W E S T P O R T. 359 



An income of 480I. is created without ex- 

 penfe. This for a landlord : if hired at 2s. an 

 acre, the account will be the fame, except the 

 deduction of that for rent. I forgot to obferve, 

 that when the heath dies, which it does in 

 three years, then dairies appear, and white 

 clover, which are llgns that the land is fit for 

 culture. There is fomething very extraordinary 

 in this circumftance, that laying on a powerful 

 manure for cultivated vegetables, mould prove 

 poifon to the fpontaneous growth. * It is only 

 to be accounted for by fuppofing that the heath 

 is nouriihed by an acid in the foil, which being; 

 neutralized by the alcali, is no longer the food 

 of that plant, after w r hich it dies for want of 

 its ufual fupport. It is very remarkable, that 

 all the wild mountains in this country have 

 marks, and to a great height of former cul- 

 ture, mounds of fences, and the ridges of the 

 plough. Lord Altamont's great grandfather 

 found the eftate a continued foreft ; in 1650, 

 thofe woods were of much more than a century 

 growth, fo that no cultivation could have been 

 here probably of 300 years. There is a tradi- 

 tion in the country that it was depopulated by 

 the plague, and upon that the wood fprung up 

 which formed thofe forelts. At prefent there 

 is no wood on any of the hills, except imme- 

 diately about Weftport. 



I obferved, befides this great range of moun- 

 tain improvement, that Lord Altamont profe- 

 cutes various parts of hufbandry with much 

 fpirit. He has been at great expenfes in intro- 

 ducing 



