FARMERS' REGISTER. 



753 



low at low tides. On one eide of this area, has 

 been constructed a canal about eighteen feet wide, 

 to conduct a creeU sufRcienily large lor two mills 

 above; and on the oilier, one half as wide, to 

 receive and convey several small streams, and a 

 great number oi' springs. At the termination o( 

 the work, these canals are connected by a dam 

 nearly two hundred yards long, one iialf crossing 

 the solt marsh, and the other the space constitut- 

 ing the (brmer bed of the creek. These canals 

 are between (bur and five miles long, and have 

 been constructed cautiously and leisurely, to di- 

 minish the loss of the adventure, should it prove 

 unyiiccessful. 



The experiment was commenced by cutting a 

 ditch on the left side for the small canal, about 

 lour feet wide, and two deep, near the dry land, 

 but wholly in the soil of the wet. — It was found 

 to yield too little earth to make a bank high and 

 strong enough to resist eiiher inundations or high 

 tides; that the earth became so porous, on drying, 

 as to produce leaks and breaches ; and that it was 

 yet so adhesive as to admit of the burrowing of 

 muskrats, with which the place abounded. Thus 

 the first attempt failed, and a considerable ditch 

 became wholly useless. 



As this spongy and fibrous soil extended to the 

 base of the hills on both sides, the next attempt 

 was made by driving a double row of slakes and 

 puncheons round and split, being six feet long, 

 two feei into the wet ground, about eighteen from 

 the dry, fitted together as <'lo>e as possible, and 

 covering them with the same kind of soil, dug out 

 of the canal for conducting the creek, w^hich 

 afforded earth when cut about one foot deep, to 

 cover the stakes. The result was, that the wooden 

 wall under this spongy and fibrous earth, was no 

 security against the muskrats, and that the bank 

 was pierced by them at pleasure. The labor in 

 wood was therefore lost, but not the insufficient 

 channel, nor the bank. 



The channel being about twelve inches deeper 

 than the adjacent sunken ground, wouhi contain 

 and conduct the creek except in inundations, and 

 as the bank hitherto described was in every vievv 

 insufficient, chasms of fifteen or twenty feet wide 

 were made in it at about three hundred yards 

 apart, to let the water pass out when high. The 

 creek was turned into this canal, with a view of 

 floating the sand from above, and depositing it 

 along the bottom, conveniently for removal to the 

 bank in order to oppose its friable nature to the 

 architectural skill of the muskrats. 



At some convenient season once a year (for 

 the experiment proceeded for years) the water of 

 the creek being turned successively through these 

 chasms above, left its bottom below of firm sand, 

 which was very easily raised upon the bank. By 

 the pressure of this annual alluvion of sand, upon 

 the spongy soil, the channel of the creek became 

 deeper, and the alluvion was increased, so that 

 finally the first embankment, being greatly raised 

 and completely covered with the sand filtered by 

 the water into a state for the object, became a for- 

 tification proof against the skill of these trouble- 

 some animals. 



The chasms left for inundationa being of the 

 kind of soil described, were not liable to b3 cut by 

 the water into new channels, and their edges or 

 banks, being higher than the bottom of the creek, 

 very little sand could escape through them. 



As the body of water on the left side, was too 

 inconsiderable lor the alluvion process, it became 

 necessary to abandon the old ditch, and to com- 

 mence a new one, so fir touching upon the base 

 of the rising dry land, as to secure a sufficiency of 

 sand for the bank, and yet to he able to penetrate 

 to the springs, which created a perpetual pond 

 and bog in a portion of the area to be drained. It 

 is now cut throut»hout its whole course of about 

 three miles, so deep as to have reached many of 

 the springs, with a bank able to command inun- 

 dations, and tides. The bank was composed of 

 sand only, (the wooden staccade having turned 

 out to be useless) and being of considerable size, 

 proved a complete barrier against the muskrats, 

 in the following cases excepted : In three several 

 places the bog or marsh, protruded into the dry 

 land at right angles with the course of the ditch, 

 m narrow necks not worth the expense of includ- 

 ing. Two of these were about thiriy yards wide, 

 and the third near ten. All were crossed, and to 

 save the trouble of getting sand for the bank, a 

 more carelijl trial was made of the staccade and 

 spongy soil. They proved in all three places in- 

 sufficient to confine the water, or resist the musk- 

 rats. A sandy soil lay on both sides of these guts, 

 but still it would be considerable labor to remove 

 a quantity of it sufficient for the whole bank ; to 

 save this labor, a ditch was cut on the inner or 

 lower side of the bank close to its ba^e, three feet 

 wide, and as many deep, quite across the mouths 

 of the two largest guts, and filled with the adja- 

 cent sandy soil ; and this thread of sand was con- 

 tinued on the back of the spongy part of the bank 

 above high water mark in the canal. At the nar- 

 row gut the bank was well coated above ground 

 with sand. At all three, success was complete. 



Eefore the inefRcacy of the staccade was disco- 

 vered, it was resorted to in making the dam across 

 the creek and marsh. Stakes and puncheons of 

 about nine feet long were driven about three into 

 the earth across both, in the centre of the intended 

 dam, and in a triple row. Nine feet from this 

 staccade on each side, a close and strong wattled 

 fence of green cedar was made, for the purpose of 

 holding the moist soil of the marsh, so fiir as the 

 dam was to be compounded of it, and of arresting 

 the sand, where it was to be made by an alluvion. 

 By laying plank for the laborers on each side, at 

 fifteen feet distance from these wattlings, and 

 working backwards toward them, cutting out the 

 earth as deeply as the laborers could reach, marsh 

 earth was easily obtained at low tides to raise the 

 dam to a suflicient height, so far aS the marsh ex- 

 tended ; but though it was eighteen feet wide, it 

 proved unable to resist either the water or the 

 muskrats. It therefore became necessary to cut 

 a ditch along the whole length of this moiety of 

 the dam, binding on the centre or staccade, four 

 feet wide, and two feet deeper than the summit 

 of the marsh, and to fill it with a thread of well 

 filtered alluvion sand. This remedy has hitherto 

 been suflicient, but nine months only having 

 elapsed, since it was tried, it ia not entirely confid- 

 ed in. 



The remaining moiety of the dam was entirely 

 composed of alluvion sand. For this object, the 

 canal for the creek was made to terminate at a 

 steep snndy hill, being cut close to its base. Care 

 was taken to keep the bottom of the creek two 

 feet above low water mark, for the sake of a cur- 



