Editing Jethro Tull (agriculturist) (section)

==Legacy==
Tull's work on agriculture initiated a new movement in 18th-century agriculture called "horse-hoeing husbandry" or "new husbandry". His system was supported by [[Henri-Louis Duhamel du Monceau]] in France, [[Michel Lullin de Chateauvieux]] in Switzerland, [[John Mills (encyclopedist)|John Mills]] in England, and many others. It offered two major innovations:

*''Scarifiers and horse hoes'': These implements were unknown until the 18th century. "Hoeing by manual labour had, in very early ages, been partially practised; for the earliest writers [...] recommended particular attention to the cutting down and destroying of weeds. But to Jethro Tull, is indisputably due the honour of having first demonstrated the importance of frequent hoeing, not merely to extirpate weeds, but for the purpose of pulverizing the soil, by which process the gases and moisture of the atmosphere are enabled more freely to penetrate to the roots of the crop."<ref name="CWJ 1844 p. 41">Johnson, Cuthbert W. (1844) ''The Farmer's Encyclopædia, and Dictionary of Rural Affairs''. "Agriculture", p. 41.</ref>
*''The use of drills'': In Roman agriculture the endeavour was "to attain the advantages incident to row-culture by ploughing in their seeds. A rude machine [has] been used immemorially in India for sowing in rows. The first drill for this purpose introduced into Europe seems to have been the invention of a German, who made it known to the Spanish court in 1647."<ref name="CWJ 1844 p. 41" /><ref>''Hurte's Essays on Husbandry''.</ref> "It was first brought much into notice in this country by Tull, in 1731; but the practice did not come into any thing like general adoption till the commencement of the [19th] century." By then there were "several improved machines adapted to the sowing of corn, beans, and turnips."<ref name="CWJ 1844 p. 41" />

The influence of the atmosphere on the soil and the increased fertility produced by pulverising and stirring heavy lands led to the notion adopted by Tull that labour might entirely supersede the necessity of [[manure]]: hence the origin of the horse-hoeing husbandry, which at one time was so highly thought of as to be called, by way of distinction, the ''new'' husbandry.<ref name="CK 1833">''The Penny Cyclopædia of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge'', Vol. 1, C. Knight, 1833. [https://books.google.com/books?id=swsDAAAAYAAJ p. 226.]</ref>

Fallows and manuring were both discarded as unnecessary; the seed was sown in rows with wide intervals, which were continually kept worked and stirred. At first the result was highly satisfactory; all the humus, by exposure to the air, was converted into soluble extract and taken up by the plants, which thrived well as long as the supply lasted: but in the end the soil was exhausted; and the warmest admirers and supporters of Tull's system, Du Hamel and De Chateauvieux, besides many others, found in practice that pulverising alone will not restore fertility. However, the system of drilling and horse-hoeing, when united with judicious manuring, has been found a great improvement in agriculture.<ref name="CK 1833" />

Tull's book upon husbandry also influenced [[Cotton#Cultivation|cotton culture]] in the American Southern Colonies. Tull's system taught that to ensure a sufficient number of plants, they did not just need to increase the quantity of seed, but to plant the seed at regular distances.<ref>Johnson (1844; p. 549)</ref>

===Tull's farm===
After Tull's death, his holdings of about {{convert |70 |acre}} of freehold land in Berkshire found their way into [[Court of Chancery|Chancery]], and were sold by order in 1784 to a Mr Blandy. Tull held about {{convert |130 |acre}} of additional land by a different tenure. The old brew-house he dwelt in has been modernised, but remains largely intact – as late as 1840 it was said to be in very good condition. Of the outhouses, Tull's granary and his stables remain, although deteriorating. At the end of the granary, which Tull built, is an old well. When it was cleared out some years ago, there was found under the accumulated mud of nearly a century a three-pronged hoe, which is likely to have belonged to Tull and is now in the museum of the [[Royal Agricultural Society of England]]. It may have been thrown by his men, who adopted new types of tool with reluctance and reportedly thwarted him in many ways.<ref name="CWJ 1844 pp. 1056–57"/>

Tull's Prosperous Farm in the rural parish of [[Shalbourne]], under the Coomb Hills about {{convert|4|mi|0}} south of [[Hungerford]], long remained an object of interest to lovers of agriculture. [[Arthur Young (agriculturist)|Arthur Young]] made a pilgrimage there<ref>''Annals of Agr.'', Vol. xxiii, p. 173.</ref> and [[William Cobbett]] did the same.<ref>Johnson (1844, p. 1060)</ref> The farmhouse was rebuilt in the 19th century.<ref>{{National Heritage List for England|num=1034015|desc=Prosperous|access-date=20 January 2020}}</ref>