DIKING AND DRAINING. 403 



world. Through these impulses and activities all auiuaals are 

 urged ou to their end in that course best for the species as a 

 whole. 



How far the acts of our domestic animals may be referred 

 to mere instinct, as we have here defined and illustrated that 

 term, or how far their acts indicate higher powers, in kind, 

 we must discuss at some future time. 



P. A. Chadbourne. 



The essay was accepted. 



The reports of delegates, and the several essays which had 

 been presented during the session, were then read a second 

 time by their titles, and adopted, when the Board 



Adjourned. 



The experiment of diking-in the salt marshes of the State, 

 and so reclaiming vast tracts of valuable lands from the 

 encroachments of the sea, now ' fairly begun in the case 

 of Green Harbor Marsh', in the town of Marshfield, so 

 admirably described in previous pages of this Report, is 

 worthy of special mention and careful study. Thousands of 

 acres of salt marshes, now comparatively worthless, may thus 

 be added to the tillage lands of the Commonwealth at a reason- 

 able cost, and easily brought into a condition to contribute 

 largely to the agricultural wealth of the community. The 

 lands thus saved from the sea, in northern Europe, are among 

 the richest and most productive in the world, and now sup- 

 port a vast population. 



It is worthy of consideration, also, whether something could 

 not be done to retrieve the mistakes of former legislatures, in 

 allowing the destruction of vast tracts of land, admitted to be 

 among the richest, naturally, of any soils in the State, by the 

 flowage of meadows along our rivers and larger streams for 

 milling purposes. The encroachments upon such lands, under 

 what are known as the Mill Acts, were, perhaps, necessary in 

 the earlier days of the colony and during the last century, or 

 previous to the introduction and use of steam, which has, in 

 so many cases, taken the place of water-power for grinding 

 grain and various manufacturing industries. It was a public 



