9.—1846.] THE 
AGRICULTURAL 
GAZETTE. CRM 
PD i. Purser, Secretary. 
HEAT MANURE now ready for delivery. ^ — 
LIQUID MANURE. 
ENGLAND INDEPENDENT OF THE WORLD FOR CORN. 
The Agricultural Gazette, 
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 1846. 
MEETINGS FOR THE TWO FOLLOWING WEEKS. 
d. 
x Mar. r 
Wxowusnav, Mar. 4| ig tural Society. 
TnunsnY,  — _5—Agri f Ireland, 
Weaowuspav, — 11—Agricultural Society of England. 
Tuunspay, ,— 13—Agricultural Imp. Sov. of Ireland, 
LOCAL SOCIETIES. 
P: Banffshire—-Vale of Alford—Holdi 
FARMERS’ CLUBS, 
Mar, 2-Moreton Hampstead — Dar: | Mar, 2—Wenlock—Great Oakley 
igton—St. Columb — New- — 10—Sr, "s - Wooten is! 
ark—Markethill— Banchory RODA HUBER EN 
- 3— Abergavenny Watford Rochford Hundred—Fram- 
ur, i 
lingham — Ardleigh — Dork- 
ng 
— 4-Monmo — ll—Braintree and Bocking — 
— 5—Hawick Harleston 
— 6—Lichfield — St. Austell — | — 12—Blofield and Walsham — 
Claydon —Wakefield — Had- Richmondshire — Grove 
leigh—Debenham erry 
— 7—Northampton — Melrose — | — 18—Northallerton—Tavistock— 
nhan Cal T Se G MA carara 
~Cardiff—Collum ton. Halesworth—W adebridge 
- 9—Selby—Exminster—Yoxford — 14—Dartford — Probus —W inch- 
—Cirencester—W. Market comb—Swansea 
We have to add, in reference to our remarks last 
week on the AGRICULTURAL Cornrzcr, that we find 
the opening has been deferred until after Lady-day, 
latio: 
even were it not more rapidly hastened by. the 
cracking produced towards the close of summer, 
when even capillary attraction has lost its last sup- 
ply, and the contraction of bulk occasions separa- 
tion into parts. However long we may have to 
wait for the completion of these processes, of this 
we may be sure, that we have nature on our side, 
from the moment the drain has been effectively laid. 
The effect may be slow, but the cause is in certain 
aud perpetual operation. But we merely allude 
here to this physical Jaw, as giving effect to the 
other hydrostatic principle of perpendicular descent, 
which would, of course, be inoperative without it. 
The tendency of a fluid to descend is of course 
equally strong in a basin as in a filter, though the 
one holds it and the other transmits it. Our object 
is to explain that a clay subsoil, which before acted 
like the first, is when undermined by deep drains 
likened to the second. 
The whole principle of deep drainage, in its mere 
mechanical relation to the soil, depends upon the 
downward pressure of water; a power so strong, 
that it has been put into use, in the hydraulic press 
for instance, as one of the most irresistible of natural 
forces; a small tube of moderate height, charged 
with fluid, will in virtue of this power, burst the 
stoutest cask, if inserted into a well-secured aper- 
ture ; and so equable and searching is the pressure 
of fluid-weight, that it has already been applied in 
the arts,wherever great force, continuous action, and 
perfect equability in its application, is particularly 
desired, as in the proving of gun-barreis, the testing 
of cast-iron beams and other purposes where the 
general stoutness of material affords no security 
against the weakness of its weakest parts. 
~ Now anybody who has carefully and personally 
examined the character of the very stiffest clays, 
will not fail to have observed that, like ourselves, 
they have their weak points ; here there is a natural 
crack, there a “sand-pot ;” here again a bit of im- 
bedded gravel, there a vein or cleavage filled with 
lighter soil of some description ; that in fact, how- 
ever obdurate in general character, perfect contin- 
uity of texture is never to be met with. So long 
as these ts, so to call them, have no vent 
and we are informed that it is in the 
of the Council to complete the wing of the building, 
soas to accommodate 200 students, as originally 
proposed ; for it appears doubtful whether, with a 
less number, the establishment can be kept in a state 
of full efficiency at the low charge for each of 307. 
per annum, which the Council is anxious not to ex- 
ceed. It appears, too, that additional capital will 
be required for this purpose, and those who wish 
well to the College, and have not yet lent their aid, 
thus still have an opportunity of doing so, and 
thereby extending the sphere of its usefulness. 
