3 11 On the Ayricultiiral Improvements of Liiwolnsldrc. 
turned alono; the wild land, and thus, for 21. or 3/. an acre, the 
\\()rthless slope would be converted into catch- meadow, which 
elsewhere would be worth 60s., and even in that secluded spot, 
40s. an acre : so that the value of this farm might be raised, for 
300/., from 75Z. to '250Z. yearly. This is a farmer's plan, and a 
moderate estimate. There are several practices of English farmers 
changing the nature of land at a moderate cost — transformations of 
soil, which I have brought before the Society; the application of 
chalk ; the use of marl on sand, which was the foundation of the 
improvements of Holkham ; the use of clay upon peat in the 
fens, which makes hollow land close and good ; there is the 
old English practice of thorough draining, on which all are 
agreed ; but no discovery has surprised me so much as the mar- 
vellous effect of hill-side irrigation — for while under-draining, 
after great labour, may add 10s. to the value of an acre, in West 
Somerset a mere rill is made to produce on the barren flank of 
a moor more abundant herbage than the old grazing land of 
Northamptonshire yields. The method seemed to me capable 
of wide application, as it requires but trifling outlay, a rapid 
stream untainted with peat, or even a bog capable of drainage, 
and moderately sloping ground, however poor. There is no doubt 
that it might be widely extended in its native district round 
Exmoor, and I should think also in Wales. There are many 
tracts in the north of England, and I have seen many valleys in 
Scotland, which, if they were in Somersetshire, 1 could not doubt 
would be covered with catch-meadows ; but the climate of the 
north may counteract irrigation. I have not seen it farther north 
than at Teddeslcy in Staffordshire, where 80 acres of catch- 
meadow have been formed for 224Z., or about .^Os. an acre, and 
40s. added thereby to the yearly value, a return on the outlay of 
80 per cent. This place embodies all the principles of moorland 
improvement. When Lord Hatherton came to reside there in 
18'iO, his house was surrounded by heaths and by alder-bogs. Of 
these he has under- drained 500 acres, at the moderate expense of 
about 3/. an acre, and upon them are fine swedes and clean wheat- 
stubbles. All the water thus tapped from these bogs is conducted 
to the farm-yard, where it turns a wheel which threshes the corn 
and does the other work of the barn. Thence this subterraneous 
water issues forth in a full stream, and finally, divided into slender 
rivulets, spreads verdure over the catch-meadows, carrying with it 
the liquid manure from more than a hundred beasts kept in the yard 
summer and winter. The beauty' of this arrangement, which re- 
sembles the complicated functions of an animal body, is as striking 
as the practical benefit of changing a morass into a sound corn and 
stock farm, for the farm of 1250 acres carries 1.500 sheep, besides 
more than 200 head of cattle. I know of no farm which offers so 
