severer frosts and rigorous winter-weather be sparing of refreshings and unless you perceive their leaves to crumple up and fall which is their language for Drink give them as sparingly as you can Indeed during the Summer and when they are expos'd they require almost perpetual irrigation and that the liquor be well impregnat'd with proper Compost But in hard Frosts or foggy Seasons watering your housed Plants indangers them by mustiness and a certain Mill-dew which they contract On the other hand Applications too dry create an intemperate thirstiness and then they drink unmeasurably and fall into Dropsies Jaundies Feavors swell languish and rot and if the liquor prove too crude as commonly it does if taken from running and hungry fountains it extinguishes the natural heat and obstructs the Pores and therefore when ever you are constrain'd to make use of such drink expose it first to the warm Sun for better concoction infusing Sheep Pigeons or Neats-dung to give it body But though Spring-water be so bad slow running River is often very good and Pond-water excellent so it be sweet but all stinking pools mineral and bituminous waters are not for our use and often good Air is as needful as good water Worms Mouldiness Cankers Consumptions and other Diseases being the usual and fatal consequence of these vices If you be to plant in fresh and new broken-up Earth and that the season or mould be too dry 't is to be water'd but then give it a competent sprinkling or sifting of dry and fine mould upon what you have refresh'd and then beating it a little close with the back of your spade plant it successfully for this you will find to be much better than to water it after you have planted as the custom is and as you may observe in setting Violets Auricula's Primroses and other Capillaries planted in beds or bordures and then dash'd with a flood of water which so soon as the Sun has look'd upon resign and lose their tinctures scorch and shrivel up Lastly For the Season likewise of this work let it be towards the Evening in hot and summer dayes for the reason immediately assign'd for the moisture being in a short time drunk-up deserts the Plant to the burning Planet and hence it is that Summer mists are so noxious and Meridian watrings and therefore the best expedient is upon such exigencies to pour your refreshings rather all over the Area on which your Cases of choice and rare shrubs are plac'd and among the Allees and Paths between your Beds of Flowers for the raising artificial Dews by which is unfolded no common secret or water them per lingulam and guttatim than either with the Pot or Bucket And after this manner if at other seasons they stand in need of heat and comfort of warmth by strewing Sand or Cinders on the same intervals the reflection will recreate them upon all emissions of the Sun-beams As for grosser Plantations and Trees of old Orchard Fruits moderation is also to be observed and not to dash on such a quantity near the stem and body but first with the spade to loosen the Earth about them especially towards the extremities of the tenderest Roots which generally sprout at the ends of the most woody whose mouths are shut with tougher bark These therefore may be cut sloping to quicken them a little and make them strike fresh fibers especially if some rich and tempting mould be sensonably apply'd For Trees will as we shew'd with very little Earth to cover them take fast root provided you stablish them against impetuous winds shocks and accidents of force and thrive exceedingly with this refreshment Some make pretty large holes with an Iron-Crow or which is better a pointed stake and pour the liquor in at those overtures but besides that by this means they wound the roots which gangrenes and sometimes kills the Tree if the holes be not fill'd the Air and Moisture mouldies them So as when all is summ'd together there 's nothing comparable to frequent stirring up the Ground opening the dry clod and watring upon that and if you lay any fearnbrakes or other trash about them to entertain the moisture and skreen it from the heat let it not be wadded so close or suffer'd to lie so long as to contract any mustiness but rather loose and easie that the Air may have free intercourse and to break the more intense ardours of the scorching Sun-beams Thus I have exercis'd Your Lordships and these Gentlemens Patience with a dull Discourse of Earth Mould and Soil but I trust not altogether without some Fruit or at least not improperly pro hîc nunc as the Subject has Relation to what has so lately been produc'd and with happy event made out by those Learned Persons who have entertain'd this Noble Society with the Anatomy of Plants FINIS ERRATA Pag. 49. l. 22. r. un-uniform
