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MONTHLY JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURE. 



its being completely well done. In this business it is hit or mixs. It is not more 

 or less — it's everything or nothing ! On this subject, as to the means of doing 

 it, and the profits of it when well done, no patron of this journal shall plead ig- 

 norance before we are done with it ; for we know of no subject more worthy of 

 attention. But we have not room to dwell longer at this time. 



Might not farmers associate, and appoint agents in this city to engage Irish 

 ditchers — for they are like muskrats in a swamp — on their arrival, to go and live 

 by the year, at certain wages. But we shall return to and elaborate this idea on 

 some early occasion. We think it might be practicable to get laborers and me- 

 chanics in this way, to the advantage of all parties. 



DRAINING. 



BY THE VERY REV. DR. BUCKLAND. 



He would iidvise the fiii'iners of Devon and 

 Dorset to go by railway to Lincolnsliire and 

 Norfolk, where the most beneficial chan:;es 

 had been realized over entire counties. There 

 were men now living who could remember 

 when 40,000 acres of land belonging to the 

 late Lord Leicester, in Norfolk, which are 

 now worth £40,000 a year, were nothing but 

 rabbit warrens and barren heaths. Lord YiU'- 

 borough had 30,000 acres of land in Lincoln- 

 shire, which formerly let at 4s. fid. [$1 03] 

 per acre, and at this low rate ruined almost 

 every fanner who rented it ; this same land is 

 now rented at an average of 2.5s. [$6 25] per 

 acre, by fanners who are all makuig such 

 large fortunes that many of them keep their 

 carriages. In Norfidk it was the custom of 

 Lord Leicester, when applied to for a iimn, 

 to ask the applicant how much capital he 

 could command. " I have farms," he would 

 say, " of all sizes for every amount of capital 

 — from 2,000 downi to 200 acres." This was 

 an admirable plan. He was satisfied that one 

 gi'eat cause of bad fanning was the ambition 

 of tenants in undert;iking a lai'ger fann than 

 they could slock and adequately maiuire. It 

 was not sm-prising that the farmer could not 

 succeed who, having a capital of £ 1,000, took 

 a fann which required £2,000.* The learned 

 Professor then reterred to the important oper- 

 ation of draining, as the foundation of all good 

 farming. It was useless to put tons of manure 

 on land that was not dry ; in that case it would 

 only Hoat upon the surface, for wet clay coidd 

 not allow it to gf) down — it w;us almost en- 

 tirely thrown away. Draining rendered the 

 land pen(!trable by water, and enabled the 

 rain to dowx'iul freely through it, carrying to 

 the roots those fertilizing elements of carbonic 



* The reader must bear in mind that this means 

 the capital requisite for a tenant — not to purchase the 

 land ; and this explains, to a great extent, the greater 

 productiveness of Knglish farms. They have a great 

 amount of capital — we nothing, comparatively, but 

 the naked land 1 Hut all difficulties vanish to meu 

 of resolution and ihoughl. 



acid and ammonia with which rain-water w^as 

 always charged. Caibonic acid was contuiu- 

 ally supplied to the air from chimneys, and 

 from putrefying animal and vegetable sub- 

 stances, also from the breath expired from the 

 lungs of animals, and a hundred other sources ; 

 it Hoated in the atmosphere in a gaseous form, 

 and was brought down again by ram. Fall- 

 ing upon drained land, this rain penetrated 

 its surface, and, as he had just .said, earned 

 with it to the roots of plants two of their 

 greatest elements of fertillt)'. 



It was the landed proprietors' and the farm- 

 ers' incumbent duty to increase the fertility 

 of the soil, because the soil alone afforded the 

 food which it was our business to provide for 

 ourselves and families. Fifty years ago. Par- 

 liament had given a premium for drauiing to 

 Mr. Elkiiigton ; and his system, where it was 

 applicable, had answered the required pur- 

 pose ; but it was not applicable so generally 

 as newer systems, for the publication of which 

 the country was mainly indebted to Mr. Smith, 

 of Deanston. He remembered, vidieu retuiTi- 

 ing from Scotland after visiting Mr. Smith's 

 farm at Deanston four years ago, being taken 

 by Sir Robert Peel into a field of his near 

 Tamworth, which was almost swampeil with 

 water, and nearly unproiluctive. He advised 

 Sii' Robert to drain it after the manner of Mr. 

 Smith, which he linthwith did, and the result 

 was in the very first year a splendid crop of 

 turnips, and the second year a crop of barley 

 so luxuriant that the stalks could not supjiort 

 tlie ears, imd fell prostrate to the ground. — 

 The expenses were repaid in two years, and 

 this worthless field was now a most profitable 

 piece of land. The Rev. Doctor then men- 

 tioned another instance of the effect of drain- 

 age near Wolverhampton, in Staffordshire, by 

 Lord llatherton. His Lordsliiji had reclaimed 

 a wild tract ot 1,500 acres adjoining Cainiock 

 Chase, on hills higher than those in East Dev- 

 on, and had increased its value from 5s. to 253. 

 per acre. After intpressing thus forcibly the 

 import:u;ce of draining, as the first step in ag- 

 ricidtural improvement, the learned Professor 

 proceeded to remark on the application of 

 maniues. 



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