DRAINAGE OF SOILS. 
333 
the different descriptions of land, in all its diversified variety of soils, 
strata, and inequalities of surface, and I hope it will, in some measure, 
convince landed proprietors and those engaged in agriculture of the 
folly of supposing that any single rule can be applicable to every case 
without being modified to the particular circumstances to which it is 
to be applied. 
To drain land effectually, and at the least expense, must surely be 
the desired object of those who engage in it; but how can they ever 
expect to attain this, if the work is executed without any consider¬ 
ation of the cause from which the wetness proceeds, as is too often 
the practice in this country. Thus, when a field is injured by wet¬ 
ness, no matter from whence it comes, all that is thought necessary 
to dry it, is to make drains straight to the wettest place, and through 
the hollowest part of it, and if these have not the desired effect, others 
are added , and the work people are bound to make them a fixed depth, 
and, after cutting and carving in all directions, the land is partially 
dried, and, in some instances, completely, but at three times the ex¬ 
pense it would have been if they had been properly directed. The 
person engaged in this arduous undertaking believes himself a com¬ 
plete drainer, and tells his master that there is no occasion for em¬ 
ploying a professional man to lay off the drains, for he can do it as well 
as any man, and at half the expense; the master believes him and 
being glad he has such a clever person in his employment, gives him 
orders to commence operations, which are carried on for two or three 
years, when, after having spent a considerable sum of money to little 
or no purpose, a professional man has to be sent for to investigate 
the cause of the bad success and provide a remedy, which has gener¬ 
ally to be a complete renewal of the operations upon other principles. 
Besides the instance at Castle Strathallan, already mentioned, of land 
having to be drained anew, another case occurred in which I was 
employed near Lanark, where the person acting as land-steward hav¬ 
ing prevailed on the proprietor to let him drain two fields with a 
number of small drains, the result was, after spending considerable 
time and capital, the land still continued very wet. When I was 
called upon, I found that not only much deeper drains were neces¬ 
sary to remove the evil, but also considerable alterations were required 
in their directions; which being executed, has proved completely 
effective in drying the land. 
A similar cause occured at Dargill, in Perthshire, the property of 
Lord Willoughby de Eresby ; the soil of the field is of a light nature, 
with a subsoil composed of a mixture of gravel and clay, from four 
to seven feet deep, under which lies the stratum, composed of 
