324 0^ '^^ Benefit of Water Meadow t, July 



nourifhmcnt to the ftock, but they exhanfl the land fo as to 

 prejudice the fuccecding crop. And it ought to be remaiked 

 by the way, that in rcany parts of this diftri£t, the foil is not 

 at all favourable to the production of turnips. It therefore 

 necefl'^rily follov»'s, that a farmer, under thefe circurnftances, 

 has no certain refource to fupport his flock during this month, 

 but hay — and even in that he is fomctin-jes difappointed, by 

 having been obliged, in the preceding Spring, to teed all the 

 land which he had laid up for a hay crop : he is then obliged 

 to buy hay, and that frequently at the diftance of many miles. 

 And, to add to his diflrefs at this critical timo, his young 

 ewes are then brought home from wintering, to be kept near- 

 ly a month on liay alone. 



In this month, which fo often ruins the crops, and ex- 

 haufts the pockets of thofe fheep breeding farmers who have 

 no water-meadows, the water-mead fanners msy be truly 

 faid to be '* in clover." They hain up their dry meadows 

 early, fo as almofl to infure a crop of hay ; they get their 

 turnips fed otT /'/; tune to fow barley, and have the vaft ad- 

 vantage of a rich fold to manure it. They favc a month's hay^ 

 and have no occafion to touch their field-grafs till there is a 

 good bite for their (heep -, and their lambs are as forward at 

 May-day^ as tliofe of their lefs lucky neighbours are at Mid- 

 fumtner. And, after all, they are almoll certain of a crop 

 of hay on their water meadoArs, let the feafon be what it 

 will. 



Management of water meadows. — The management of wa- 

 ter meadows (^s nearly as it can be defcribed in an account 

 neceffarily fo concife as this), is in the following way. 



As foon as the after grafs is eaten off as bare as can be, the 

 manager of the mead (provincially " the drowner") begins 

 cleaning out the main drain, then the main carriage, and then 

 proceeds to " right up the works," that is, to make good all 

 the water carriages that the cattle have trodden down, and 

 open all the drains they may have trodden in, fo as to have 

 one tier or pitch of work ready for '• drowning," and which 

 is then put under water (if water is plenty enough) during 

 the time the drowners are righting up the next pitch. In the 

 flowing meadows this work is, or ought to be, done early 

 enough in the Autumn, to have the whole mead ready to 

 catch, if poffible, " the firfl fljods after Michaelmas i' the wa- 

 ter being then " thick and good," being the firfl wafhing of 

 the arable land on the fides of the chalk hills, as well as of 

 the dirt from the roads, &c. 8fc. 



The 



