Farming of Lincolnshire. 



319 



containing probably about 9000 acres. The chief natural water- 

 course is the river Eau, descending- from the Chff and other high 

 land bv Corringham, Scotter, &c., to the Trent near Butterwick. 

 The drainage is chiefly a natural one by means of numerous 

 drains emptying by sluices into the river at low tide. From 

 Butterwick to Trent Fall the river ebbs sufficiently low to allow 

 the drains to discharge their water without artificial aid^ but this 

 is in consequence of the soil having been warped to a consider- 

 able height, and thus elevated above the level of the Trent v. aters. 

 The drainage is generally good^ but there are extensive tracts 

 that have not been raised sufficiently high to be out of the reach 

 of floods, and the southern part of the district possesses 2 steam- 

 engines for lifting the water. In the angle of the Trent, imme- 

 diately north of Gainsborough, is a district of about 2600 acres, 

 called Morton Carr, originally a very low and worthless tract of 

 common, but now warped and drained. At the close of last 

 century the work of improvement was begun ; catch-water drains 

 were constructed under the high lands which surrounded and 

 divided the Carr, and warping-drains were excavated across it. 

 The lower grounds had only a 2-feet fall to low-water mark in 

 the Trent at Ravensfleet ; but the land was warped up several 

 feet by artificially directing the muddy overflows of the river. 

 This land, lying in the townships of Morton, Walkerith, East 

 Stockwith, Blyton, Wharton, Pilham, and Gilby, was enclosed 

 and drained under an Act passed in 1801, but the drainage 

 being defective, a recent Act was obtained a few years ago, and 

 a powerful steam-engine was erected to assist the discharge of 

 the water. 



The river Trent bounds the western side of the county, from 

 Newton to Stockwith, by a tortuous course of 20 miles, and then 

 enters the county, dividing the district last noticed from the Isle 

 of Axholme for a similar distance, until it unites with the Ous£ 

 and flows onward into the H umber. This broad stream, 

 bringing the floods from the counties of Nottingham, Leicester, 

 Derby, Warwick, and Stafford, receives the river Idle at Stock- 

 with, and afterwards the drains from the low lands of Yorkshire, 

 and carries away the waters from about 80,000 acres of the lias 

 valley and the hills eastward, and from about 50,000 acres 

 forming the Isle of Axholme westward. This district consists 

 of about 30,000 acres of low land surrounding about 20,000 

 acres of uplands, which rise like islands out of the broad hori- 

 zontal plain ; being the Lincolnshire division of an immense 

 breadth of flat land lying in the three counties of Lincoln, Not- 

 tingham, and York. 



The history of the drainage of this level is remarkably inte- 

 resting, both to the engineer and agriculturist ; but there is not 



