360 Mr. Farey's Statement of Geological Facts 



strata than the general mass, which I have mentioned above, 

 would well employ the attention of Dr. R. and other ob- 

 servers in Antrim, where I think, while inspecting Mr. D.'s 

 Alap, that I can perceive clearly their influence, in sepa- 

 rating the long and wide stripes of Bog, with which the 

 western side of that County, from Lough Neagh north- 

 ward, is unfortunately encumbered : and that such stony 

 ridges, might be traced northward to the top of the cliff, 

 and into its face, to the facade which Dr. R. has so well 

 described vol. xxxiii. p. 104. 



The readers of your 36th volume, p. 361 and 437, will 

 have noticed, besides some important facfs, as to the natural 

 liistory of the extensive Bogs or Peat Mosses of Ireland, 

 that our legislature had seriously entered on a scheme for 

 effectually draining, in orderto aid the cultlvatinn of the main 

 of such Bogs : and I embrace the opportunity here of men- 

 tioning, that Dr. William Richardson, having; long turned 

 his attention to these Bogs, and to the making of accurate 

 observations and discriminations, as to the causes and na- 

 ture of Bogs and Fens, and the different steps to be taken 

 for the improvement of each, some time ago prepared a 

 long and excellent Memoir on the subject, which is now 

 printing (for the first time) in the numbers of ihe Agricultural 

 Magazine* (published by V. Griffiths, No. 1, Paternoster 

 Row), in which nearly the whole of the most expensive 

 steps now pursuing under the Act of Parliament for the 

 above purpose, are decidedly and as I think, justlv con- 

 demned, as useless and indeed hurtful some of them, if per- 

 sisted in: it is a subject that has fallen somewhat under my 

 cognizance, ever since the quackeries of the late Mr. Elking- 

 ton first engrossed the public attention, and on which I have 

 enlarged rather, in the chapter on Draining in the retnaining 

 part of my Derbyshire Report, now in the press. 



I should 



• Dr. R. will excuse my correcting an inaccuracy in vol. x. p. 67, of this 

 work, in mentioning the Fens of Bcdjhnhldre, since ther" are none such. 

 The name" Bedford Level of the Fens," situate in Cambridgeshire, a great 

 many miles from Bedfordshire, and so called in compliment to an Earl of 

 Bedford who patronized their embank. nent and drainage, has probably 

 misled the Doctor, as it has before done others. 



Among the important facts with respect to the Irish Bogs which Dr. R. 

 gives us, is that of their not immediately resting upon Ctoy or Mail, as re- 

 presented vol. xxxvi. p. 367, 37 1, and 44;^. i but that in every one of the nu- 

 merous places which he bad examined, " a toujh, viscid, ponderous, and 

 whitish E.irth, which when analysed (says he) by my scientific College 

 friends (in Dublin) gave eighl.y-lhrce parts of silex, sixteen of alumine, and 

 one of oxide of iron." Agr. Mag. vol. x. p. 81 and 144, was found immediately 

 under the peit: and which confirms the observations of Mr. Wm. Smith 

 and myself during near 20 years past, that though Fens and Marshes, and 



