254 



American Institute — Drainage. 



Vol. XII. 



servoirs — which ooze through the superin- 

 cumbent surface, and keep it always wet. If 

 there is a descent, this water may be readily 

 got rid of by boring, by under drain, or open 

 drain. If surrounded by high ground, select 

 the lowest spring, and dig a well; the water 

 will then follow the vein and thus thorough- 

 ly drain the field. Should there be a suffi- 

 cient descent, open or close drains may be 

 made, conveying the water from the various 

 springs to the lowest part of the field, where 

 a pond may be formed, for the purposes of 

 watering cattle, supplying ice, or even fish! 

 The earth excavated, if clay, will form a 

 valuable manure for sandy land — and vice 

 versa, if sand, will render porous and fit for 

 cultivation a clay soil. It not unfrequently 

 happens that water is retained near the sur- 

 face of a field, by a clay strata of inconsider- 

 able thickness, thus rendering the soil unfer- 

 tile ; this difficulty may be overcome at a 

 small expense, by perforating the clay with 

 a subsoil plough ; the water will sink into 

 the gravel or sandy soil beneath, and escape. 

 In many fields you often find alternate por- 

 tions wet, and dry — upon examination it will 

 be found that the wet portions are clay ; and 

 the dry, sand or gravel. In this case your 

 field may be reclaimed at once, by opening a 

 drain from the wet to the dry land, which 

 will immediately absorb the moisture. 



A drain should on no account be made di- 

 rectly down a rapid descent ; lest its effici- 

 ency might be destroyed by the impetuosity 

 of the stream, and consequent collection of 

 water at the bottom, inducing an overflow, 

 and occasioning injury to the adjoining field; 

 let it descend the field diagonally, and the 

 water will naturally percolate slowly witfi 

 out forming obstructions. 



If the slope is gradual, by all means run 

 your drains in a straight line directly down 

 it, in parallel lines; as it stands to rea- 

 son where the situation admits of it, that a 

 straight line carries the water more readily 

 than a diagonal one. Main springs some- 

 times render a field unfit for agricultural 

 purposes. I have known fields that have 

 been perfectly useless to their owners for 

 years from this cause, which might have been 

 remedied in a few hours by simply opening 

 the channel of the spring; lands that have 

 been long immersed in water, may by proper 

 drainage be made to yield very large crops 

 of grass, or grain: for the reason that water 

 constantly absorbs gaseous matters from the 

 air, and carries them with it wherever it 

 goes in a solution — it is finally deposited by 

 an arrangement of nature in the earth — and 

 is constantly renewed by every succeeding 

 overflow, until the land becomes rich in these 

 impurities of the water, all of which are in 



a more or less degree indispensable to the 

 growth of plants, being of organic origin, 

 and containing not only decayed vegetable 

 matter, but frequently animal. It is only 

 necessary therefore to get rid of the super- 

 fluous water by judicious drainage, and all 

 these matters become at once capable of 

 ministering nourishment to your cultivated 

 plants. And land which in its undrained 

 state was of no use to you, becomes of ines- 

 timable value. While saturated with water 

 it is impossible for the earth to obey the laws 

 nature, |and radiate heat — as all bodies of 

 on the face of the earth should ; all warm 

 bodies throw out heat to cold bodies, as 

 nature is forever striving for an equili- 

 brium of heat. She is bountiful and yet 

 provident in all her works; she ungrudg- 

 ingly dispenses her favors to man, yet 

 never wastes; her sun shines and throws 

 ight upon all alike ; still science can assist 

 nature, and proper drainage is calculated to 

 benefit not only wet, but in many cases even 

 dry soil may be benefited by drains. I once 

 had a small piece of land which would yield 

 me no return for my labor. I ran several 

 drains through it, and ploughed it deep and 

 thoroughly; the second year after it produced 

 a heavy crop of grain. The conclusion I 

 came to was, that the soil contained substan- 

 ces injurious to vegetation; which were ren- 

 dered soluble by the rain water falling upon 

 the ground, and carried off through the 

 drains. 



Undrained lands are called cold, and just- 

 ly so, for the reason that they never derive 

 proper benefit from the sun's rays ; they give 

 off incessantly a very large quantity of vapor, 

 and with this vapor nearly all the heat they 

 may contain. It is not necessary to take my 

 word for this fact, as you may by the same 

 experiment I tried, satisfy yourselves. In 

 the summer at mid-day place a thermometer 

 in a dry field, and it will probably rise to 103 

 degrees — then in a moist undrained field, and 

 it will fall perhaps below 80 degrees. Such 

 was the case in my experiment. 



Immediately after the water is removed 

 from the land, the air at once penetrates and 

 possesses itself of all the vacant spaces; the 

 consequence is that the roots of growing 

 plants descend likewise, and find a virgin 

 ^oil, of great depth ; accumulated by con- 

 tinued washing of the rain perhaps for cen- 

 turies. It will strike you as a natural conse- 

 quence, that the deeper you make your 

 drains, the greater the depth of available 

 soil will be afforded for the purposes of ve- 

 getable growth. Wheat and clover will ex- 

 tend their roots four feet in depth, if the soil 

 will admit of it. Practical men in Europe 

 have found that the effects of draining have 



