ACTUAL IMPROVEMENTS IN ENGLISH AGRICULTURE. 149 



the amount of this work which has been done : but there are no 

 means even of framing a reasonable conjecture. It undoubtedly 

 embraces hundreds of thousands of acres, and much more is in 

 progress, since, important and indispensable as moisture is to 

 vegetation, nothing can be more prejudicial than a superabun 

 dance of water, and especially stagnant water. Of the different 

 modes of draining I shall speak hereafter at large. It is a sub 

 ject of great importance and utility, and requires to be treated in 

 the fullest and most exact manner. The next great improve 

 ment, that I have witnessed in England, is in the fen-country of 

 Lincolnshire and Cambridgeshire, where vast territories, embracing 

 many thousands of acres, have been, it may almost be said, 

 created, that is, redeemed from the sea, fortified by strong and 

 extensive embankments, and now rendered as fertile and produc 

 tive as any lands which can be found upon the island. These 

 lands, likewise, are kept drained by immense steam engines, 

 which move with an untiring power, and accomplish this mighty 

 work with ease. In other cases, in Lincolnshire, another 

 process is going on, here denominated warping, by which, on the 

 banks of the Humber, immense tracts are enclosed, the tide shut 

 in, and compelled to leave its rich deposit, thus forming, likewise, 

 the richest meadows. Still another process is in progress, by 

 which the crooked course of a river is straightened, its channel 

 deepened by its own new current, and rendered navigable, and, 

 by the erection of artificial banks, the soil within them continu 

 ally raised, and hundreds of acres, where so recently the fish, at 

 high water, sported with impunity, are rescued from the sea, and 

 covered with thriving flocks of cattle and sheep. In Yorkshire, 

 not only are various processes of redeeming and improving land 

 going on, but the curious process of removing, by the aid of 

 steam machinery, the rich deposit from the bed of a river, whose 

 current has been diverted from its natural course ; and this de 

 posit, after being taken out, is laid, at not an inordinate expense, 

 on a peat bog hitherto unproductive and worthless. By judi 

 cious management, it is spread on the land to the depth of eight 

 inches, and the covering proceeds at the rate of five acres per 

 day. In Nottinghamshire, a most splendid improvement has been 

 effected in turning the course of a small river, so as at pleasure 

 to irrigate several hundred acres of land, which were formerly 

 poor and comparatively unproductive, but now yield the most 

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