130 AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND. 



yielded from my mill to the uppermost part of my grounds, being in 

 length a measured mile. There laye of medow land thirty acres overworn 

 with age, and heavily laden with moss, cowslips, and much other imper 

 fect grass, betwixt my mill stream and the maine river, which (with two 

 shillings cost) my grandfather and his grandsire, with the rest, might 

 have drowned at their pleasures ; but from the beginning never any thing 

 was done, that either tradition or record could witness, or any other testi- 

 monie. 



&quot;Having viewed the convenientest place, which the uppermost part 

 of my ground would afforde for placing a commanding weare or sluce, I 

 espied divers water falls on my neighbours grounds, higher than mine 

 by seven or eight foote : which gave me great advantage of drowning 

 more ground, than I was of mine own power able to do. 



&quot;I acquainted them with my purpose ; the one being a .gentleman of 

 worth and good nature, gave me leave to plant the one end of my weare on 

 his side the river : the other, my tenant, being very aged and simple, by 

 no perswasion I could use, would yield his consent, alledging it would 

 marre his grounds, yea, sometimes his apple trees ; and men told him, 

 water would raise the rush, and kill his cowslips, which was the chiefest 

 flower his daughters had to tricke the May-pole withal. 



&quot; After I had wrought thus farre, I caused my servant, a joyner, to make 

 a levell to discover what quantity of ground I_might obtaine from the 

 entry of the water; allowing his doubling course, compassing hills to 

 carry it plym or even, which fell out to be some three hundred acres. 



&quot; After I had plyrnmed it upon a true levell, I betooke myself to the 

 favour of my tenants, friends, and neighbours, in running my maine 

 trench, which I call my trench-royal. I call it so, because I have within 

 the contents of my worke, counter-trenches, defending-trenches, topping- 

 trenches, winter and summer-trenches, double and treble-trenches, a tra- 

 versing-trench with a point, and an everlasting trench, with other trouble 

 some trenches, which in a map I will more lively expresse. When the 

 inhabitants of the country, wherein I inhabit, (namely the Golden Valley,) 

 saw I had begun some part of my worke, they summoned a consultation 

 against me and my man John, the leveller, saying our wits were in our 

 hands, not in our heads ; so we both, for three or four years lay levell to 

 the whole country s censure for such engineers as their forefathers heard 

 not of, nor they well able to endure without merryments. 



&quot;In the running and casting of my trench-royal, though it were level 

 led from the beginning to the end, upon the face of the ground, yet in the 

 bottom I did likewise levell it to avoyde error. 



&quot; For the breadth and depth, my proportion is ten foote broad, and 

 four foote deep ; unless in the beginning, to fetch the water to my drown 

 ing grounds, I ran it some half mile eight foote deep, and in some places 



