300 



FARMERS' REGISTER 



[No. 5. 



and it must be pastured so, or not at all, frequent- 

 ly. The pasturing of lands in wet weather, espe- 

 cially in long rainy spells, must be very injurious 

 to them, especially arable lands. Cattle, it ap- 

 pears to me, should be kept up during suchspellsi 

 Lastly, the low grounds were disfigured, with 

 many undrained ponds, sunken places, &c, the 

 effluvia of which, is generally unfriendty to I 

 though I have never suffered from this cause, the 

 ponds being of small extent. Such was the con- 

 dition of Ihe land, which leads us to consider 



Secondly — The method adopted to drain and re- 

 claim it from inundation. 



To do this, I diverted the part of the stream A 

 E C, trom its ancient bed, through the heart (or 

 belly rather, of the low grounds, as it now an- 

 swers the purpose of a main gut, or as physicians 

 would say, the alimentary canal) into a new chan- 

 nel ABC, ten feet wide, and on an average of 

 four and a half or five feet deep, and about three 

 quarters of a mile long. This depth however, 

 was found insufficient; and then I had a small 

 ditch excavated, in the middle of the bottom of 

 the. big ditch, three by two feet deep. This ga- 

 thered the water into a deep, narrow channel. 

 which increasing the velocity ot the stream, soon 

 by its abrasions, ripped up the adjacent benches, 

 B B Fig. 2, (which represents a transverse sec- 

 tion of the canal, down to the bottom of the little 

 ditch o.) The ditch has washed out in width 

 and depth astonishingly, since it was cut, contrary 

 to the expectations of many persons, who suppo- 

 sed that the land being so wide and level, there 

 was little or no fell, and consequently the chan- 

 nel would not wash sufficiently, to take the stream 

 in high water. Ii is now from 40 to 50, and in 

 some places 60 feet wide, and upon an aver 

 six and a half feet deep: and where it passes 

 through knolls, eight or nine feet in depth. There 

 are holes in the bottom ten feet deep; but this is 

 not the uniform depth of the bottom. I observe 

 that the clay parts of the ditch wash more, and 

 more uniformly, than the sandy parts, contrary to 

 the common opinion. The reason for this is ob- 

 vious. The clay parts of the ditch are less en- 

 couraging to vegetation, than the sandy 

 the grass and weeds springing up from which, 

 catches the trash and sediment, and further pro- 

 moiing the growth of weeds and grass, the roots 

 of these hold the banks of the ditch together, and 

 prevent their being washed away. In dry wea- 

 ther too, the clay cracks in large fissures, and 

 when a freshet occurs, the water rising and run- 

 ning into these chasms, sever large blocks of clay 

 from the banks, which tumbling in the water in a 

 dry state, soon dissolve and wash down the cur- 

 rent. These lumps leaving scooped places in the 

 banks, the large projections of earth above also 

 tumble in, and dissolve away. There is another 

 reason: the clay freezes in the winter when the 

 water is down, which pulverizing and loosening; 

 it, gives the water a prodigious effect on the banks. 

 If there is much fall at the sandy places, then 

 they wash very much; otherwise they do not: for 

 the vegetation then has no time to cover the | 

 banks, the sediment being washed away as fast as 

 it accumulates. 



In cutting this ditch, it will readily be seen, by 

 looking on the figure, that the current in the. old 

 channel is not diverted from its general straight 

 course A B C D E, (which is uniform in all 



streams that flow in a certain direction towards 

 the ocean, for however they may meander in par- 

 ticular parts of their beds, they have in the main 

 a straight course,) but only diverted from a part of 

 its old bed, A. B C D. On the contrary, the 

 stream is directed more into its general straight 

 course, (which is here southerly,) as the figure 

 shows; for if it were continued where, it now runs, 

 above and below, it would be in a right line, with 

 its natural direction, A B C D E; so that it may 

 be considered as only cutting off a large bend or 

 elbow of the creek, about a mile and a half long, 

 following- in the measure, all the curves of the 

 old channel. There is much evidence to believe 

 that the stream was once more in this general 

 straight course, (to which attention should be 

 paid in straightening channels,) than when it me- 

 andered along the foot of the hill, from whence it 

 has been lately diverted, since the panal now pass- 

 es through many places which appeared to have 

 been once ponds, (but were entirely filled up when 

 ihe ditch was cut, with sand, leaves, and rotten 

 wood, as far down as the bottom of the ditch,) no 

 doubt formed by deserted parts, of a very ancient 

 channel, from whence the current must have re- 

 ceded towards the foot of the hill, where it for- 

 merly ran; that is, along A B C D. This reces- 

 sion in streams, from more elevated to lower 

 1 ■-, is occasioned by the current itself, gradu- 

 ally raising, by depositions of mud and sand, the 

 3 of its channel, above the adjacent ground, 

 (hence the. bed of a creek or river lies oftentimes 

 in the highest part of the low grounds,) where if 

 it meets with obstructions, it retires with the fall 

 into the low places, and following the indentations, 

 or natural sinks of the land, it forms numerous 

 curves, and becomes extremely crooked, till the 

 fool 'if the hill fixes a limit to its further mutation, 

 at least for a time; but as its banks here become 

 higher than the surrounding land, it changes 

 again to ihe same place probably, from whence it 

 first was diverted. 



The clearing and cultivation of land, has had 

 a powerful influence on the mutation of ihe beds 

 of streams. Subsequent to these operations, the 

 channels of streams have become much slraighter, 

 less branching, (that is, the water collected more 

 into one main channel,) and the banks have be- 

 come much better. By felling the timber, and 

 loosening the soil of the adjacent hills, many 

 ponds and sunken places have been filled up in 

 the low grounds, with the sand and soil washing 

 down from thence; and the streams too, being , 

 loaded during freshets, with sand and mud from 

 the same source, have filled up the holes they for- 

 merly made, and the parts of the crooked chan- 

 nels they have deserted, and have formed by their 

 increased velocity, and the sediment they deposite 

 in freshets, new and straighter channels for them- 

 selves, and higher banks. The executor of the 

 work under consideration, a very intelligent man, 

 and one of observation, and who had had 50 years 

 experience on the subject of mill races, and 

 straightening creeks, observed to me, that before 

 t'i\^ country was much cleared, when he first turn- 

 ed his attention to the subject of ditching, the 

 s ; reams, where the low grounds were wide espe- 

 cially, divided into numerous branches, and ran in 

 many places, nearly over the whole low grounds, 

 in so" much, that it was oftentimes difficult to dis- 

 tinguish where Ihe main current flowed — that the 