prove if cleared of their nitrous parts they pass the Potters Fire however they seemed before to be of different constitution This is evident in Vessels made of Tabacco-Clay or whatever the material be which has of late been so successfully employed for the sinding out of a composition if so I may call it nothing inferiour to the hardest Pourcelain and almost as beautiful by a worthy Member of this Mr. Hook Society But to return to our superficial Earth which we call the Mould I affirm it to grow and increase yearly in depth from the Causes aforesaid and in some places to that proportion as to have raised no inconsiderable Hills and Eminences by the accidental fall and rotting of Woods and Trees such as Birch and Beech c. which are not of a constitution to remain long in the ground as Fir Oak Elme and some other Timber will do and grow the harder without corruption and relenting into Mould as soft and tender as what they first were sown or planted in and of this I am able to give undenyable Instances I insist not here on the perpetual successions and generations of Flints and other Stones in the same places where they have been sedulously gathered off by many not improbably thought to proceed from Worm-casts hardened by the air and a certain lapidescent succus or spirit which it meets with And this for happening most on Downs very much exposed yet undisturbed is the more probable as on the other side it establishes our conjecture of the purest Moulds being capable of such a change that which is thus cast up by the Worms being so exceedingly elaborated and refined Therefore let no man be over-confident that because some Earths are soft fat and slippery they may not possibly consist of Sands of which there are so many kinds since 't is evident that even all fossile Bodies which can be reduced and brought to sands may by contrition of the Particles be rendred so minute as to emulate the finest Earths we have enumerated the compactedness and accidental mixtures resulting as we affirm from things extrinsecal not excluding exhalations passage of liquors and several juices to them or conveyed by subterraneous steams and influences be the Stones or Rock Glareous Metallic Testaceous Salts or any other Concretes whatsoever And what if we should indeed suspect all Earth to be arrant Salt nay Glass and that Glass how hard soever the off-spring and child of water the most fluid crystalline sincere and void of all other qualities 't is not impossible I think but by the different texture of its parts even that liquid Element may be brought to the consistence of a most different body to what it appears We know that Water besides that it was the first immense body which invested Gen. 1. the Chaos was by some thought to be the Mother of Earth nay the principia soluta of all mixts whatsoever and that the bottom of the Sea was made by a perpetual Hypostasis or subsidence which precipitated from every part of it to the Center I do not stand to justifie these speculations but to illustrate what I am about namely that Water is apt enough to be condensed and made hard and crude Mercury and running metal Crystals Gems and Pearls do more resemble it than that dirty and opace body which we usually denominate Earth Besides we find how divers Waters not only indurate and petrifie other substances but grow into Stones and leave a rocky Callus where they drop and continually pass and that all sands and stones are not diaphanous therefore that is no eviction but that they might once have been fluid since their opacity may be adventitious and proceed from sundry accidents so as granting this Hypothesis we are less to wonder that this matter is above all other so disposed to Vegetation and apt to produce Plants indued with Colour Weight Taste Odour and with sundry medical and other virtues as I think that excellent Philosopher Mr. Boyle an ornament of this Society does somewhere make out from the various Percolations Concoctions and Circulations of that fruitful Menstrue And if that be true that there is but one Catholic homogeneous fluid matter diversified only by shape size motion repose and various texture of the minute Particles it consists of and from which affections of matter the divers qualities result of particular bodies what may not mixture and an attent inspection into the anatomical parts of the vegetable family in time produce for our composing of all sorts of Moulds and Soils almost imaginable which is the drift of my present Discourse And why might not Solomon by this means have really had all kinds of Plants in his incomparable Gardens even Ebony Cloves Cinnamon and from the Cedar to the Shrub such as grew only in the remotest regions furnished as he doubtless was with so extraordinary an insight into all natural things and powers for the composing of Earths and assigning them their proper mixtures and ferments I do not here enquire whether there be not a Pansperme universally diffused individuated and specified in their several Matrixes and receptacles pro ratione mixti as they speak but I think there might very unexpected Phaenomenas be brought to light in vegetable productions did men seriously apply themselves to make such possible tryals as is in the power of Art