32 FRUIT AND KITCHEN GARDEN. 



it be strongly impregnated with metallic substances, or 

 composed of cold wet clay, it will prove pernicious to the 

 roots of fruit-trees, and will scarcely admit of a remedy. 

 A decomposing rock, or a bed of sand, is preferable. 

 Perhaps the best of all is a dry bed of clay, overlaying 

 sandstone, which crops out within the general inclosure. 

 If the inferior strata be retentive, and if water lodge in any 

 part of the garden, draining should be carefully executed, 

 so as to carry off the superfluous moisture. 



Preparatory to the distribution of the several parts of a 

 garden, it is proper that the ground bo trenched to the 

 depth of two feet at least ; but the deeper the better. - In 

 this operation all stones larger than a man s fist are to be 

 taken out, and all roots of trees, and of perennial weeds, 

 are carefully to be extracted and cleared away. When the 

 soil is not tolerably good to the depth of two feet, it will 

 generally be proper to remove a portion of the subsoil ; 

 and its place should be made up by a proportional quantity 

 of turf or fresh loam from the fields. If the subsoil be 

 gravel, and the upper layer sandy, the additional earth 

 should be clayey loam, or the scourings of ditches ; but if 

 the original body of soil be of a compact texture, the ma 

 terials introduced should be mixed with sand, marl, and 

 other light opening substances. When the whole ground 

 has been thus treated, a moderate liming will, in general, 

 be useful. After this, supposing the work to have occupied 

 most of the summer and autumn, the whole may be laid up 

 in ridges, and left in this state for several months, to ex 

 pose as great a surface as possible to the action of the 

 winter s frost. The draining, trenching, and other opera 

 tions here recommended, will unavoidably be attended with 

 considerable expense, and this expense will not immediately 

 be followed by any perceptible beneficial result. The lapse 



