ADMIXTURE OF SOILS. 27 



I have had the pleasure to witness, some of as good examples of 

 intelligent, exact, and successful farming as are to be found in 

 the United Kingdom. In the cases of marling, to which I shall 

 refer, while the upper stratum, or surface, is light and sandy, yet 

 there is found, at not a great depth, a deposit of clay or marl, 

 which is proved to be highly beneficial, and which, from its 

 being so accessible, is applied easily, and at a moderate expense. 



The substance applied is a bluish clay, and found from four 

 to six feet under the surface. Pits are dug, about six feet by 

 three, in rows, in a part of the field most convenient for the ap 

 plication of the material, and least inconvenient on account of 

 the injury done to the fields, and two or three spades depth of 

 the clay is taken out ; the top soil, which in many cases is peat, 

 being thrown back into the open pits. The whole piece thus 

 dug over is sometimes converted into a plantation, where, the 

 roots of the trees extending themselves, and the ground being 

 covered with the waste of the trees, the soil thus dug over be 

 comes consolidated, and ultimately brought into a condition 

 for use. 



In most parts of the country, and universally where the land 

 is inclined to wetness, at least before the introduction of Mr. 

 Smith s system of under-draining and subsoiling, in which all 

 cultivation in ridges is disapproved of, fields are cultivated in 

 beds, or, as they are here called, stetckes, varying in width from 

 six furrows to thirty. The practice of one farmer, in Norfolk, 

 whose admirable cultivation is second to none, I have had the 

 pleasure of observing, is to plough two of these beds outward, 

 leaving a deep trench, or wide double furrow, in the centre, and 

 here, where the clay is near the surface, obtaining it to spread 

 upon the land. In the instructive Report on the Agriculture of 

 Norfolk, published in the Journal of the Royal Agricultural So 

 ciety, an account is given of one enterprising farmer in Norfolk, 

 who had applied 54,055 loads to a little more than 286 acres 

 of land, or at an average rate of 189 loads per acre. In another 

 case, a farmer clayed a thousand acres twice over, at the rate of 

 forty loads per acre, in the course of eight years. Another 

 farmer applied at the rate of fifty loads per acre. In another 

 case, a great improvement has been effected by trenching, so as 

 to bring the bottom soil to the top, and bury the top at the bot 

 tom. &quot; In this case a trench is opened three or four feet wide, 