to effect and how far Soils may be dissembled and the Air and Water attempered at least for some curiosities which may give light to more useful things I do not conclude but I should expect very rare and considerable things from an attentive and diligent Endeavour To this end the raising of artificial Dews and Mists impregnated with several qualities for the more natural refreshment of Exotic Plants were it may be no hard matter to effect no more than were the modification of the Air abroad as well as in our more confined Reserves where we set them in for Hyemation and during the most rigorous Colds As for mixtures of Earths Plants we know are nourished by things of like affinity with the constitution of the Soil which produces them and therefore 't is of singular importance to be well read in the Alphabet of Earths and Composts For as we have said Plants affect the Marsh Bog Mountain Vally Sand Gravel sat and lean Mould according to their tempers and for want of skill in this the same Plant not only languishes and starves but some we find to grow so luxuriate as to change their very shapes colours leaves roots and other parts and to grow almost out of knowledge of the skilfullest Botanists not here to speak of what alterations do accrue from transplanting and irrigations alone I mention this to incite the curious to essay artificial Compositions in defect of the natural Soil to make new confections of Earths and Moulds for the entertaining of the most generous and profitable Plants as well as curious especially if as I hinted we could
the bottom such as you take from the last years Hot-bed giving it a surface of under-turf which has been foder'd on sweet and air'd In this to plant your Roots but so as not to touch the Soil but rather let it lie about the Pasture-Earth in which your Bulbs should alwayes be planted For all dung'd Earths canker the roots of Flowers whilst their fibers reaching the heartier Mould draw from it without danger But if you would indeed be provided of excellent Earth to plant most Flowers in lay turf of Pasture-ground in heaps for two Winters till it be perfectly consum'd This is also admirable for Tuberous roots and indeed all up-land-mould whether Sandy or Loamy may be made perfectly good with Neats-dung laid on the surface about Michaelmas for one year that it may wash kindly in then in September after pare this turff off as thin as you can and for the first foot depth of Earth you have bedding for Bulbs and Tuberous Roots superiour to any other Another proper mixture much in esteem with our Gardners is hollow Willow Earth a fourth part sifted from the grosser sticks with almost an equal portion of Sheeps-dung Lauremberg says Goats is better with a little natural Mould and indeed this is excellent to raise any seedlings of Flowers but for the more minute and delicate such as Cypress Mulberie the Samera of Elme and the like prepare a Mould almost of powder gently refresh'd with a dewie sperge or brush not with the watring-pot which plainly gluts it Auricula Anemonies c. should be raised in the Willowmould describ'd above but planted forth where Neats-dung and Loam is sifted among the pasture Earth The Pine and bigger kernels make great advance by being coated with dung which being grown to great Trees abhor it Touching change of Crop something has been said already and Pease degenerate betimes at least in two or three years be the Land never so good so 't is observ'd that most Plants long standing in the same bed impair both the Ground and themselves especially Sorel To Conclude for a general good Garden-soil take the natural under-turff if it be not too stiff add to it a quarter part of Neat or Sheeps-dung perfectly consum'd one bushel of sleek'd lime to each load of Mould with some sweet though rotten Wood-pile or Willow-Earth mix it well together and you have a choice composition for all your rare Exotics Oranges and Case-shrubs remembring to place the sprag of rotten bavins hampers or baskets to keep the Mould loose with Lime-stone Brick-bats Shells and other rubbish at the bottom that the water may pass freely and not rot the fibers And therefore be careful never to make your Cases close below but rather so barr'd as to be able to keep the course materials from dropping through whilst auger-holes though never so thick boards are apt to be stop'd up and then your roots do certainly rot and your trees grow sick The same is to be observ'd in Pots and that you place them about an inch from ground that they may freely drain and as freely receive refreshing But I must not quit these curiosities to speak of the cooler Composts till I have describ'd the best Hot-bed that I know of Dig a Pit or Fosse hot-beddepth four foot is sufficient and of what figure and dimension you think will best entertain your furniture for it if it be twenty foot in length and ten foot broad I think it competent Line the sides with a wall of brick and half thick fill this pit with fresh soil from the