DURABILITY OF DRAINS. 41 



Mr. S. B. Phinney, of Barnstable. I would ask the compar- 

 ative value of stone and tile, side by side. I have used both. 

 I commenced in Barnstable, some few years ago, upon some of 

 the land belonging to the agricultural society there, and I 

 found the stone cheaper than the tile. That was something 

 like twelve years ago, and so far as the drainage to-day is con- 

 cerned, it is considered better by the stone drains than the tile. 

 Perhaps labor was somewhat cheaper at that time than it is 

 now, but I should like to know how they compare in value. 



Col. Waring. I should say that whichever kept open the 

 longest was the most valuable. All you want of either kind of 

 drain is to furnish an outlet for water, and the one which fur- 

 nishes the most permanent outlet would be the most valuable. 

 In the case to which you refer, perhaps the tile were of the 

 crude kind, that were made in the early stages of the manu- 

 facture, and the probability is, they were laid by men who did 

 not understand it, and the dirt has found its way in and 

 obstructed the drain. A perfectly well laid pipe tile drain, with 

 collars embedded in clay, seems to me almost as permanent as 

 the land itself. I do not see any influences that can disturb 

 it. They cannot be worn out by the water flowing through 

 them ; they are burned too hard for that. 



Mr. Johnson, of Framingham. Do we understand that it 

 takes a thousand feet of tile to lay an acre ? 



Col. Waring. It takes about a thousand feet to drain an 

 acre, with drains at intervals of forty feet. 



Mr. Johnson. You say it would cost $25 for the tile, and 

 that it would cost more than $25 to lay the stone, if the ditch 

 were dug, and the stone there by the side of the ditch ? 



Col. Waring. No ; I mean that the stone being delivered 

 at the side of the ditch, it would cost more than $25 a thousand 

 feet to make your ditch enough wider to accommodate a good 

 stone drain, and lay the stone in it. 



Mr. Johnson. I do not doubt that is true. 



Mr. Buffinton. There is another thing I have thought of, 

 and that is, whether more air could not be got into the soil by 

 a stone drain than a tile drain ? 



Col. Waring. I do not think much air gets into the soil in 

 any case, by reason of the presence of a drain. When the soil 

 is full of water, and the water is drained away, of course air 

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