1716. The garden-rake consists of a range of teeth inserted in a straight bar of iron or wood from six to eighteen inches in length, and attached at right angles across the end of a handle. Rakes vary in size, and in the length and strength of their teeth: they are used for covering seeds, or raking off weeds or cut grass, for smoothing surfaces, and for removing or replacing thin strata of pulverised surfaces, as in cuffing (cuffing is a mode of covering tree seeds sown in beds, by spreading the earth, previously drawn off to the sides, over the seeds by a smart blow, or cuff, with the back of the rake). For the latter purpose a wooden-headed rake is preferable; for the others, iron is generally more used.
