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XXIV. Description of a Pine Pit. In a Letter to the Se- 

 cretary. By Mr. Thomas Scott, Gardener to William 

 Leader, Esq. F. H. S. 



Read July 2, 1822. 



Sir, 



I have sent you plans and elevations of the Pine Pit which 

 has been built for Mr. Leader under my direction, and which 

 has completely answered every expectation I had formed of 

 it, both in bringing the fruit of the Pine Apple to perfection, 

 and in saving fuel to a considerable extent. 



While I lived at the Earl of Besborough's, at Roehamp- 

 ton, I fruited from a hundred to a hundred and twenty plants 

 in houses which consumed about twelve chaldrons of coals ; 

 the Pit I have sent you the drawing of will fruit the same 

 number of plants with, at most, from three to four chaldrons. 



Behind the back wall of the Pit there is a cavity for the 

 reception of hot dung, fresh from the stable, and there 

 are holes in the wall, to admit the heat from the dung into 

 the pit. When the weather is dry, and a moist heat is re- 

 quired, I turn the dung once a week, but if the weather be 

 wet, I use the fire, and let the dung lie undisturbed, so that 

 I have either a damp or dry heat, at pleasure. I consider that 

 no expense is caused by the use of the dung in this way, be- 

 cause, after being turned two or three times, it answers the 

 same purpose, as it would after having been thrown up in 

 heaps to sweeten it for Cucumber or Melon beds. The 