Tue object of all art is the imitation of nature: 
to exceed, or even reach in every case the perfec- 
tion of the pattern, is impossible, but the more 
closely it is kept in view, and the more nearly it is 
attained, the more perfect the performance will be, 
and the more exactly will our own ends be answered. 
Any departure from the principles suggested in the 
examples set before us by nature, through a hasty 
desire to arrive at the object by a nearer road, de- 
feats the intended purpose. Sumarrow DRAINAGE 
offers many evidences of this. The gravitating 
tendency of water is perpendicular, and the more it 
is made to deviate from this course, the weaker the 
effort of escape becomes, and the slower the motion 
of. the fluid, consequently a deep drain will fill 
quieker than a shallow one, provided the superstra- 
tum of soil be sufficiently porous to yield a passage 
to the moisture. But this it will do more and more 
readily every year, after the drain is once laid, let 
the clay have been ever so obstinate at first. The 
difficulty of making drainers believe this, occasions 
such a perpetual conflict between them and their 
apo euch a perpetual tendency on their part 
lo ay their drains shallower, that unless their em- 
SE be very strongly convinced of the truth of 
b uenis he wishes to carry out, the wearing 
m [E pne. opposition of his * practical” 
OM pearl y the tempting cheapness of a shal- 
On DE rcd will prevail. It is importont to be 
Aon of sh sent this: but, happily, the delu- 
RADO W drains is passing away ; with many 
othe’ a OW things that assumed, in agriculture, 
the garb of “practice” and “experience,” and at- 
tempted to set up an antagonism between scientific 
truth and practical expedience, as if what was true 
in the closet could be false in the field. 
Every substance capable of absorbing water is 
capable of transmitting it. If, on digging up.clay, 
we find it damp, we may be quite sure that if under- 
mined, and pressed upon by moisture from above, 
the capillary sustension being overborne, it will 
begin to weep from below, and every drop that falls 
wears a wider passage for the next, so that time 
only would be wanting to increase the porosity, 
underneath, ‘they remain comparatively inactive ; 
but once undermine the field by deep drains, and 
their valuable office begins to show itself The 
subsoil which before held up the surface-water like 
a basin, now begins to transmit it like a filter; every 
succeeding summer increases the number of cracks, 
as the drying clay gives way to the contracting 
tendency, and surrenders that continuity of texture 
which depended upon the imprisonment of its 
moisture. Where one drop of water descends and 
escapes, another must follow it, till the last be gone, 
drawing the air after it. From the moment the 
system of regeneration commences—to use the for- 
midable words. of the chemist—the protovide 
begins to be converted into the peroxide ; 
that is, slightly oxygenated earth, which repels 
vegetation, changes gradually by contact with at- 
mospheric air into the highly oxygenated earth, 
which favours vegetation ; and the roots of plants, 
which formerly turned up like fish-hooks on coming 
in contact with the subsvil, now plunge boldly into 
it, and add, by their eventual decay, to its vegetable 
character. 
The student in hydrostatic science is astonished 
at the surprise with which a writer in the “ Journal 
of the Royal Agricultural Society” tells us that 
his 4-foot drains drew off the water in half the 
time that his 8-fvet drains used to do. It would 
be a marvel to him, contradictory to every known 
principle, in the laws of fluids, if it were otherwise. 
The deeper the drain, the more irresistible the 
pressure of the water towards it, and the more 
rapid the escape. A simple experiment will illus- 
trate this. Let a gun-barrel be filled with water 
and held vertically, allowing the fluid to escape at 
the nipple. The column of water will drive the 
fluid cut with a force increasing rapidly with the 
distance from the point of escape to the mouth of 
the barrel; as the column decreases in depth, the 
force and rapidity of the stream will diminish also ; 
till at last the fluid, instead ofbeing projected several 
yards, merely escapes in drops. It is upon the 
same principle that a deep drain acts with more 
energy than a shallow one, exemplifying one of the. 
soundest maxims of agricultural science—that 1 
you drain the subsoil, the soil will drain itself. 
It is a mere error to suppose that there is any- 
thing in the constitution or in the natural history 
of the most stubborn clay, of any description or 
locality whatsoever, which can long resist the ope- 
ration of this principle. Every workman that. ever 
handled a draining tool knows that it is easier to 
cut drains in winter than in summer, because in 
winter the clay is wet, thereby showing that it has 
been penetrated by the surface moisture. Herein 
If the water can make its way into it, it 
can make its way through it.. Givé it a 
channel of escape underneath, and every pore 
by which the d ling fluid i itted, how- 
ever slowly at first, becomes worn and “widened, 
year after year, by the perpetual attrition of the 
tiny,thread-like stream that once has found its vent. 
