nOW TO GROW GOOD GRASSES. 87 



CHAPTER XIII. 



ON THE IRRIGATED MEADOW. 



Irrigation, as a means of increasing the amount 

 of pasturage, is so important a process that it 

 may be well to describe it in this place. 



Por a perfect irrigated meadow, we should have 

 full command of water whenever it may be required. 

 This water should be capable of flowing through, not 

 of pouring over, and standing on the land, — this 

 latter being flooding. The drainage should be so 

 perfect that the land will be sound enough for us to 

 walk over in the dry in a few hours after the water 

 has been turned off. 



"Where these conditions can be secured, irrigation 

 will be found most useful, not only in augmenting 

 the supply of grass, but in producing it so much 

 earlier than in the higher meadows that the farmer 

 hereby gets a fresh green pasture, of great utility, 

 especially in fattening and bringing on early lambs. 

 Prom these circumstances it follows, that although 

 some land is occupied in the w T ater-conduits, yet the 

 value is so far increased that meadow at 30-s. per 

 acre before irrigation has, under one's own eye, 

 become worth £5 per acre in four years. There are, 

 however, some necessary expenses in setting out the 

 work, making floodgates, &c, the extent of which 

 will of course depend upon the nature of the ground. 

 In Gloucestershire, on the banks of the Churn, where 



