SIZE AND SHAPE OF FIELDS. 89 



for taking off the water, as well as to suit the proper length 

 of the ridges, with gutters or gripes where requisite. 



Uniformity of Soil. It is necessary, at the same time, to 

 attend to uniformity of soil, and many farmers have to la- 

 ment, that the inclosures on their farms are laid out, more 

 with a view to beauty than utility, and that regularity and 

 uniformity of appearance have been chiefly kept in view, 

 whilst little regard has been paid to a point infinitely more 

 essential, that of having the several fields of the same sort 

 of soil j hence soils of the nature most heterogeneous, are 

 thus unfortunately mingled in the same field. One farmer 

 .complains, that this principle has been so little attended to 

 on his farm, that he has ridges, one half consisting of a 

 strong wet clay, and the other half of a sandy soil, fit for 

 turnips. A spirited correspondent proposes to obviate this 

 objection, by altering the texture of the soil. He observes, 

 that there are fields, partly consisting of strong soils, and 

 partly of light, where probably there are not above one or 

 two acres of the latter, for ten or twenty of the former ; and 

 where almost every year the culmiferous crops fail on the 

 light soils from drought. He therefore suggests, that at 

 any slack time, whether in winter or summer, when the field 

 is under fallow, it would be proper to employ two carts and 

 horses, with four fillers, and to cover the acre or two of 

 light soil, with the strong soil contiguous. Draining per- 

 haps would, in the first place, be necessary ; but the soil in 

 the field would ever after be uniform. In fields where light 

 soils predominate, the same plan reversed might be adopt- 

 ed. The principal objections to this plan, are, 1. The ex- 

 pence, and 2. That the subsoil remains the same ; but the 

 idea is certainly excellent wherever it is practicable. 

 The advantages of attending, as much as the circumstan- 



