blem that has not as yet been solved, by men in either of these departments. The causes which occasion it are twofold: first, underground water-in which case it is completely to be removed by draining; and secondly, tenacity of soil, which retains moisture as if in a cup-a species of evil for which no cure has ever been found. Observing some years ago, that on no land where the subsoil was completely dry were any Rushes ever known to spring up; and reasoning on the indisputable maxim that, sublatâ causâ, tollitur effectus, I conceived, that if any means could be devised to carry off superfluous moisture from underneath the soil, and to carry it off speedily, the Rushes would disappear as a matter of course. Experience had shown that, from underground drains, however carefully executed, no such effect would follow; because numerous examples exist of persons who, from an anxiety to lay dry particular fields, have intersected them with drains in all directions, within five and six feet of one another, and still Rushes have sprung up, even on the tops of their drains. Nothing, therefore, promised to be effectual except some method of rendering the entire subsoil a drain, and thus carrying off the water which descended from the higher grounds, or fell from the sky, before it had time to stagnate.

For this important purpose deep trenching seemed particularly well adapted, as the first principle of it consists in reversing the order of the natural strata, and putting down, to any given depth, the loose and friable soil which has been the subject of culture. By that means, a subsoil of an entirely different quality, namely, the fine mould of the surface, would at once be created at the bottom of the trench, and through which the superfluous water, formerly retained by impervious strata, would now readily percolate. Besides this, another object of immense interest presented itself—and that was the sudden and effectual alteration, and therefore melioration, of the soil from wet to dry, from stiff to porous; and if it were true, as already stated, that "the best soil, whether for wood or agricultural crops, was one that is at once loose and deep," here both depth and looseness would at once be obtained, with the power of retaining water only to the proper extent, and exerting a great chemical agency for the preservation of manures.

My first experiment, in reducing this theory to practice, was made on about two acres of old meadow land, on which Rushes had been abundant from time immemorial, from two to three feet high. Having previously ascertained that there were no great underground springs, I directed the whole to be trenched eighteen inches deep. The trenching was effectively executed in the line of the slope or declination of the surface, so that, if any interstitial mounds of subsoil (see the foregoing note) had been inadvertently left in the bottom, no obstruction, after

rain, should be given to the speedy descent of the water. The surface mould not being above six inches deep, the whole was deposited by the first spit at the bottom of the trench. The next six inches consisted of strong loamy clay, and were thrown immediately upon the first; and the last six inches, which were of as obdurate a clay (Scotticè Till) as could well be imagined, formed the top of the new surface.

Being in haste to return the land to its former condition of meadow, I did not bestow the proper time, as I ought to have done, in working it by means of a complete summer-fallow, or drill-crops well manured; but, after merely reducing the clay to a good state of pulverisation, I gave it an abundant top-dressing—first of mild lime, and then of dungcompost, prepared with peat-moss-according to Lord Meadowbank's method, and immediately sowed it down with grass-seeds. This took place in 1810. The hay-crop that followed was immense. It has been cut in hay repeatedly since that period, and twice dressed with lime compost; but since the time of the trenching, (now seventeen years,) not a Rush has ventured to put up its head. Had the cure been only temporary, Rushes certainly would have appeared again in greater luxuriance, in consequence of the culture, after the third or fourth season.

The next experiment I tried was on the sheepwalk of the park, of which a particular quarter, near the margin of the lake-being of strong rich loam, eight or nine inches deep, with a clayey subsoil-was apt to be rushy, after being some years in pasture. This space of ground extended to about four acres. It was trenched in 1821, nearly twenty inches deep. It was treated nearly in the same style as the meadow just now mentioned, and got the same dressing of lime and compost slightly ploughed in, and completely pulverised, and was then sown down in pasture. After six years, I can truly say that no rush has ever appeared upon it; and now, after another year, (in October 1828,) I can attest the same result. Let it be observed, that this experiment differed somewhat from the other; for pasture immediately succeeded the sowing down, and no cutting of hay took place.

In 1822 I made various other trials, all attended with the same uniform success. From one and all of them I was led to the conclusion, that in deep trenching on cultivated land, properly executed, a certain cure will always be found for Rushes, proceeding from the worst cause in which they originate, viz., tenacity of soil. The simple theory is this, that if a new and permeable subsoil, composed of the uppermost friable strata, be thus formed underneath, it will act nearly as if gravel or sand had been substituted: and we know that, if either soiis or subsoils be once fairly stirred, no complete consolidation will afterwards take place.

