“To plant well and expeditiously in this way, requires considerable dexterity on the part of the workman; and where raw hands are employed, it will be necessary to have some person to teach and superintend them.” Mr Cruickshank disposes of the old cross system of slit planting by the spade, with very little ceremony; as it would almost seem, without being able to appreciate its merits. It is, in fact, a totally different mode of planting from that by the flat dibble-planter or planting-iron, and is well adapted for all plants with horizontal roots, and which have stood from one to three years in the nursery line. By first striking the spade in perpendicularly, as deep as the turf-soil, by again striking it in at right angles to the end of the first cut, in the form of a T, and bending back the spade, the turf-soil is raised from a horizontal bed, and the first cut opened so wide as to admit the root, which {345} inserted and drawn a little along by an experienced hand, and well tramped down, has its rootlets disposed over the horizontal bottom almost as regularly and well adjusted for growing, as can be done by pit-planting. This practice is sometimes performed singly, a clever workman managing the spade with one hand and the plants with the other, and inserting 1000 each day. The plants suited for this system are fully double the size of those suited for the flat-dibble system, and are purchased at about one half more price, thus enhancing the cost of planting to £1, 10s. or £2 per acre; but in many situations, especially where the herbage grows freely, affording an earlier growth, and more regular success, sufficient to balance the greater expense ten times over. Although the cross-system of slitting is the best for commanding general success, yet wherever the flat dibble planting can be depended on, it merits a preference, as from the smallness of the plants, the roots receive less fracture and derangement in the woody state, and the process comes nearer to raising from the seed _in situ_. The expense of each system per acre, will be nearly as follows:— {346} _By Cross-slitting, or the Double Notch._ 3000 larches and Scots firs, from one to three years transplanted, at 5s. L.0 15 0 500 hard wood, from one to three years transplanted, at 12s. 0 6 0 4 days of one superior planter, or of two ordinary planters, at 3s. 0 12 0 ――――――――― L.1 13 0 _By the Flat Dibble, or the Single Notch._ 4000 larches or Scots firs, from the seed-bed, or one year transplanted, at 2s. 6d. L.0 10 0 1000 hard-wood plants, 0 7 0