518 
of improving the breed of stock; and in doing this to large assem- 
blages of farmers at the annual sheep-shearing at Woburn, he anti- 
cipated by more than a quarter of a century the universal feeling 
that has recently given birth to the Royal Agricultural Soeiety of 
England, and proclaimed to the nation the necessity of applying the 
discoveries of science to the improvement of agriculture. 
His Grace was also an extensive planter, and well aware of the 
advantages of scientific management of woods and forests; a matter 
too much neglected in this country, but which forms the subject of 
special education in almost all the other states of Europe. 
In relation to Geology, His Grace had studied with more profit 
than usually attends the speculative consideration of such subjects, 
the effects of actual causes in filling up estuaries and marshes, and 
gradually converting them into valuable land; and by the artificial 
process of warping and silting to preserve and fix the tidal sedi- 
ments, he co-operated with nature in this effective process of 
transmuting swamps and shallow lakes into the most fertile corn- - 
fields and verdant meadows. The excavations that came under his 
review in the operations of deep draining in the fens, called his 
attention also to the phenomena of bog timber and peat, which seem 
frequently to have grown in situations below the high-water level 
of the sea; and he had formed just and lucid theoretical views as 
to the difficult problem of the causes and conditions which ‘could 
admit of the growth of peat mosses and forest timber in such si- 
tuations. j 
The most important of the great works of drainage undertaken 
by the late Duke of Bedford was that called the Nene outfall drain- 
age; it consisted of a new tidal channel for the river Nene, about 
seven miles long, commencing six miles below the town of Wis- 
beach, and terminating in the sea. The engineers employed in this 
great operation were the late Mr. Rennie, Mr. Telford and Sir John 
Rennie. The difficulty of the operation consisted in its being cut 
through light incoherent sand, liable to be moved by the flux and 
reflux of the tide. The new channel was dug to nearly half the 
depth required (about eleven feet), when the old course of the 
Nene was dammed up, and its waters being turned into the new 
_channel, in a few weeks deepened it eleven feet more, with an in- 
clination of about four inches per mile, precisely as the engineers 
desired and had anticipated. The bottom of this channel is from 
80 to 100 feet wide, and its surface at high water from 200 to 300 
feet. The object of this measure was to turn the course of the 
Nene from the shallow and shifting sands of its natural estuary in 
Cross Keys Wash ; and to improve at the same time the navigation 
of the Nene, the drainage of the district, and the communication 
between the counties of Norfolk and Lincoln. By its successful 
execution the surface of the river at low water has been reduced 
nearly eleven feet, thus producing an outfall sufficient for the per- 
fect drainage of a most valuable tract of fens; ships of 400) tons 
have taken the place of shallow barges in the Nene;' the trade of 
Wisbeach has been increased from 50,000 to nearly 120,000 tons 
