74 
Irrigation and the Storage of Water 
fertile, liis language being, “ Land that is naturally rich, and in 
good heart, does not need to have water set over it, because the 
hay produced in a juicy soil is better than that exerted by water ; 
yet when the poverty of a soil requires it, water may be set 
over it.” 
Irrigation in England. 
In Arthur Young’s “Farmer’s Calendar” the following 
appears under November : — 
In this month you may begin to winter water the meadows and pastures 
wherever it can he done ; and be assured that no improvement will pay 
better : a winter's watering will answer in the hay fully equal to a common 
manuring of the best stuff you can lay on the land; and the expense, in some 
situations, is trifling. The lower parts of a farm are generally in grass ; the 
farmer should attend to his ditches, so that the water from all the higher 
parts of the farm may have an unobstructed course to a ditch a little above 
the bottom, from which it may be let at pleasure over the meadows, observ- 
ing that it only runs over them, and does not stagnate. 
Underneath April Young also wrote : — “ Throughout this 
month if there are watered meadows on a farm the use of them 
in supporting ewes and lambs is exceedingly great,” than which 
nothing can be more true, as has been amply exemplified in the 
April of 1892 and of 1893, when the flockmasters of the South- 
West of England who had water meadows were able to give their 
sheep abundance of luxuriant fresh grass, while all others devoid 
of this resource were compelled to fall back almost entirely on dry 
winter fodder in conjunction frequently with costly meals or other 
feeding stuffs. These water meadows often appear to the eye of 
a traveller from a railway carriage as oases in a desert — specks 
of emerald brightness with sombre surroundings. They had 
this appearance well-nigh throughout last summer, and proved 
invaluable for yielding abundant crops of grass for hay when 
no cuttings could be taken elsewhere. Mr. J. Deane Willis, 
the well-known Shorthorn breeder, obtained three successive 
crops of hay from his Bapton Manor Meadows in the Wylie 
Valley of Wilts. 
Arthur Young’s advice to utilise the drainage water from 
arable fields at the higher part of a farm for irrigating meadow's 
at the lower part has been carried out practically in several 
instances since with the additional service being required of the 
water to drive a turbine and machinery at the homestead. 
In Vol. VI. 1st Series of the Journal (1845) appeared (p. 518) an 
interesting prize essay on the reclamation of an extensive tract 
of waste land on Brendon Hill by Mr. John Roals, and the 
conversion of a portion of it into a water meadow. The arable 
land at the upper part had to be under-drained, and the pipes 
