130 



HISTORY OF AGRICULTRE. 



Part I. 



and he projected the walks over the grounds now known as the meadow walks, which were long the most 

 fashionable place of resort for the citizens. 



779. The Dukes of Hamilton and Athol, Lords Stair, Hopeton, and May, were active members of this 

 society, and especially Cockburn of Ormiston, already mentioned (772.), who was one of its principal pro- 

 moters and founder. 



780. Dawson, of Frogden in Roxburghshire, is a man to whom modern agriculture is more indebted than 

 perhaps any other. Dawson studied tiie Norfolk agnculture for several years, and conceived the happy 

 idea of conibining it with the system of TuU, and improving on both. The result wa.s his invention of the 

 culture of turnips on raised drills, with the dung buried directly under the plants. He also extended the 

 use of lime, and of artificial grasses and clovers, and on better principles ; and was the first to introduce 

 the practice of ploughing with two horses without a driver. On these improvements depend the superior 

 excellence of what is known as the convertible or Berwickshire husbandry. It is this husbandry which 

 has thrown capital into the hands of the farmers of Scotland, and rendered the profession of farming 

 there more respectable than in England. Scotland also has set the example, not only in improved modes 

 of culture, and in implements and machines ; but in the more expensive department of the farm house and 

 offices, numerous examples of which may be there found, both commodious in plan and disposition 

 {figs. 114. and 115.), and elegant in elevation, {fig. 116.) The laying out of the fields of .farms, the roads. 



fences, and water-courses, and especially the management of hedges, has been greatly improved ; and 

 the breed of working horses {fig. 117.) cannot be equalled in any other country for strength, activity. 



docility, and hardiness. While we state'these particulars, we freely admit that the improvement of fatting 

 animals has made incomparablv greater 

 progress in England, and also that the 1 1-8 



cottages ofthe laboring classes {fig. 118.) 

 are in general more comfortable and 

 neat in the latter country, and their 

 gardens are also better cultivated. But 

 the system of paying farm servants in 

 kind, or chiefly so, almost peculiar to 

 Scotland, far more than counterbalances 

 every advantage which the English cot- 

 tager at present possesses. We shall 

 describe the practice at length in our 

 survey of the agriculture of East Lo- 

 thian, in the statistical department 

 of this work. (See Part IV. Book I. 

 Chap. S. Sect 3., and Index. 



SuBSECT. 2. Ofthe Literature if Bntish Agriculture from the Hevolution to the 

 present time. 

 781. The literature of English agriculture from the revolution is rich in excellent works^ 

 We have already, in detailing the professional improvements, noticed the writings of 

 Mortimer and Tull. To these we now add the numerous works of Bradley, which 

 appeared from 1717 to his death in 1732. They are all compilations, but have been of 

 very considerable service in spreading a knowledge of culture, and a taste for rural 

 improvement. Stephen Switzer, a seedsman in London, in 1729; Dr. Blackwell, in 

 1741 ; and Hitt, a few years afterwards, published tracts recommending the burning 

 of clay as manure, in the manner recently done by Governor Beatson, of Suffolk ; 

 Craig, of Cally in Kircudbrightshire, and some others. Lisle's useful Observatiom 

 on Husbandry, were published in 1757 ; Stillingfleet's Tracts, in which he shows the 

 importance of a selection of grasses for laying down lands, in 1759; and the excellent 