stable trodden as other hot-beds are but without any Mould at the surface In this place Woodden-Cases made like Coffins but not contracted at the extreams nor lidded of what length and breadth you think best but not above a foot in depth let these be Dove-tail'd with woodden handles at each end to lift in and out and lastly boar'd full of auger-holes at the bottoms Your Cases thus fitted fill them with proper Mould such as you would sow Melon-seeds in or any other rare Seed and thus place them in your bed of dung The heat will pass kindly through the perforations and continue a cherishing warmth five times as long as by the common way of Hot-bed and prevent you the trouble of making new and fresh for the whole process of the Melon or what other of choicer Plants require more than one removal The heat of this bed continues eight or ten weeks without need of repairing and if it should 't is but casting in some fresh-made soil and littier beneath and about your Cases of which some you may glaze Cheveron-wise at the top and with spiracles or casements to refresh and give them Air and Sun at pleasure And these Beds where you cannot conveniently sink them for want of depth because of water you may build above ground as well and you may or may not extend a Tent over it to keep out Rain Wind and Sun according as you find occasion But thus have you a neat and useful hot-bed as I have been taught to make it by the Right Honourable the late Lord Vicount Mordant at Parsons-Green whose industry and knowledge in all hortulan Elegancies requires honourable mention And now at last I am come to set down the several wayes of preparing Composts of Dungs and those other ingredients we have mention'd and begin with the rudest as that which best accommodates to the grosser part of Husbandry which yet requires a special maturation and so descend to the more refin'd And these I distinguish into the moist the dry and the liquid for Irrigation But first here by the way greatly to be reproved is the heaping of a deal of indigested soil and other trash expos'd as commonly we find it to the heat of the Sun continual rains and drying winds as it lies in the wide field without the least coverture or shade by which means all the virtue is drawn forth and carried away leaving little more than a dry and inspid congestion of Caput Mortuum and perhaps a florid green Circle or Fairy-Dance at the bottom which the impregnated rains have inrich'd with what it has wash'd from the heap wherefore to prevent this and make one load of our prepared Soil worth ten of it Cut a square or oblong pit of thirty or forty foot in length at the least four foot in depth and ten foot over or of what dimensions you think will suffice to furnish you with store Let one of the sides or edges be made so sloping as to receive a Cart or Wheel-barrow to load and unload easily let the bottom and sides also be so well pav'd or laid with a bed of small Chalk Clay or the like that it may be capable of retaining water like a Cistern If to this you can commodiously direct any channels or gutters from your Stable and other sinks about the house it will be much the better The Pit thus prepar'd and under covert
only for stability or as a womb and receptacle to their Seeds and Eggs for so we are taught to call the Seeds of Plants I shall not undertake to discuss Every body has heard of Van-Helmonts Ash-tree and may without much difficulty repeat what has been experimented by exquisitely weighing the Mould before and after a Gourd is planted in it and till it be grown to bulk and full maturity fed with water only how much liquor is insum'd and how little of the Earth consum'd to make some conjecture though I do not yet conceive the Earth to be altogether so dull and unactive as to afford no other aid to the Generation of what she bears the diversity of soils being as we have shew'd in this Discourse so infinitely various and the difference of invisible infusions so beyond our Arithmetic But if we give Liquids praedominion and at least the Masculine preference be they Salts or Spirits that is nitrous Spirits convey'd into her bosome how they will sure we are that Water and Vegetables are much nearer of alliance than either Water or Air are with the Earth and Mould But neither do I here also by any means exclude the Air nor deny its perpetual Commerce and benign influences charg'd as it comes with those pregnant and subtil particles which insinuating into the Earths more steady and less volatile Salts and both together invading the Sulphur and freeing them from whatsoever they find contumacious that intestine fermentation is begun and promoted which derives life and growth and motion to all that she produces That by the Air the most effete and elixiviated Mould comes to be repair'd and is qualified to attract the prolific nitrous spirits which not only disposes the Earth to this impregnating magnetism but converts her more unactive and fixed salts into quite another genius and nature