XV 

 THE MAKING OF NEW LAND 



THE corduroy farming did not exhaust all that the 

 Isle of Axholme had to show of interest, for in the 

 low country by which it is surrounded there is some 

 extremely fine capitalist farming on what is called the 

 warp land. 



After leaving the common fields on the sandstone 

 ridge, we found ourselves in a region of straightened 

 river courses and drainage channels like the Fens, 

 mostly below high-water mark and covered with a 

 deep silty soil similar to that occurring between 

 Wisbech and Boston. This is classic ground in the 

 history of embankments and drainage, for here 

 Cornelius Vermuyden was at work in the time of 

 Charles I., and here, when authority was relaxed 

 during and after the Civil War, the angry marshmen 

 rose and destroyed pumps and sluices, letting in the 

 tidal waters until the haunts of the wild-fowl were 

 re-established. It required repeated efforts and the 

 ruin of many adventurers before the land was finally 

 won from the sea ; only within the last half-century by 

 the aid of steam and of the centrifugal pump has it 

 been possible to unwater the land regularly and with 

 certainty. The memory of Vermuyden is preserved 

 in the name of the Dutchman's Drain carried by a 

 large channel to the north of Epworth, but drainage 



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