INTRODUCTION. xlvii 



accomplislied at present, though much capital has been 

 fruitlessly sunk in attempting- too much at one time ; so 

 that of late the contractors have confined themselves to 

 smaller operations. What has really been accomplished, 

 however, is the completion of a fine straight channel 

 for a length of two miles or thereabouts, through lands 

 in West Lynn and North Lynn, from Lynn harbour to 

 the sea, in lieu of the old tortuous course of the Ouze. 

 This latter has been blocked out by a cross-bank at the 

 North end of Lynn harbour, and has " silted up" to 

 such an extent, since that bank was made (about twelve 

 years ago), that last year the company ventured, and 

 successfully, upon the construction of another cross- 

 bank, about half a mile below. By this enclosure about 

 two hundred and twenty acres of good land were 

 reclaimed, and a considerable portion of this is now in 

 tilth. Other enclosures have been made along the east 

 shore of the Wash, by throwing out shelter banks; 

 and it is found that when, by these banks, the flow of 

 water is excluded, the process of accretion goes on 

 rapidly outside the banks so formed. Thus what proved 

 impossible of accomplishment on a large scale is being 

 done little by little ; for only a year or two ago nearly six 

 hundred acres, in the neighbourhood of Babingley and 

 Wolferton were added to the estates of the Prince of 

 Wales and the Hon. Mrs. Howard, and very recently the 

 Estuary Company's enclosure, number three, was com- 

 pleted, consisting of two hundred and seventy acres of land 

 which had warped up outside the Babingley shelter-bank, 

 and other similar enclosures are in progress or contem- 

 plated. It may be also mentioned that the cut before 

 alluded to, called the Marsh Cut, terminates at a bend of 

 the old channel, and that from this point " guide-banks" 

 are being slowly constructed, to take the channel two 

 miles further out to sea, through a sand called Vinegar- 

 Middle. Much of the loss originally incurred was 



