110 AGRICULTURE. 



junction of two pipes from the intrusion of particles of 

 soil. We confess to some original misgivings that a pipe 

 resting only on an inch at each end, and lying hollow, 

 might prove weak and liable to fracture by weight pressing 

 on it from above ; but the fear was illusory. Small particles 

 of soil trickle down the sides of every drain, and the first flow 

 of water will deposit them in the vacant space between the 

 two collars. The bottom, if at all soft, will also swell up 

 into any vacancy. Practically, if you re-open a drain well 

 laid with pipes and collars, you will find them reposing in 

 a beautiful nidus, which, when they are carefully removed, 

 looks exactly as if it had been moulded for them. 



And now for the controversy between the deep and the 

 shallow. 



We shall dismiss with a very few words two classes of 

 writers on the subject of draining 1st. Those who limit 

 the advantages of a drain to the water which is passed into 

 it from its own surface, and who therefore enjoin that it 

 should be filled with porous material, and that it should be 

 shallow. 2nd. Those who will not drain 4 or 5 feet deep 

 because it makes the ground too dry for the roots of plants. 

 This idea must have come from some garret, having been 

 conceived by an ingenious recluse brooding over his ig- 

 norance, and reasoning as follows : What makes vege- 

 tation burn up ? The absence of water from its roots. 

 What takes away the water ? Deep drains. Ergo, deep 

 drains are the cause of burning. We will supply a 

 formula : Why does vegetation burn ? Because its roots 

 are very superficial. Why superficial ? Because they 

 won't face the cold of stagnant water. What removes the 

 cold and the water ? Deep drains. And the facts exactly 

 coincide with our logic. Deep-drained lands never do 

 burn. Nothing burns sooner than a few inches of soil on 

 a very retentive clay. No land is less subject to burn than 

 the same soil when, by 4 or 5 feet draining, a range of 3 or 

 4 feet has been given to the previously superficial roots... 



Having dismissed these two small matters, we must 





