78 EUROPEAN AGRICULTURE. 



sible after rains, or from whatever source the wetness may conic, 

 relieve the land from it. Several things are therefore to be con 

 sidered such as the capacity, the depth, and the direction of the 

 drains, the distance at which they should be placed, their outlets, 

 and the mode of their formation. The expense of draining must, 

 in all cases, be considerable. The materials employed in their 

 formation, and the permanency of the work, are essential points 

 to be considered. The great improvements made in draining 

 land, in England, have been the work of the past few years ; in 

 no branch of husbandry has more been gained ; and the results 

 have been in the highest degree valuable and important. I 

 believe I am safe in saying that, in what it has done, arid what 

 it promises to do, for the advancement of agriculture, no other 

 process of improvement can be compared with it. 



3. ELKINGTON S SYSTEM OF DRAINAGE. It is but few years 

 since Elkington a name well known in English husbandry 

 effected a great improvement, by what might be termed tapping 

 the springs. It was generally supposed, at least much more gen 

 erally than at the present time, that the wetness of land pro 

 ceeded from springs, gushing up spontaneously, and supplied 

 from internal sources, much rather than from water falling upon 

 the surface. It is well known, likewise, that a large portion of 

 the earth s surface is in layers, or distinct strata, somewhat like 

 the leaves of a book lying upon its side, and, in some cases, not 

 flat, but with its side raised up, and, as the geologists term it, 

 dipping one way or the other, at different angles of inclination. 

 In effecting the drainage of a low piece of land, Elkington s first 

 plan and this was the plainest dictate of common sense was 

 to cut off the water by a drain formed at the foot of the elevated 

 ground, and round the whole margin of the meadow. By this 

 drain the water from the high lands, whether proceeding from 

 permanent springs or from the infiltration of occasional rains, 

 was intercepted, and, if possible, conveyed away. I have seen 

 this done repeatedly and successfully, and the meadow, when 

 thus insulated, made quite dry. 



But there were other caset&amp;gt;, in which it happened that the 

 water falling upon the land, though it might pass through one or 

 two of the upper strata, would meet, in its passage down, with an 

 indurated and impermeable stratum or layer, by which it would 