It is probable that this method of eradicating Rushes has not as yet become very extensively known, and therefore has not been much verified by the experience of others.* In the end of 1821, or beginning of 1822, a scientific friend of mine, who saw the work going on in the park here, was so much struck with its importance and simplicity that he drew up a short account of it, as managed at this place, and published the article in the "Farmer's Magazine" of Edinburgh, where the reader will find it. But in that article, as far as I remember, (for I have it not at hand,) the depth of the trenching and the expense attending it are both underrated. In respect to the trenching, I never trenched less than eighteen, and sometimes twenty inches in depth; and as to the expense, it never amounted to less than 1s. per pole, or per fall Scotch measure, (which bear the same proportion to each other as the higher national rates do,) or £8 per acre when spade-work only was necessary. If the aid of the pick was called in, it amounted to 2d. more per fall, or 26s. per acre. But in such a case previous outlay is of little moment, if we can only rely on an adequate or profitable return.

It is a curious fact, and may be verified by those who are disposed to make the experiment on a single acre, or less, that the trenching of ground, if done only deep enough, has (besides eradicating Rushes) the extraordinary effect of rendering wet land dry, and dry land moist, for the most beneficial produce either in timber or agricultural crops. In respect to the former soil, it is obvious on the face of the proposition, and from the foregoing experiments. As to the latter, I have more than once verified it by trenching a sandy soil fifteen inches deep, when there were not more than four inches of good mould on the surface, and when the mould was unscrupulously put down to the bottom of the trench, and eleven inches of pure sand superinduced upon it! Nevertheless, the oats sown the first year upon this soil, and manured and treated as above, at once reached the mould at the bottom of the trench;

* So little does this seem to be known, that an intelligent friend of mine (than whom no man does more work, or does it in a better style of execution) is, at this moment, (October 1827,) engaged, with the help of a professional drainer, brought at some expense from a distance, in endeavouring to extirpate the Rushes in his park by surface drains, at twenty and thirty feet distance. It would be quite in vain for me to tell him that his drainer has no science, and that his Rushes, in this way, cannot be permanently eradicated. There are very few men who put any value on advice that is gratuitous. Besides, I am too near at hand (not five miles off) to be of any use to him. Were I to come from Lincolnshire, or the Land's-End, offering for fifty guineas to communicate my secret, I believe I could render him very material service.

No. XC., for May 1822.

and they would have gone down double the depth, had they had an opportunity. On trying oats in the mould of a hot-house, the roots were found to descend two feet nine inches!

I regret that there is not room, in the brief space of an ordinary note, (which has been now so greatly exceeded,) to demonstrate the reasonableness of the experiments made on chemical principles, so as to satisfy the man of science. The man of practice may very easily satisfy himself. He who tries the thing will be convinced, that, while by deep trenching he will raise the value of his land (as held out in the text, by the one-half in some cases, and by double in others, especially if he take a green crop the first season, his entire expense, for both labour and manure, will generally be repaid by that crop so that, whether he operate as a husbandman or an arboriculturist, he will, by the second season, (as the saying is,) be fairly ❝on velvet”—or, in other words, that this improvement of the subject will pay itself after a twelvemonth.

I am aware that the trenching of land, whether in theory or practice, is a subject not fully understood-not even by Mr Withers himself, notwithstanding his two pamphlets, which are drawn up to illustrate it. The extraordinary and wonderful effects produced by deepening, and the comminution of the parts, (but the one is useless without the other,) are known comparatively to few persons, notwithstanding the success with which chemistry has already been applied to agriculture; and none but gardeners and nurserymen are, as yet, prepared to believe the vast power which they put into the hands of a man of science and enterprise.

SECTION VII.

NOTE I. Page 167.

I FEEL particular satisfaction in paying this just tribute to the memory of a superior and ingenious artist. His professional character has been slightly, but justly sketched, in the passage to which this Note refers; and all who remember him will unite with me in doing justice to his private worth, his pleasing manners, and his extensive information on all subjects connected with rural affairs. Mr White was an excellent agriculturist, an ingenious mechanic, and a planter of great skill. Like his master, Brown, he was in the habit of undertaking the execution of his own designs, and also of plantations of considerable extent, in both England and Scotland, until his business as a landscape-gardener, in the latter country, became too extensive to admit of such undertakings. In this way he had planted, before the year 1780, for Lord Douglas, at Douglas Castle, about fifteen hundred acres of ground, which are now covered with fine wood, and of which the thinnings have long been a source of considerable revenue to the noble owner.

About the year 1770, Mr White made the purchase of an estate in the higher parts of the county of Durham, on which he planted so extensively and successfully, that it may be worth while, for the encouragement of the young planter, to give some idea of the returns which it made to him. But these are so wonderful and portentous, that, to the ordinary reader, they may rather seem referable to the feats of some arboricultural Münchausen than to the sober results of judgment and industry.

The territory of Woodlands (for so it was named by the new owner) extended to between seven and eight hundred acres, and cost Mr White about £750. It was situated in a high, and at that time a barren tract of country, about eighteen miles from the city of Durham, and wholly destitute of wood. But as it was surrounded with coal mines, he had the sagacity to foresee that there was scarcely any return that might not be expected from Fir and Larch, and other quick growers, judiciously planted, and on a suitable soil. The first thing he did, there