DRAINING IN GENERAL. 57 



shrubs, and witnessed more growth in a single season than 

 they had made the three previous years. We have seen that 

 lawn in summer time as brown as the dead leaves that fall 

 about in autumn, for want of draining, although it was a 

 swamp in winter, and after rain ; and, after the operation, it 

 was never wet, nor was it ever off its fine green colour. But 

 the same thing may be witnessed in a hundred places, if the 

 same means be used. 



Having shown how undrained and ajDparently undrainable 

 land can be im]3roved, under the most adverse circumstances, 

 we shall touch upon the various modes adopted for the opera- 

 tion of draining under more advantageous features. The 

 more complete and the deeper an outlet can be made for the 

 superabundant water, the more complete will be the drainage; 

 but something can always be done to help land. 



Errors in Draining. — One of the evils into which many 

 fall is draining too near the surface. A stiff clay field of eight 

 acres, on the side of a hill, and a lawn of two acres adjoining, 

 but lower down, were some months in the year so wet as to 

 be almost impassable on foot, and the feet of the cattle at 

 these times would sink eight or nine inches deep. A man 

 who had been employed in the neighbourhood to drain, was 

 set to work at this; and finding an easy and j^leasant descent, 

 and the water so near the surface, he undertook to cure the 

 evil by drains made diagonally from corner to corner, there 

 being a capital outlet at both sides to a ditch of almost any 

 capacity. The drains were two rods apart, and twenty inches 

 deep, formed with flat sole-tiles, and an arch-tile on them. 

 There happened a dry winter, and there was not much incon- 

 venience ; but under the scorching summer's sun, the earth 

 (tracked as heretofore ; and the next being an ordinary season, 

 there was not the least difference perceived. We v>'ere applied 

 to for advice ; ordered drains straight down the hill, to a 

 cross-drain, large enough to take all the water ; and, as ex- 

 pense was an object, we proposed trying the drains at two 

 rods apart first, because there would be no expense lost, even 

 if we had ultimately to make one between every two. The 

 drains were made three feet six inches deep, and, before a tile 

 was put down, every drain had a complete and co2)ious run of 

 water. Two-inch round tiles were laid at the bottom, and, as 

 there happened to be on the field tlie clippings of the hedge 

 which had been neglected, some of the bushes were put at 



