Book IH. WARPING. 665 



4114. Objections to irrigation have been made on the supposition that it renders a 

 country unhealthy ; but as the water is continually kept in motion, this is not likely to 

 be the case, and indeed is found not to be so in Gloucestershire, Lombardy, and other 

 countries where it is extensively practised. Others think that though the produce may be 

 increased, it becomes in a few years of so course a nature, mixed with rushes, and water 

 plants, that cattle frequently refuse to eat it, and when they do, their appearance proclaims 

 that it is far from being of a nutritious quality. [Rutland Report, p. 114.) But this 

 obiection is never applicable to meadows skilfully made, and properly managed ; and 

 whenever the grasses are coarse, they should be cut earlier if intended for hay. Rushes 

 and water plants are proofs that the meadow lies too flat and is ill managed. (Code.) 



4115. The principal impediments to irrigation are the claims of different individuals 

 on one stream, as millers, canal owners, &c. ; the intermixture of property and interests ; 

 and the existence in some cases of adverse leases. 



4116. The formation and arrangement of surfaces for irrigation, however simple in 

 principle, is in practice one of the most difficult operations of agricultural improvement. 

 Whoever, therefore, contemplates extensive and intricate works of this kind, will find it 

 desirable to call in the assistance of a professor and contractor of reputation. In Glou- 

 cestershire there are a class of men known as *' flooders," who have under them a com- 

 pany of men accustomed to every part of the work, and who accompany their chief to 

 execute works in any part of the country. 



Sect. II. Of Warping, or tlie Improvement of Land by Muddy Water. 



4117. Warjnng is a mode of fertilizing lands by depositing a coat of mud on their 

 surface. This may be practised on the borders of large rivers and estuaries, into which 

 sea tides flow ; or where floods are frequent, provided, however, that in either case the 

 waters contain alluvial matters in a state of suspension. According to the best inform- 

 ation that can be obtained [Marshal, in R. Econ. of York. 1788. Day, West Riding 

 Report, p. 171.), warping was first practised on the banks of the Humber, by one Barker, 

 a small farmer at RawclifF, between 1730 and 1740. It was afterwards extended by 

 Richard Jennings, of Armin, near Howden, in 1743; but it was about the year 1753 

 before it was attempted by any other person. It was first brought into notice by Marshal, 

 in 1788, and subsequently in the Report of the West Riding of Yorkshire, and is now 

 practised by various proprietors and farmers on the Humber, the Trent, and other rivers. 

 It has been long practised in Italy (267.) in a somewhat different manner to what it is 

 in this country, and may be considered as of Egyptian origin 



4118. The theory of warping is thus given by Arthur Young. The waters of the 

 tides that come up the Trent, Ouze, Dun, and other rivers which empty themselves into 

 the great estuary of the Humber, is muddy to an excess ; insomuch that in summer, if a 

 cylindrical glass, twelve or fifteen inches long, be filled with them, it will presently deposit an 

 inch, and sometimes more, of what is called warp. Where this warp comes from is a dispute. 

 The Humber, at its mouth, is clear water ; and no floods in the countries washed by the 

 warp rivers bring it, but, on the contrary, do much mischief by spoiling the warp. In 

 the very driest seasons and longest droughts, it is best and most plentiful. The im- 

 provement is perfectly simple, and consists in nothing more than letting in the tide at 

 high water to deposit the warp, and permitting it to run off again as the tide falls ; this 

 is the aim and effect. But to render it efficacious, the water must be at command, to 

 keep it out and let it in at pleasure ; so that there must not only be a cut or canal made 

 to join the river, but a sluice at the mouth to open or shut, as wanted ; and that the 

 water may be of a proper depth on the land to be warped, and also prevented flowing over 

 contiguous lands, whether cultivated or not, banks are raiserl around the fields to be 

 warped, and from three or four to six or seven feet high, according to circumstances. 

 Thus, if the tract be large, the canal which takes the water, and which, as in irrigation, 

 might be called the grand carrier, may be made several miles long : it has been tried as 

 far as four, so as to warp the lands on each side the whole way, and lateral cuts made in 

 any direction for the same purpose ; observing, however, that the effect lessens as you 

 recede from the river ; that is, it demands longer time to deposit warp enough for pro- 

 ducing benefit. 



4119. The effect of warjnng is very different from that of irrigation ; for it is not the 

 water that works the effect, but the mud, so that in floods the business ceases, as also in 

 winter ; and it is not to manure the soil, but to create it. What the nature of the land 

 may be intended to be warped, is not of the smallest consequence: a bog, clay, sand, 

 peat, are alike eligible : as the warp raises it in one summer from six to sixteen inches 

 thick ; and in the hollows or low places, two, three, or four feet, so as to leave the whole 

 piece level. Thus a soil of any dejitli you please is formed, which consists of mud of a 

 vast fertility, though containing not much besides sand and gravel. 



4120. In respect to the method of executing the work, it is described in the following 

 Planner in The Agricultural Survey of the West Riding of Yorkshire, by Lord Hawke. 