The observer of Nature will find that every effort 
to imitate the principles on which her operations 
are conducted, receives adventitious and unex- 
pected aid at her hands, greater in proportion to 
the fidelity with which the pattern is followed out. 
We remarked, in a former Paper, that in soils which 
drain naturally, the descent of the water is perpen- 
dicular. It is obvious, however, that, in laying 
shallow drains, we lose sight of the pattern, and 
attempt to create a more lateral and horizontal 
flow of the moisture, saturating the soil near the 
drain by the lateral pressure, sluggish as it is, of 
the rain that fell further off, towards the crown of 
the ridge ; a tardy escape, and an unequal distri- 
bution of the moisture, is the pernicious conse- 
quence. But he who has the acuteness to perceive, 
and the boldness to follow closely, the true pattern 
exhibited in naturally free subsoils, puts himself at 
once within the protection of the hydrostatic law 
above explained ; and, while deriving an unforeseen 
assistance, learns an instructive and profitable 
lesson in. the consistency and convergence of the 
laws of Nature that work together for good, how- 
ever apparently unconnected. He who would bring 
up the pearl must keep his eyes open and dive deep. 
What we have hitherto said, applies only to the 
mechanical principles of drainage; the far more 
important investigation of it, in a chemical point of 
view, we must postpone for further remark.— 
925 
DEEP DRAINING. 
I wave read with interest the communication on 
draining, by Mr. Mechi, in your Number for 7th of 
ebruary, and beg to offer some remarks suggested by 
its perusal. 
I am quite satisfied, from actual experiment, that 
rain-water will get to the bottom of 4 or 5 feet drains, 
though formed merely by tiles or pipes, in the manner 
described in the article referred to; and the familiar 
instances there adduced to show the difficulty of keep- 
ing water out of places which it is necessary to have 
dry, might well convince objectors of the propriety of 
keeping silence until they have put the matter to the 
test for themselves. 
But there is a very important element in the ease, 
which has been much looked in such di i 
viz. that by deepening the drains you increase the 
capacity of the soil to retain moisture beneficially. 
Strong undrained soil is saturated by a comparatively 
small quantity of rain ; and whatever more falls upon 
it while in that state must run off from the surface, or 
stagnate upon it; whereas if drained the surplus water 
is not only got rid of below, but the whole depth, from. 
the surface to nearly the level of the bottom of the 
drain, has acquired the capacity of keeping in store just 
so much as it needed for the benefit of the crop upon 
it. A eask tapped at the bottom is a very good illus- 
tration of the effect of a drain, so far as it goes ; but a 
cask or other vessel filled with sponge, and tapped at the 
bottom, affords a better. If water is poured into such 
a vessel, it is obvious that none can escape below, until 
the sponge has drunk its fill; but if you continue pour- 
ing on the top the surplus will begin to escape by the tap 
in the same proportion. It is on this principle that land 
thoroughly drained, and deeply ploughed, stands drought 
better than any other: it has not merely been furnished 
with the means of ridding itself of surplus water, and 
so of protecting its erop from drowning ; it has acquired 
also the power of retaining in itself a supply against a 
time of drought, and so of preventing its perishing of 
thirst. By treating soil in this way it is found that 
plants grown upon it send down their roots without fear, 
and are greatly less at the mercy of the vicissitudes 
of the season. It follows as another consequence of 
this, that tiles or pipes of small bore may more 
safely be used in deep than in shallow drains: 
for a shallow drain must pass the water nearly as fast as 
it falls ; whereas, it is a good while before a deep one 
gets anything to do at all; and under continued rain 
the small pipe, owing to the help which it gets from the 
great depth of porous matter lying above it, is able to 
dispose of an amount of water which would swamp it 
altogether, if it lay nearer the surface. I do not, how- 
ever, recommend the use of such very small pipes ; for 
when all the other items of expense remain the same, it 
seems a pity for the sake of 6s. or 8s. per acre to risk 
the efficieney of such a costly operation. A field can- 
not be said to be thoroughly drained until provision has 
been made for carrying off all the rain that falls upon it 
by the drains, and without any running on tbe surface. 
Now, let any one look at the quantity of water running 
in the furrows of a close bottomed field during a heavy 
rain, and he will see that in order to get it all passed off 
in one-ineh pipes, the drains must either be very near 
each other, or else made much deeper than usual. I 
have already given reasons to prove that the latter 
alternative will suffice ; but if any one question it, let 
him visit during a heavy rain any undrained field lying 
lies the whole (mechanical) principle of drainage. |on a really open subsoil, and he will find nearly the 
