No. 144.J 519 



Draining on clay land may be executed more economically per 

 rod than on any other kind of soil, on account of its firmness. 

 Draining wet and gravelly lands, or clays mixed with sand, is 

 more expensive, as the sides cave, which requires the removal of 

 more earth. Stony and rocky lands are more expensive still, as 

 it is necessary to use pick and bar. 



On a loam soil drained four feet deep, with a clay subsoil, the 

 upper ten inches plowed, one man will dig 3^ rods per day, in 

 which time he will throw out ten cubic yards of soil. When 

 drains are made four feet deep, they should range from twenty to 

 thirty feet apart. It sometimes occurs that the water drained 

 from one portion of land may be made to irrigate another. This, 

 to a certain extent, has occurred on my farm ; the water from a 

 thirty acre underdrained field is concentrated, and carried along 

 the upper margin of a ten acre lot on a lower level, gradually de- 

 scending to the Hudson river in an open drain, from which the 

 whole field at certain periods is completely covered with a sheet 

 of water, holding in suspension the soluble parts of the land, more 

 or less manure, and other fertilizing properties. The grass pro- 

 duced by this process is exceedingly luxuriant, and affords am- 

 ple pasturage, by occasionally removing the stock, and irrigating, 

 for ten head of milch cows, from spring to fall. 



Prof. Mapes — As the prices of land advance, the restoration of 

 the swamps and lowlands becomes important. Thousands of acres 

 within ten miles of the eity of New-York remain unimproved, 

 but entirely susceptible of being rendered good garden soils, bj 

 merely supplying the conditions necessary to secure the decay of 

 the organized matters they contain. The great Newark meadow, 

 and its continuation through all the valley of the Passaic, the 

 Raritan meadow, and many others are of this description. Indeed, 

 this very muck, when decomposed in barn-yards and compost 

 heaps, becomes good manure for many upland farms, while iti 

 drainage and amendment in place ensures a most fertile soil. Th« 

 operations of Mtssrs Gustin & Co., on the Newark meadow, go to 

 establish this fact beyond dispute. This firm have dug ditches 

 through the meadow, embracing and intersecting one hundred or 



