especially written for the service of the inexperienced settler.]

In this country, hay-cutting commences about the first or second week
in July. Timothy-grass and clover mixed or timothy alone are the best
for hay, and the most productive. The quantity of seed required for new
land is six quarts of grass-seed and two pounds of clover to the acre;
on old cleared farms nearly double this seed is required. Timothy is a
solid grass with a bulbous root. If the weather is hot and dry, the hay
should be carted the second day after cutting, for there is no danger
in carting it at once into your barn, the climate being so dry that it
never heats enough to cause spontaneous combustion. We have other sorts
of grasses, such as red-top, blue-joint, &c.: these grasses, however,
are inferior, and therefore never grown from choice.

Soon after my arrival at Darlington, one of my neighbours residing on
the lake-shore invited me to a mowing and cradling "Bee."* As I had
never seen anything of the kind, I accepted the invitation. On my
arrival at the farm on the appointed day, I found assembled about forty
men and boys. A man with a pail of spring water with a wooden cup
floating on the surface in one hand, and a bottle of whiskey and glass
in the other, now approached the swarm, every one helping himself as he
pleased. This man is the most important personage at the "Bee," and is
known by the appellation of the "Grog-bos." On this occasion his office
was anything but a sinecure. The heat of the weather, I suppose, had
made our party very thirsty. There were thirty-five bees cutting hay,
among whom I was a rather awkward volunteer, and ten cradlers**
employed in cutting rye.

[* What the Canadian settlers call a "Bee" is a neighbourly gathering
for any industrious purpose a friendly clubbing of labour, assisted by