the Learned Doctor Mayow has ingeniously Tract Medico-Phys Medico-Phys made out and all this by a naked exposure to the Air alone without which it produces nothing Nor can Plants totally excluded from the Air live or so much as erect themselves to any thriving purpose as being depriv'd of that breath and vital Balm which no less contributes to their growth and nourishment than does the Earth it self with all our assistances For that Plants do more than obscurely respire and exercise a kind of Peristaltic motion I little doubt from the wonderful and conspicuous attraction and emission which some of them discover particularly the Aloes and other Sedums and such as consisting of less cold and viscous parts send-forth their aromatic wafts at considerable distance Besides we find that Air is nearer of kin and affinity to Water than water is to Plants unless I should affirm that Air it self were but a thinner water for how else are those Vines and other Trees of prodigious growth maintained amongst the barren Rocks and thirsty Pumices where Rains but seldom fall if not from this rorid Air. Not to insist again that perhaps even these Rocks themselves may once have sprung from liquid Parents and how little even such as are expos'd to continual showers in other Climates abate of their magnitude since we rather find them to increase and that also the Fruits and Juices of Vegetables seem to be but the concretion of better concocted Water and may not only be converted into lignous and woody substance as the Learned Doctor Beale has somewhere instanc'd in a Discourse presented to You and Recorded in the Public Transactions but is apt enough to petrifie and become arrant stone Whatever then it be which the Earth contributes or whether it contain universally a Seminal virtue so specified by the Air Influences and Genius of the Clime as to make that a Cinnamon Tree in Ceilon which is but a Bay in England is past my skill to determine but 't is to be observ'd with no little wonder what Monsieur Bernier in his History of the Empire of the Mogol affirms to us of a Mountain there which being on one side of it intolerably hot produces Indian Plants and on the other as intemperately cold European and Vulgar Not here to pass without notice at least what even the most exhausted Mould will to all appearance produce spontaneously when once it has been well expos'd to the Air and heavenly influences if what springs up be not possibly from some volatil rudiments and seeds transported by winds higher than we usually place our Experiments unless we could fix them upon Olympus top But Porta tells us with more confidence that he took Earth from a most profound and dry place and expos'd it on such an eminence as to be out of reach even of the winds but it produc'd it seems only such Plants as grew about Naples and therefore may be suspected To return then again from this digression and pursue our Liquids where there is good Water there is commonly good Earth and vice versa because it bridles and tempers the Salts abates the acidity and fierceness of Spirits and imparts that usefull ligature and connexion to the Mould without which it were of no use for Vegetation In the mean time of all Waters that which descends from Heaven we find to be the richest and properest in our work as having been already meteoriz'd and circulated in that great digestory inrich'd and impregnated with astral influences from above at those propitious Seasons whence that saying Annus fructificat non Tell us has just Title to a Truth we every years Revolution behold and admire when the sweet Dews of Spring and Autumn hitherto constipated by cold or consumed with too much heat begin to be loosened or moderately condens'd by the more benign temper of the Air impregnating the prepared Earth to receive the Nitrous Spirits descending with their baulmy pearls yet with such difference of more or less benign as vapours haply which the Earth sends up may be sometimes qualified that nothing is more uncertain And this we easily observe from the Labours of the Industrious Bee and her precious Elixir when for some whole moneths she gathers little and at other times stives her waxen City with the harvest of a few propitious days But I am gone too far and therefore now shall set down only a few directions concerning watring and so dismiss the Subject and your patience 1. It is not good to water new-sown Seeds immediately as frequently we do and which commonly bursts them but to let them remain eight and forty hours in their beds till they be a little glutted with the natural juice of the Earth 2. Never give much water at one time for the surface of the Earth will often seem very dry when 't is wet enough beneath and then the Fibers rot about Autumn especially in Pots and Cases winter'd in the Green-house To be the more secure we have already caution'd Gardners to keep their bottoms hollow that nothing stagnate and fix too long which should be but transitory If such Curiosities