332 QUARTERLY JOURNAL. 



pit did not reach to the chalk rock, nor did it pierce through any 

 porous stratum ; its loanny sides and bottom were perfectly water 

 light, so that little or none could escape. 



My plan was different. I saw marks in an adjacent field of where 

 chalk had been drawn at some former time ; thither I opened a 

 stone-filled drain below the plowshare, from the lowest dip of the 

 hollow ; and when the water had accumulated, it ran towards the old 

 chalk pit, but totally disappeared long before arriving at the place, 

 and thus was a valuable field laid dry. Another arable field contained 

 a. pond which very often overflowed its boundaries. Lower ground 

 was at the distance of half a mile ; and the- expense of forming so 

 long a drain prevented all attempts to get rid of the annoyance. I 

 advised the tenant to dig a deep drain from the pond up into a hiyh 

 bank of gravel, into which the water oozed away immediately ; and 

 ever after carried off all excess. By this simple expedient a large 

 piece of excellent land was reclaimed, and brought into a regular 

 course of culture at a very trifling expense. 



It is by such means that land, naturally friable and loose in tex- 

 ture, may be relieved of superabundant water, and give admittance 

 to the necessary supplies of air at all times. I have already observed 

 that sandy soils require no exposure for the purpose of reducing 

 adhesiveness either by the action of frost or machinery ; and yet we 

 often see such land carefully fallowed up in the autumn, and 

 even laid in ridges, to receive the advantages supposed to be im- 

 parted to it by the contact of frosty air. That such an idea, namely, 

 that arable land is benefitted by exposure to frosty air, has been long 

 entertained, is evident from what has been written on the subject by 

 old authors. Even our amiable poet, Thomson, in one of the flights 

 of his pregnant imagination, says, 



" The frost-concocted glebe 

 Draws in abundant vegetable suul. 

 And gathers vigor for the coniing year." — Winter. 



Showing that the notion was held by philosophers as well as culti- 

 vators ; and, at the present time, there are many among the latter 

 who mistake the disrupting, ameliorating effects of frost on tenacious 

 soils for its enriching property, which they imagine is connnunicated 

 to all soils. But this is a mistake : the less light sandy soils are 

 exposed to the sun and air, the less are they exhausted of their 

 humid riches. Their best qualities are as liable to be washed away by 

 winter rains as dissipated by the summer sun ; and, therefore, they 

 cannot be too close and level during winter, if it is intended that they 

 should be cropped in the spring. 



I have often noticed the mismanagement of a field of light soil by 

 the following culture : It was fallowed, cleaned, dunged, ploughed, 

 and sown with tankard turnips about the middle of June. The crop 

 ■was abundant, and a flock of full-mouthed wethers was put on in 

 the end of September, Within a month, the turnips were eaten oflf, 

 and the field was ploughed into single 'bout ridges to lie for the win- 



