HISTORY OF STAFFORDSHIRE. [65 



Pigeon's or fowFs dung is a good top-dressing for grass, turnips, 

 or any other crop, to be sown on by hand. To increase the quantity, 

 strew malt-dust over the floor every time the dove-house or. hen- 

 roost is cleared, and keep this compost in a dry place till used. 

 Before sowing it, it should be turned over and well mixed : enough 

 of this has been collected upon a farm in one year to top-dress ten 

 acres equal to a dressing of other manure. 



Bone or horn-shavings from Birmingham, is esteemed a good 

 manure for light tillage land, as is ground bones and chopped rags. 



Manuring Waste Land.Some persons have contended that 

 wasteland can only be improved by robbing the land already in 

 tillage of part of its manure ; but waste land ought to be improved 

 from its own resources, or foreign aids, as from paring and burn- 

 ing, lime and marl, with clean fallowing, turnips, clover, sheep, 

 and other stock, with the manure they make from the product of 

 the land in question, without robbing the old inclosed laud. 



Embankments. Connected with the improvement of our valleys 

 and low land, is the embanking them from external waters, to 

 secure them from the damage, depredation, and ruin, that may be 

 caused by inundation. The water of many rivers and brooks is 

 liable to overflow its banks after excessive rains, and if this happen* 

 in summer, when mowing grass is growing on the land, such grass 

 becomes greatly injured^ Vy being fouled with mud, sand, and ex- 

 traneous matter ; it is~ difficult to mow, and of little value for hay 

 when mown. If such flood occur in hay harvest, as is sometimes 

 the case, the damage is still greater; the hay is sometimes totally 

 ruiped, or floated away. In some valleys of rich meadow land, this 

 misfortune is expected once in three years upon an average; in 

 others, the meadows are always grazed as the safest way. 



It is very certain that such meadows may in most, or all cases, be 

 secured from floods by embankments, and at the same time greatly 

 improved by drainage, and by watering or not at pleasure. If the 

 business were taken up in a general way, embankments should be 

 raised parallel to the river or brook at a proper distance from it on 

 either side, and carried up the collateral streams to the same level ; 

 these embankments to be formed of materials dug out of drains on 

 their outside, such drains to be continued by culvers under the col- 

 lateral streams, which would at all times drain the land. The dis- 

 tance between the embankments and their height must be propor- 

 tioned to the swell of water, or flood, that it is proposed to guard 

 against. The land between the embankments would be subject to 



