WAS 



OR, BOTANICAL DICTIONARY. 



WAS 



791 



but is always found to be amazingly fertile. On the coast of 

 Lincolnshire, from Wisbeach to Boston, which through a long 

 succession of ages has formed a large tract of warp country, 

 called the Silt district, no attempts have been made to warp 

 artificially. It is therefore suggested, to the proprietors or 

 farmers living near a muddy river, that they should consider 

 the position of their grounds well, and try the amount of the 

 subsidence of the mud in the water, in a cylindrical glass jar, 

 as a great benefit may be near them, and lost from their 

 inattention to this subject. 



Wartwort. See Euphorbia and Spurge. 



Waste Lands. The scarcity of corn, which prevailed 

 throughout Great Britain a few years ago, acted as a power- 

 ful stimulus to the enclosure and improvement of waste land, 

 which is now still more necessary, as it affords a large in- 

 crease of productive labour for the most valuable members of 

 society. The insufficiency of labour for the demand of the 

 country, leaves no danger of old land being at all neglected 

 in order to bring wastes into cultivation ; but in the cultivation 

 of waste land, particular circumstances must be considered. 

 Some wastes, from the situation and the quality of their soils, 

 are capable of being brought into a high state of cultivation 

 and improvement, with comparatively little labour and ex- 

 pense ; while in others the expense of cultivation would be 

 great, and the profit precarious and inconsiderable. Hence 

 some able judges conclude, that the same quantity of labour 

 and expense, which would be necessary to divide and cultivate 

 such soils, would in all probability raise a much larger pro- 

 portion of produce from lands already but imperfectly culti- 

 vated. It is often said, that our soil and climate are more 

 adapted for producing grass than corn ; but the fact is, that 

 the greatest portion is well suited to either, and will amply 

 repay skill and industry wherever exerted. Profitable, how- 

 ever, as this business would entirely turn out, both to the 

 individual and the public, the taste of landholders, in general, 

 is rather to increase their quantity of wilderness, than to 

 improve their present possessions. When, however, a pro- 

 prietor feels indisposed to improve his waste grounds himself, 

 surely he may find a pleasure in giving liberal encouragement 

 to his tenants, and the labouring poor, to exert themselves to 

 render it productive. The foundation of the encouragement 

 should perhaps be a long lease to poor industrious honest 

 labourers, with a small allowance to build-a house, and to 

 help themselves to live, until they can raise food to support 

 themselves; after which they should pay interest for the 

 money, and a small rent for the ground. It would, indeed, be 

 better that landholders should give any encouragement short 

 of their own loss, rnther than allow such lands to lie any 

 longer as they are. Waste lands are generally classed under 

 three general heads : First. Elevated barren lands, covered 

 with different sorts of coarse plants, which comprehends all 

 the varieties and denominations of moory, heathy, and moun- 

 tain down, and other such lands, however diversified by the 

 particular circumstances of quality and situation. These cir- 

 cumstances must constantly regulate the modes of clearing 

 the surface, dividing, enclosing, and laying out the lands, as 

 well as the buildings that may be necessary, and direct the 

 kind and extent of the different operations, which are after- 

 wards the best and most proper, and conducive to improve- 

 ment. Where the land is thin, too much ploughing is mostly 

 to be avoided, though in other circumstances it may, for the 

 most part, be freely adopted, especially where any suitable 

 ameliorating substances are at hand ready to be applied. In 

 the improvement of waste land, where the heath and other 

 coarse plants on the surface are considerable, it is the prac- 

 tice with some, to apply lime in large proportions some time 

 VOL. ii. 132. 



before the ground is to be broken up, as it is found to have 

 great power and effect in destroying such coarse matters, and 

 in preparing the superficial parts of the soil and ground for 

 the operation of the plough, and the action of other tools, for 

 bringing it into necessary cultivation. Objections have been 

 made to the cultivation of Wheat, in the first instance, though 

 that would appear to be the most profitable method of pro- 

 ceeding. This crop should be followed by Turnips, or by 

 Oats, with Ray-grass and Red Clover, though the former is 

 generally preferable, especially if the necessary quantity of 

 suitable manure can be procured in a ready manner; then 

 Barley, with seeds, may be tried in succession to the Turnips, 

 particularly where they succeed in such a manner as to keep 

 sheep a sufficient length of time on the field. The course of 

 the crops will then run thus: Wheat, the stubble carefully 

 turned down in the autumn, then Turnips, and these follow- 

 ed by Barley or Oats, with Ray-grass and Red Clover. The 

 first crop of these grasses, grazed by sheep, or other sorts of 

 live stock, is most convenient. Land thus managed, when 

 broken up a second time, will soon, it is asserted, become 

 equal to any other in the vicinity. It may be necessary, in 

 many cases and for many reasons, to vary the first crop. In 

 some it may be most useful and proper to begin with Turnips ; 

 in others with Oats and seeds, or with the former only. In 

 lands where mucilage appeared deficient, Buck-wheat, turned 

 in, has been tried with great success, especially when after- 

 wards mixed with lime and dung. Still the above method 

 of beginning with Wheat is the best in all cases where cir- 

 cumstances will permit it, because Wheat, when the ground 

 is properly prepared, will best repay the expense of such 

 preparation ; and green leguminous crops, eaten off by sheep 

 or cattle, will afterwards improve the land considerably, even 

 without other means, which should never be neglected where 

 the expense of providing them is moderate. Heath-land, 

 where the staple is very thin before small stones and gravel 

 are reached, may be improved in somewhat the same way, 

 in some cases; and after the surface materials have been 

 reduced and spread out by nine-share ploughing, sow 

 it with grass-seeds well harrowed in. By this simple method, 

 the sward soon becomes sweet, good, and productive; the 

 heath, which originally covered the ground, soon disappear- 

 ing. Wastes that are naturally poor, thin, and barren, should 

 seldom have corn attempted to be raised upon them in the first 

 instance. Heath-lands, where the staple is very thin, intended 

 for sheep-walks, may be improved by breast-ploughing, burn- 

 ing, and spreading out the ashes upon a certain proportion 

 of them every year; half of such portion being directly pre- 

 pared for early Turnips, the other half for the same crop in 

 the spring. The Turnips, on the first part, when fed off on 

 the land by sheep, should have the ground they occupied 

 sown, after being prepared early in the spring, with Tares, in 

 the quantity of three bushels to the acre, with a few Oats, 

 which are also to be fed off with sheep ; then sow Turnips 

 again for the spring, which being fed off as before, the land 

 is to be sown with Oats and White Clover seeds, eight pounds 

 to the acre, with a bushel of good hay-seeds. The Clover is 

 not to be in any way stocked, after the Oats are cut, until the 

 spring. This land, by being hurdled off, where practicable, 

 and fed with sheep for two or three years, will, it is said, 

 become an excellent sward, and form a great improvement, 

 affording the improver vast profit in the increase of the sheep 

 it can support. There are other modes of bringing waste 

 lands, of these different kinds, into cultivation ; as by plant- 

 ing Potatoes in the ridge, and other methods, which is well 

 suited to the means of improving small portions by the 

 labouring poor, in many instances, as they often produce 

 9 P 



