278 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



manure, which is being consumed and transformed by the 

 process of slow combustion. From the well or cesspool, where 

 the main drains converge, a kind of twelve-inch tunnel is car- 

 ried to the canal, at a depth of thirteen feet, and tliere it empties 

 the drainage water. The cost of draining was not far from 

 $30 an acre. 



Then came the laying of pipes for irrigation, an expensive 

 part of the plan. The cost of this is given in the annals at 

 $9,140. This seems to be a very large outlay. The company 

 had no precedents to work by, but were the pioneers in that kind 

 of improvement, and experience is often very expensive. The 

 work, it was afterwards estimated, might haver been done at 

 two-thirds the cost. But the most of the land has been brought 

 directly under the tubular system, the few more distant pieces 

 being within easy reach of the cisterns. The average cost of 

 pipes and laying has been about $40 per acre, for the 225 

 acres. 



Movable pipes, made of plate iron, 2| inches in diameter, 

 and 26 feet long, were adopted as, on the whole, the most econ- 

 omical. To the end of the pipe an India-rubber 2i in. tube is 

 attached, lined inside by a spiral thread of iron wire, so that 

 sufficient play is had at the joint without diminishing the size 

 of the pipe. Next to the India-rubber comes the male-screw of 

 a bayonet-joint, and at the other end another screw, so made 

 that the joint is united to the pipes by an iron collar, so that a 

 half-turn of the screw makes it perfectly tight. The carriage 

 and adjustment of the movable parts is easy. A cart can carry 

 enough to lay a pipe 200 yards long. The workmen carry a 

 length on their shoulders to where it is needed, and the ends 

 rest on cross-stakes, where they are joined ; a boy at tlie stop- 

 cock opens or shuts it as directed. The^ foreman works the 

 hose, carrying in his arms one or more lengths, which can be 

 attached to lengthen out the distributing pipe, from time to 

 time, as required. 



A thousand tons of liquid manure were distributed in 25 

 days, or at tlie rate of 40 tons a day. The machinery was kept 

 at work only in the afternoon, as the morning was taken up in 

 bringing the boat-load from Bondy. In the dry season the soil 

 is diluted with three times its bulk of water, and then the same 

 machinery will distribute 150 tons a day. The cost of a length 



