114 
On the Improvement of Cold and Heavy Soils. 
to, and I immediately began with the scuffle and drag to work 
the clods of couch and wiry turf to the surface, which, with 
the quantity of soil necessary to procure a good dressing of ashes, 
were shovelled and forked together, and burned in heaps of about 
a cart-load each, with wood cut from the wild neglected hedges 
surrounding the field ; at the cost, including spreading, of 2Z. per 
acre. I scarcely know how to put a value upon the wood used, 
as it would barely have been worth drawing home ; the cost of 
cutting and tying up would be about 5s. per acre. The weather, 
while the work was in progress, proved unfavourable ; and this, 
as it was the first, so it was the least effectively done of any I have 
attempted ; nevertheless, the result has been highly satisfactory. 
The field, after the ashes were ploughed in lightly, was planted 
with vetches, which were eaten off, the succeeding summer 
(1840), by sheep : and then planted with wheat, which produced 
rather more than 30 bushels per acre ; it was sown with seeds 
upon that crop, and continues down, carrying a much greater 
stock than it has ever before done. Should I find it deteriorate, 
as such land as this always does, I shall plough it again for 
vetches, having no doubt that it is now capable of bearing a crop 
sufficient, when consumed upon the land by sheep, to enable it 
again to grow as good a crop of wheat as the last, to be then laid 
down again. 
My next piece was upon part of a field, called the " Barn 
Ground," in the spring of 1840, and as I have done several others, 
under similar circumstances, and with precisely the same results, 
the description need not be repeated. This is a field of 15 acres, 
6 of which are a strong clay of tolerable quality, worth 30s. per 
acre; the remainder fair turnip-land : the clay part of the field 
was exceedingly foul, so that I had two objects to attain — first, to 
get rid of the couch by burning it in the clods ; next with the 
ashes so obtained, to render the whole field alike capable of 
bearing a crop of swedes. In this I succeeded. The whole, after 
draining so much as needed, was limed and manured alike, and 
the crop was quite as good upon the clay as any part of the field. 
All the swedes were consumed upon the land by sheep: the suc- 
ceeding barley-crop was much better upon the part that had 
rarely, if ever, been planted with barley before ; the seeds were 
equally good, but the wheat-crop this year (1843), from the exces- 
sive growth of straw, went down early, and became mildewed, 
and, though more bulky than the rest of the field, will not be so 
productive. The field is now ploughed for swedes again ; and the 
clay part is as healthy, and as likely to grow a crop, as that which 
has always been considered turnij)-land. 
I come next to two fields, upon which the fertilizing power of 
ashes is still more satisfactorily shown than in the last mentioned, 
inasmuch as they were not assisted by any other kind of manure j 
