CHAMBERS'S INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE. 



abandoned, by those who neglected the principle 

 that the soil has to be made, and enriched by 

 manures and green crops fed off with sheep, 

 instead of immediately taxed with corn-cropping; 

 whereas, there are innumerable instances to shew 

 that light chalk-lands, as well as other wastes, will 

 prove worth reclaiming, if only persevered with: 

 tillage and the application of mineral and animal 

 manures, for a course of years, having the effect of 

 creating a good soil where scarcely any existed 

 before. 



The basis of improvement in light, silicious 

 soils is the application of chalk, marl, or clay; 

 this admixture giving greater solidity and reten- 

 tiveness for moisture, a power to arrest and retain 

 organic riches from the atmosphere, while supply- 

 ing many mineral substances required in the 

 constitution of a fertile soil. 



Marling and Chalking. Marl is a term applied 

 in different localities to a variety of earths, 

 generally consisting of a mixture of clay, sand, 

 and lime, but also including such substances as 

 red or blue clay of an unctuous or pulverulent 

 character. Marl-beds are found in hollows at the 

 foot of hills, at the bottom of ancient lakes, below 

 peat-mosses ; particularly in districts where chalk- 

 hills, limestone rocks, or spring-waters containing 

 much lime in solution, abound. Clay-marl, used 

 in Norfolk and Suffolk, is the till of the diluvial 

 or drift deposits, consisting of blue and yellow 

 clay containing lumps of chalk. A common 

 dressing upon gravelly or sandy land is from 

 forty to seventy cubic yards per acre. The cost 

 of filling and spreading is about 30!. per yard; and 

 of the cartage, according to the distance. Shell- 

 marl is a kind found under bogs and mosses, and 

 at the bottom of most dried-up lakes, and is 

 evidently a calcareous earth, formed of decom- 

 posed testaceous fish. 



Chalk is employed as a manure and mechanical 

 solidifier of light soils, in every locality where 

 it exists, and has been the chief agent in im- 

 proving the thin, flinty loam of the Lincolnshire 

 wolds. It is there excavated from pits or 

 quarries, and carted upon the land at an expense 

 of 5d. or 6d. per cubic yard. A dressing of 80 to 

 i oo cubic yards is applied per acre ; the chalk is 

 weathered by exposure to a winter's frost, and 

 then crumbled down by harrowing. On the 

 Chiltern Hills of Buckinghamshire, pits or wells 

 are sunk in the fields, about twenty feet deep, and 

 the chalk drawn up in baskets by a wheeL 



MOSS-LANDS, FENS, AND MARSHES. 



Peat-mosses are supposed in some cases to have 

 been occasioned by the destruction of ancient 

 forests, either by the hatchet or from natural 

 decay. In other cases, bogs have been formed by 

 aquatic plants vegetating in hollows, holding 

 water ; mud accumulating round their roots and 

 stalks, formed a semi-fluid mass, which increasing 

 gradually, filled up the hollows, so that sphagnum 

 and other mosses could grow. The peat which 

 has been formed in this manner is therefore a 

 compound of vegetable substance not entirely 

 decomposed ; commonly inclosing decayed trees, 

 of pine, birch, hazel, or oak. The lowest layers of 

 peat are commorily formed of aquatic plants ; the 

 next, of mosses ; and the highest, of heath. The 

 quality of the bog may be judged of from the 



540 



plants which grow upon it : on ground completely 

 saturated with water, various species of moss 

 grow, to the total exclusion of other plants ; but if 

 the land should in any way become drier, reeds, 

 rushes, and other plants spring up in the place of 

 the moss ; and all the moss tribe, the horsetail 

 and the marsh trefoil, are fibrous, and difficult to 

 decompose ; while reeds, rushes, and sedge are 

 comparatively easy of decomposition. 



Morasses abound in all mountain and moorland 

 districts, particularly in Scotland ; while extensive 

 tracts of flat mosses and peaty land are found in 

 Lancashire, the fen-country of Cambridgeshire 

 and Lincolnshire, and in Somersetshire. In 

 Ireland, the mountain peat occupies 1,300,000 

 acres, and the flat or red bog 1,600,000 acres, 

 including the extensive tract known as the Bog 

 of Allen. 



The following are examples of successful under- 

 takings upon various descriptions both of the flat 

 or red bog and the black or hill peat. 



The reclamation of a large portion of Chat- 

 moss, in Lancashire, was commenced by Mr 

 Roscoe of Liverpool, and has been subsequently 

 prosecuted with success. Drainage the first 

 step to improvement was effected by cutting 

 open parallel ditches 66 yards apart, 4 feet wide 

 at the top, and sloping down to about 14 inches 

 at the bottom, 3 feet 6 inches deep. In a wet 

 floating mass like this moss, it was not possible to 

 sink the ditch to the whole depth at once ; and 

 the first two spits being taken out, it was then left 

 for time to consolidate the surface. The covered 

 cross-drains, 10 yards apart, laid 3 feet deep, and 

 running into the open ditches, were commenced ; 

 but in forming these, as well as the open drains, 

 it was necessary to allow some time to elapse 

 between the different operations, that the water 

 might to some extent run off; the hollow drains 

 being made by the top sod, dried by exposure to 

 the air, being wedged into the open cut, and the 

 peat thrown in again upon that to fill up. When 

 the surface was partially dried, the heath and 

 other plants growing upon it were set on fire, and 

 burned off as closely as possible ; and by plough- 

 ing and cross-ploughing, and cutting up the sods 

 by a roller armed with knives, the tough and 

 elastic character of the surface was destroyed. 

 Both men and horses were obliged to work with 

 pattens or flat pieces of wood attached to their 

 feet After this process, marl found at the 

 southern edge of the moss was laid on the top, 

 by means of a movable railway ; the dressing 

 being 100 cubic yards to the acre equal to about 

 one inch covering over the whole surface and the 

 average distance which the marl had to be removed, 

 about two-thirds of a mile. Town-manure was 

 brought by the Liverpool and Manchester Rail- 

 way a mixture of night-soil and ashes being 

 preferable to anything else ; and by growing a 

 crop of potatoes in the first instance, the different 

 particles of moss-earth and manure became so 

 thoroughly blended together that the soil formed 

 would produce anything, and wheat, clover, and 

 oats followed each other in successful rotation. 

 After-experience has shewn that turnips, oats, and 

 potatoes are the best crops for such land ; and an 

 admixture of lime and salt answers better than the 

 bulky marl for destroying the vegetable fibre, con- 

 verting the moss into friable mould, and preparing 

 it for a first crop of potatoes. On the extensive 





