76 



HISTORY Ol-' AGRICULTURE. Part I. 



which has been rewarded by the acquisition of their richest soil. These newly-formed 



lauds, before their embankment, are called sckorres. They are flooded at every tide by the 

 water of the sea, and are augmented by mire, bits of wood, rushes, sea-weeds, and other 

 marine plants decayed and putrid, also by shells ami fishy particles which the ebb always 

 leaves behind in considerable quantity. This growing soil soon produces various plants and 

 grasses, and improves daily. When such lands have acquired a crust or surface of black 

 earth, three or four inches deep, they may be embanked and fallowed. Those are always 

 the most productive which have been deepened in their soil by the augmentations of the 

 sea; and experience proves that in the coiners and hollows, where, from an obstructing 

 boundary, the greatest quantity of mire has been deposited, the soil is doubly rich and 

 good, and cannot be impoverished by the crops of many years. In some instances, the 

 embankments are made on the part of government ; in others, by companies or individuals, 

 under a grant of a specific tenure (generally twenty-one years), rent free, or, according to 

 circumstances, at some moderate annual payment. 



448. The polder of Snaerskirke, near Ostend, contains about 1300 acres. It is of Ir.te 

 formation, and was overflowed by a creek with its minor branches every spring tide. By 

 constructing two banks and a flood-gate at the creek, the sea is excluded, and the space 

 subdivided by roads, and laid out in fields of thirteen acres each, surrounded by ditches. 

 The bank is fifteen feet in height, thirty feet in the base, and ten feet across the top : the 

 Jand which has been reclaimed by it, was let for a sheep pasturage at 600 francs (25/.) per 

 annum, and was thrown up by the farmer as untenable. Upon being dried by this sum- 

 mary improvement, the lots, of which there are one hundred of thirteen acres each, were 

 sold by auction at an average of 7000 francs (291/. 135. 4rf.) a lot, and would now bring 

 nearly double that rate. They are let to the occupying farmers at 36 guilders the mesure, 

 or about 21. 15s. the English acre, and are now producing superior crops of rape, of 

 sucrion (winter barley), and beans, which constitute the usual rotation ; this, however, is 

 varied according to circumstances, as follows: — 1. oats, or rape ; 2. winter barley, or 

 rape ; 3. winter barley ; 4. beans, pease, or tares. 



449. Other examples of reclaimed lands are given. One called the Great Moor, recovered 

 through the spirited exertions of M. Hyrwein, contains 2400 acres. Attempts had been 

 made to recover it by the Spaniards, in 1610, but without success. This marsh was 

 seven feet below the level of the surrounding land ; therefore, to drain it, the following 

 operations became necessary : — 



450. To surround the whole with a bant; of eight feet in height, above the level of the enclosed ground, 

 formed by the excavation of a fosse, fifteen feet wide and ten feet deep, which serves to conduct the 

 water to the navigable canal. — To construct nulls to throw the water over the bank into the fosse". — To 

 intersect the interior bv numerous drains from eight to twelve feet wide, with a fall to the respective mills, 

 to which they conduct all the rain water, and all the soakage water which oozes through the banks. 



451 . The mills in use for raising the water, are of a simple but effectual construction, and 

 are driven by wind. The horizontal shaft above works an upright shaft, at die bottom of 

 which a screw bucket, twenty-four feet in length, is put in motion by a bevil wheel, at such 

 an angle as to give a perpendicular height of eight feet from the level of the interior drain 

 to the point of disgorgement, whence the water is emptied with great force into the exterior 

 canal. With full wind, each mill can discharge 150 tonneaux of water every minute. 

 The height of the building from the foundation is about fifty feet, one half of it above the 

 level of the bank. The whole is executed in brickwork, and the entire cost 36,000 francs, 

 about 1500/. British. It is judiciously contrived that the drains, which conduct the water 

 to the mills, constitute the divisions and subdivisions of the land, forming it into regular 

 oblong fields of considerable extent, marked out by the lines of osiers which ornament 

 their banks. Roads of thirty feet wide lead through the whole in parallel directions. 



452. The soil of this tract, which has been formed by the alluvial deposit of ages, is a 

 clay loam, strong and rich, but not of the extraordinary fertility of some polders, which are 

 cropped independent of manure for many years. The first course of crops, commencing 

 with rape, is obtained without manure, and the return for six years is abundant ; the 

 second commences and proceeds as follows : — 



1. Fallow, with manure from farm-vard. 5. Clover. 



2. Sucrion (winter barley). 6. Beans and Peas mixed. 



3. Beans. 7. Oats. 



4. Wheat. 



453. The second division adjoins French Flanders, but does not extend to the sea. The 

 soil may be described as a good loam of a yellowish colour, mixed with some sand ; but 

 is not in its nature as strong as that of the former division. Its chief produce is wheat, 

 barley, oats, hops, tobacco, meadow, rape-seed and flax, as primary crops ; and, as 

 secondary, buckwheat, beans, turnips, potatoes, carrots, and clover. This division, unlike 

 the former in this respect, is richly wooded. 



454. The general course of crops in this division is asfolloivs : — 



1 . Wheat upon manured fallow. 5. Flax, highly manured with urine and rape cake, 1 t Fallow, manur«t. 



r, top C 



t Turnip., } """ vear ' wi,houl manute 8'. Kant, manured, 



•_'. ( '.lata, tup iln-^itl with ashes. 6. Wheat, >or< Rye. 



Hi 



