44 
On Thoraiigh- Draining. 
I have thus endeavoured to answer the proposed questions, vi'hich are 
difficult, inasmuch as everything depends on the nature of the soil, the 
fall of the water, and various other local circumstances; but the informa- 
tion is correct as far as it goes. 
Lyng, March 14, 1843. 
Remarks on the foregoing Evidence. By Ph. Pusey. 
This body of evidence, for which I beg to thank those members 
who have furnished it, sets at rest any question as to the English 
origin of thorough-drainage ; showing that for a century it has 
been used generally in the large and well-farmed counties of 
Essex, Suffolk, and Norfolk, as well as in Hertfordshire. But it 
does more ; it gives us the power of improving other English 
counties in a cheaper and, I believe, a better manner than by the 
more modern processes of stone and tile draining used in the 
north — I mean on heavy clay lands. It is incomparably cheaper 
than either, and I think better ; because some of the evidence 
shows, and I have heard and seen, that tiles alone will sometimes 
not draw off the water upon our heavy English clays, such as are 
hardly, if at all, known in Scotland. Filling drams with broken 
stones costs 71. or 8/. per acre upon these clays, and the stone in 
many such districts is not to be found. I have tried this English 
method myself on 50 or 60 acres of extremely stiff land, which 
were drained for me last winter by the old Suffolk drillman 
Thomas Teago, whom I mentioned in the last Number. Our 
Berkshire labourers soon learned to use the Suffolk tools, which 
are excellent;* and these fields are now filled with drains at 11 
feet interval and 30 inches of depth for the very low expense of 
3/. per acre. I intend to drain the whole farm in the same way ; 
and this discovery relieves me from a great difficulty, for the farm 
would hardly find a tenant without draining; yet to go over 300 
acres of it w ith tiles would have cost at least 3000/. I must men- 
tion one item of saving in this process of the eastern counties, 
which has struck me very forcibly. I found that my drainer first 
traced out every drain with a common plough, opening the soil to 
the depth of 8 inches. He told me that he reckoned the saving of 
labour, and, consequently, of expense, effected by this simple ope- 
ration at "2d. per pole, which amounts to 21. per acre. Now 
many men have endeavoured to invent draining-ploughs, not one 
of which as yet has established its usefulness, yet here is a 
common practice of using the commonest and oldest of all im- 
plements, the plough, by which on one farm 600/. will be saved ; 
* These tools may be obtained from Mr. Teago of Peasenhall, Suffolk. 
