344 Dr Davy's Agricultural Discourse. 



erected for hydraulic purposes. For every species of irrigation, I 

 need hardly mention that there is one circumstance in common, 

 which is, the making of the surface of the soil so gently inclined and 

 regular, as to admit the flow of water over or through it uninter- 

 ruptedly, with means of excluding the water when necessary. 



Having stated thus much generally as to irrigation, I shall ven- 

 ture to make a few remarks on it, in connection with the cultiva- 

 tion of the sugar-cane, and the practicability of applying it far more 

 generally than has hitherto been done to this the staple crop of these 

 colonies. That irrigation is favourable to this crop, is, I believe, so 

 well proved, that no doubt can be entertained respecting it. In this 

 island, I understand, on one estate in St Phillip's, where the trial 

 has been made, the success has been great ; and that in periods of 

 drought, when, without irrigation, the canes would hardly have been 

 worth the reaping. In Berbice, there are one or two estates that I 

 heard of when there, which had always been productive, yielding, 

 even in the driest seasons, and always without the application of ma- 

 nure, not less than three hogsheads an acre, these estates having a 

 command of water brought to them by an inland never-failing stream, 

 derived by a canal from one of the large rivers of that country. 



This partial success considered, and the nature of the cane, it 

 being almost an aquatic plant, is it not deserving of thought, whether 

 irrigation cannot be more generally applied, and whether all possible 

 means, consistent with just economy, should not be taken to effect it, 

 and even at intervals, and occasional, if means permitting it only at 

 intervals be available \ 



In some parts of Barbadoes, especially in the parishes of St Joseph 

 and St Andrew, and in that portion of St John's below " the Cliff," 

 there are running streams, some of them perennial, in a great mea- 

 sure running to waste, which I have no doubt might be turned to 

 tlie purposes of irrigation with excellent effect, especially if connected 

 with terrace cultivation, which, in certain of the hill-sides, in these 

 parishes where rock is in plenty, capable of affording stone for ter- 

 race walls of support, might be effected with no great labour and 

 probably at a small expense. Such teri'aces are likely to have the 

 double advantage of facilitating irrigation, and of preventing the soil 

 from being washed away by heavy rains. Not only in the parishes 

 named, but in most parts of the island, I imagine, partial irrigation 

 might be accomplished, by forming channels in the cane-fields, to re- 

 ceive, after any considerable fall of rain, the running water in small 

 streams, with such a declivity as to allow of their flowing slowly, 

 remembering always that it is running water that promotes vegeta- 

 tion, and stagnant water only that injures it. Such small channels, 

 after heavy rains, might also prove useful in preventing that accu- 

 mulation of water, which occasions a destructive flood, that de- 

 signated here, from its effects, " a wash." 



VVerc thorough- draining introduced, the watei" in excess fioai a 



