CO] A TOPOGRAPHICAL 



and west parts are a good light soil, fit for turnips and barley ; the* 

 east and south parts are a colder gravelly soil, in many places 

 covered with heath (erica), to a great extent, but the whole capable 

 of improvement and cultivation. 



Whittington-heath is a considerable tract of good sound land, and 

 inany similar ones lie in different parts of the county ; but the 

 most extensive wastes> besides those above-named, are in the north 

 of the county, and in the Moorlands. Some of them are but cold 

 barren spots, but they are all capable of being improved, and applied 

 to useful purposes, either for tillage, grass land> or plantation. 

 Waste land in general is thus best reclaimed: 1. Pare and burn, 

 spread the ashes directly, and plant potatoes ; 2. oats ; 3. lime 

 well, and make a clean turnip fallow ; 4. barley, or spring wheat, 

 with plenty of seeds ; but draining must be the first operation, if 

 necessary. 



Improvement of Heath Lane?. Waste lands are admirably 

 adapted to the growth of potatoes. " The east side of Dilhorn- 

 heath was cultivated with potatoes, after the heath and gorse 

 had rotted, and been mixed with lime and compost ; the crop of 

 potatoes was so abundant as to admit of many waggon-loads 

 being sent in the winter into the vicinity of the Pottery, about six 

 miles from Dilhorn, which afforded a seasonable supply to many 

 thousand manufacturers. The quantity was not only immense, 

 but the quality of the potatoes was in so high repute, that the 

 Dilhorn potatoes produced two-pence per bushel above the common 

 market price. In this part of the Moorlands the potatoe harvest is 

 of great consideration, and the 30,000 artificers and yeomanry there 

 eat less wheaten bread than in most other places with the same 

 numbers. Give a cottager in the Moorlands, with a wife and large 

 family, a cow, and a few roods of potatoe-ground, and you make 

 him a happy man ; he goes to his daily labour, earns money to 

 purchase clothing, &c. for his large family, the younger children 

 collect the dung and soil from the public roads for the improvement 

 of the potatoes-ground, and the industrious dame, with her stouter 

 children, keep the ground clean, and assist to get in the_ potatoe 

 harvest, the chief support of their family about nine months in the 

 year." A pig might be added, to eat up the offal, which> when 

 fat, would add to the general plenty. 



Many instances have occurred of great success in raising pota- 

 toes on waste land, but the shortest way is first to pare and burn. 

 Two day-labourers gave a guinea for an acre of waste land to plant 



