268 Norfolk Farming. 



drained, is so compressed, that in a few years the clay is nearer 

 the surface, and consequently more accessible for a second 

 dressing. The border lands — those fens which skirt the higher 

 grounds — are more improved than any others, being better situated 

 for the extensive application of clay, marl, chalk, and sometimes 

 sand. Extraordinary dressings of these earths, from one to two and 

 even three hundred loads per acre, are applied, and a rush-growing 

 morass has, by these means and by draining, been speedily con- 

 verted into a fruitful cornfield. Such dressings may be considered 

 too much at once ; but the case is altogether different from that 

 of mineral manures applied to uplands. Here these heavy earths 

 are wanted to consolidate the peat, for some of it is so light that 

 on losing the water it blows away. Any excess of lime the earths 

 may contain, which would be injurious on uplands, can expend 

 itself in converting the superabundance of vegetable matter into 

 fertilizing substances. 



Steam drainage is universal in these fens. Some great hits 

 have been made in reclaiming and improving the fens of 

 Norfolk ; but quite as many blunders might be recorded. The 

 drainage was begun at the wrong end ; instead of attending 

 to the mouth of the river, proprietors were more anxious to 

 throw the water off their own lands. Had the main outfall 

 been properly altered and deepened, thousands of acres, which 

 are now drained by steam, would have had fall enough for a 

 natural drainage. There is an idea prevalent that the fens are 

 now drained too much. Some are ; but they are exceptional 

 cases. At Methwold, Feltwell, and Hockham Wilton, there is 

 a poor peat, 18 feet deep, resting not on a clay, but on a run- 

 ning sand. There is really no hope of improving such land. 

 Take the water away, and it grows nothing. With the water 

 standing within six inches of the surface it produces a quantity 

 of rough sub-aquatic grass ; but when the food of such herbage is 

 gone, nothing comes in its stead ; ccmsequently the money which 

 has been expended to drain the fens of that locality is literally 

 thrown away, and dams have to be made across the mill-dykes to 

 stop back the water. It is the opinion of the best practical farmers 

 that arable fens, when loell clayed and welljarmed, cannot be drained 

 too much. On the other hand, to drain a light peaty soil, where 

 no clay, marl, or chalk, can be had, cannot answer. Such land 

 must be left pretty nearly in a state of nature. When the grass 

 appears to want renewing, it is as well to pare and burn it, sow 

 cole-seed, take a crop of oats, and lay it down again. Nothing 

 more should be attempted. 



The land to the north-cast of Norwich, comprising the hun- 

 dreds of Blofield, Walsham, Tunstead, Happing, East and West 

 Flegg, is considered the best soil of the county. Blofield has 



