Continuous Corn Groiviiifj. 
41 
3-ft. lands, the miserable crops were often starved. At interval* 
of 33 vds. 2-in. pipes were laid at the depth of 3^ feet ; in the 
lower portions of the longer drains 3-in. pipes were placed ; the 
pipes in the furrows empty into 4 or G-in. mains which collect 
the drainage of 10 or 12 acres, and discharge into dykes or 
ditches 6 or 7 ft. deep, which intersect the symmetrical fields 
and conduct the surplus water into a tributary of the Lea. 
About 70 acres were drained, at 14 ft. intervals and 28 in. depth, 
by the steam mole-ploughs of Mr. Eddington, of Chelmsford ; this 
cost 355. per acre, with hs. extra for digging and laying the 
mains by hand labour. But most of this land, thus steam-mole 
drained, has since required to be dried in the ordinary way 
with pipes. Fifteen acres were drained to the depth of 4 ft., but 
as the argillaceous substratum is cut through and the yellow clay 
reached at 3A^ ft. there appears no good reason for deeper and more 
expensive draining. ISo difference is observable in the dryness 
of the fields drained at 3^ and 4 ft., nor has repeated obser- 
vation discovered any difference in the outflow of water from 
the same acreage drained at these two depths. The dykes, 6 to 
7 ft. deep, and wide in proportion, present rather a formidable 
obstruction during the hunting season, but effectually separate 
the twenty enclosures into which the farm is now divided. 
Convinced of the economy of steam for the working of heavy- 
land, -Mr. Prout at once obtained, from Messrs. John Fowler 
and Co., of Leeds, a 14-horse-power engine with clip-drum, 
anchor, and 400 yards of rope for 1065/. This tackle, the best 
that was then procurable, has been Aery effective, is still in 
admirable order, and enables him to get through his work with 
six or seven horses. Even during earlier years ten horses 
sufficed to perform the farm work as well as the haulage of 
draining-pipes, road materials, and other extra duties. The 
steam cultivation at Sawbridge worth has already been described 
in the Society's ' Journal,' Second Series, vol. iii. p. 121. The im- 
portance of the service, so economically rendered by the steam- 
tackle, may also be gathered from the subjoined tabular state- 
ment, extracted for une from his books by Mr. William Prout. 
This Table (p. 42) indicates the reiterated operations which 
were at first essential to clean the foul land. But instead of 
the two or three ploughings and a scarifying at first requisite, 
one operation, generally a ploughing G or 7 inches deep, now 
suffices to ensure a good and clean seed-bed. The whole of 
the farm has been subsoiled 15 or 16 inches deep, but an- 
other such subsoiling will probably shortly be undertaken. So 
effectually did the steam-tackle disintegrate the formerly sour 
stiff" clay, and admit frost, air, and sun, that for a few years 
full crops throve with little extra manuring, and even consecu- 
