28o On the Proper Mode of Ridging a Wet Clay Sail. July 



ridge, of the breadth of from thirty or forty feet, fufficiently 

 rounded, was the propereft form for laying a wet clay foil 

 dry •, I immediately determined to try the experiment, and 

 pitched upon a field of feven acres, that was already formed 

 into fifteen-feet ridges; and, in order to form the broad 

 ridges in a gradual manner, I continued for feveral years to 

 call two ridges together, keeping an open furrow in the 

 crown, till I got them of a fufficient height, and properly 

 rounded, when the open furrow was difcontinued, which 

 formed one high and broad ridge of thirty feet. The field 

 was then Summer-fallowed, dunged, and fown with wheat ; 

 the crop a good one, but not up to what I was entitled to ex- 

 peft. In the following Spring, which was a dry one, it was 

 fowrj, in good condition, with beans and peas, in the propor- 

 tion of one pea to three beans. A few days after the field was 

 finiflied, one of the moft extenfive farmers in the county 

 pafTmg it, faid to me, * I fee you are making trial of broad 



* ridges -, they are excellently formed, being well rounded, 

 ' and of a proper height. I have not a doubt, that, if I chance 



* to pafs your farm fome years hence, I fhall find all the 



* ridges upon it formed after the fame model. ' Thefe broad 

 ridges, which had thus received the approbation of this ex- 

 pert farmer, were foon put to the teft. The v^eather broke, 

 and a very wet Summer followed. Upon examining thp,, 

 field, from time to time, it appeared to me to be evidently ' 

 injured by the breadth of tTie ridges : there was fuch a pref- 

 fure of water on the fides of the ridges, from their great 

 breadth, that the clay foil, which had been highly cultivated 

 in the Spring, was diffolved into mud, in io much, that the 

 water furrow betwixt the ridges almoil difippeared. When 

 the crop came to be cur, not a fmgle pea was to be feen on 

 the broad ridges, having ali died early in Summer. The beans, 

 a fcanty crop, were evidently Hinted in their growth by the 

 wetnefs of the foil, few of them exceeding eighteen or twenty 

 inches in height; but, on a round narrow ridge in the field, 

 although of an inferior foil, there was a confiderable number 

 of peas at harveft, and the beans were much more luxuriant 

 in their growth. I muil: again obferve, that the Summer w?.> 

 a remarkably wet one. A neighbour, who had a field of good 

 beans, fown upon caften ridges of fifteen icet in breadth, 

 fiiowed me an odd ridge in the field that was gathered, oa 

 which he had a third more beans than on any of the caflea 

 ridges, which proved the neceffity of laying beans dry this 

 leafon. After the beans were got off, the ridges were ga- 

 thered, for laying .the^i; dij'.y during the Winter; but, in the 



'- "■' "■'' '■• Spring, 



