Cultivation of Waste Lands. 
425 
The method of ridding above described is that usually 
ridopted, but experience has taught me that instead of burying 
the surface heath-soil it is far better to retain it on the surface. 
At the same time the subsoil should be effectively stirred and 
cleared of stones to the depth of 12 inches. This is a pro- 
cess readily understood and easily taught to a workman by an 
experienced person. By this means the surface soil, weak and 
comparatively barren though it be (yet much superior to the com- 
plete barrenness of the subsoil), is kept on the surface ready for 
immediate use. The modicum of fertility, which by very slow 
degrees has been increasing for ages, may thus by cultivation be 
turned to immediate advantage, if the few fertile earthy ingre- 
dients, found on the surface, be retained thereon to work 
with. The sterile subsoil should not be brought to the surface 
too freely, but rather incorporated gradually, as if the contrary 
practice be followed, the result is certain to be injurious. In a 
four-acre field, where formerly nothing but heath grew, I tried 
the experiment, on one acre, of mixing too much of the lower 
with the upper soil, and the consequence was a diminution of 50 
per cent, at least in the value of the subsequent crop, as com- 
pared Avith that on other parts in the same field. In opposition, 
therefore, to the usual practice, and to what is now being done 
(February, 1868) not a mile from where I am writing, I consider 
it to be extremely desirable, in " ridding" heath-land, to keep the 
surface soil on the surface, and to stir the subsoil to the depth of 
12 inches. Indeed 1 have found that by pursuing this plan, the 
corn and root crops are greater in after years, the grass is greener, 
and far less manure is required to bring the land into profitable 
condition. 
Moreover it is highly important that the stirring and ridding 
should not only be of the required depth, but done effectually, 
and the moorland thoroughly broken, otherwise the subsequent 
crops will seriously suffer. A five-acre field in my occupation 
affords a complete exemplification of this truth. The ridding of 
this field has been ineffectually done, the work varying in depth 
from 3J to 12 inches, and the growing crop of oats indicates 
precisely how the work has been executed. In one part of the 
field the oats "yellow off in another, the produce is less than 
10 bushels to the acre ; whilst in a third part of the same field 
where the ridding has been thoroughly effected, the crops are 
most satisfactory, reaching 40 bushels per acre with an abun- 
dance of nutritious straw. 
Experience has demonstrated most satisfactorily to myself 
that where the ridding has been conscientiously performed, no 
land will pay better as arable land, and that where the ridding 
VOL. lY. — S. S. 2 F 
