40 
Agriculture of Nottinghamshire. 
in the Society's Journal, part iv., vol. i., for 1840, renders unne- 
cessary our saying more of them here than to mention shortly the 
leading facts as given by him. 
These meadows comprise an area of upwards of 300 acres of 
land, extending over a distance of about 7 miles in length. They 
are watered by the river Maun, as it flows eastward from the town 
of Mansfield. The value of the land has been raised from the 
annual sum of 80Z. to that of 3660/., at a cost (from their com- 
mencement in 1816 to their completion in 1837) of 40,0007. 
The profit upon each acre, after defraying all expenses, is com- 
puted at nearly 12Z. a-year, without taking into consideration the 
great benefit they are to the arable land adjoining them, which, 
in the words of Mr. Denison, they " enrich to an extent of five 
times that of their own." 
Stretching through a dry sandy district for so long a distance, 
and thus fertilizing increasingly land so dependent on foreign aid, 
must show at a glance their almost incalculable value. As a 
triumph of art they must be considered one of the most brilliant 
and complete of any that is known, reflecting credit equally on 
the talents of the noble owner as projector, and on the intelligence 
of Mr. Tebbet as executor of the works ; nor are they unworthy of 
comparison even with those of a Bridgevvater and a Brindley. 
The Cars. 
Allusion has already been made to a district of land situated in 
the extreme northern part of the county, comprising an area of 
about 6000 acres of reclaimed bog- land, a small portion of what 
was formerly designated the " Level of Hatfield Chase," once a 
vast morass of upwards of 65,000 acres, which extended, in a 
northerly direction, as far as Hatfield and Thorne in Yorkshire. 
The first attempt to drain this extensive waste was made by Dutch 
settlers, of whom the principal was Sir Cornelius Vermuyden, 
about the middle of the seventeenth century. These enterj)rising 
men effected in some measure the object they attempted, for which 
they received ample compensation by becoming proprietors of 
a portion, and that not an inconsiderable one, of the land they 
had reclaimed. The difficulties, however, of effecting a perfect 
drainage were of no ordinary character, from the largeness of the 
tract of land, all lying on a dead level ; the soil being moreover 
highly porous — a dark peat of spongy quality ; and surrounded on 
two sides by the rivers Trent and Ouse, which were at tiiat time 
liable constantly to overflow their banks, and so inundate this vast 
swamp. The very banks that were raised for its security were of 
the same trembling bog, and consequently little likely to resist the 
fearful floods which at that time not unfrequently descended these 
large rivers. 
