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VI. — On ihe Application of Clay to Moor-Land. By S. Solly. 



To Ph. Pusey^ Esq. 

 Sir,- — On the subject of your inquiry respecting the application of clay, 

 I wish to communicate the following remarks : — One important pro- 

 perty of every kind of clay-marl has been pointed out by Lord Spencer ; 

 it gives to lighter soils the necessary solidity, — a circumstance which 

 Berzelius observed had not been sufficiently attended to in Sweden. I 

 have found the intermixture of earths less attended to by large farmers 

 than by the occupiers of small allotments and garden-farmers. In 

 Lincolnshire all the tracts formerly covered with heath retain the name 

 of moorland. This heathy or peaty soil is in general in low estimation, 

 but the ameliorations which have been successful there I shall attempt 

 here. I observed a Lincolnshire labourer wheeling away a gravel-bank 

 to cover his plot of moorland. I asked him what his object was — " To 

 get a crop of rye," was his answer. Lord Spencer has found a top- 

 dressing of sand beneficial to a peaty soil; I intend to bring up a 

 covering of gravel by deep ploughing. I have already found the 

 benefit of it in planting here, as I did with my first attempt in Lincoln- 

 shire, where the trees planted twenty years ago on a high gravel bank 

 thrown up in digging a wide and deep ditch have made great progress ; 

 some which I planted here last spring in a similar way have withstood 

 the excessive drought of the summer, and are likely to prosper. 



I have had two instances of the application of marl by small occu- 

 piers, who seem to understand the economy of agriculture in a wonder- 

 ful degree, particularly one of them, who is incapable of reading or 

 writing. The marl they have the opportunity of using appertains to 

 the lias formation ; the lime it contains has occasionally been converted 

 by the decomposition of pyrites into selenite or transparent gypsum, 

 which is called isinglass by the brickmakers. The potash generally 

 existing in clay is not easily detected by the chemist, because he is 

 unable to separate the last portions of any ingredient. The laws of 

 attraction by which substances are held together are not thoroughly 

 imderstood by any chemist ; therefore, instead of trusting to chemistry, 

 it is much better to study the operations of nature, which enables plants 

 to extract from the soil or derive from the atmosphere those elements 

 the presence of which the chemist is unable to detect. 



The silvery sand of the heaths, upon which I am operating here, ap- 

 pears to contain no nutriment ; nevertheless, in opposition to the opinion 

 of all my neighbours, I am endeavouring to bring it to the surface by 

 deep ploughing ; and I hope that by burying the heather sufficiently it 

 will answer the purpose of complete and effectual drainage, a good 

 outfall being secured below by wide and deep ditches, towards which 

 there is a sufficient slope, and the springs being cut off above by the 

 same means. The clay, which underlies this sand and gravel generally 

 at great depth, as is shown by the necessity of deep wells, sometimes rises 

 to the surface, and is good brick-earth when it contains a sufficient pro- 

 portion of sand ; but in general it is either perfectly white, fit for pottery, 

 imparting no impurities to the water of the wells sunk down to it, or 



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