Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine | Page 7

not room for any extracts, but when we mention that in the chemical part of it the author has been assisted by Dr. Madden, readers of the Quarterly Journal of Agriculture will be able to form an estimate of the way in which this chapter has been got up.
Having now satisfied himself of the nature of his farm as to soil and capabilities, he sees that new enclosures and shelter will be necessary--that some fields must be subdivided, others laid out anew--that old hedge-rows must be rooted out or straightened, and new ones planted in their room. Of what all this may be made to accomplish for his farm, and of how the work itself may be done, even to the minutest details, the chapters on "enclosures and shelter," and on "planting of farm hedges," will fully inform him. The benefits of shelter on our elevated lands, are not half understood. Thousands upon thousands of acres are lying in comparative barrenness, which, by adequate shelter, might be converted into productive fields. The increase of mean temperature which results from skilful enclosures, is estimated at 5° to 8° Fahrenheit; while in regard to the increased money value, Mr. Thomas Bishop gives the following testimony:--
"Previous to the division of the common moor of Methven in Perthshire, in 1793, the venerable Lord Lynedoch and Lord Methven had each secured their lower slopes of land adjoining the moor with belts of plantation. The year following I entered Lord Methven's service, and in 1798 planted about sixty acres of the higher moor ground, valued at 2s. per acre, for shelter to eighty or ninety acres set apart for cultivation, and let in three divisions to six individuals. The progress made in improving the land was very slow for the first fifteen years, but thereafter went on rapidly, being aided by the shelter derived from the growth of the plantations; and the whole has now become fair land, bearing annually crops of oats, barley, peas, potatoes, and turnips. In spring 1838, exactly forty years from the time of putting down the plantation, I sold four acres of larch and fir (average growth) standing therein, for L.220, which, with the value of reserved trees and average amount per acre of thinnings sold previously, gave a return of L.67 per acre."--Vol. i, p. 367.
We are satisfied that in localities with which we are ourselves acquainted, there are tens of thousand of acres which, by the simple protection of sheltering plantations, would soon be made to exhibit an equal improvement with either the moor of Methven, or the lands upon Shotley Fell, which are also referred to in the work before us. At a time when such strenuous endeavours are making to introduce and extend a more efficient drainage among our clay lands, the more simple amelioration of our cold uplands by judicious plantations, ought neither to be lost sight of, nor by those who address themselves to the landlords and cultivators, be passed by without especial and frequent notice.
Did space permit, we could have wished to extract a paragraph or two upon the mode of planting hedges, and forming ditches, for the purpose of proving to our readers that Mr. Stephens is as complete a hedger and _ditcher_, as we have seen him to be cunning as a drover and a cattle surgeon. But we must refer the reader to the passages in pp. 376 and 379. Even in the planting of thorn hedges he will find that science is not unavailing, for both mathematics and botany are made by Mr. Stephens to yield their several contributions to the chapters we are now considering.
But the fields being divided and the hedges planted, or while those operations are going on, a portion of the land must be subjected to the plough. Next in order, therefore, follows a chapter upon this important instrument, in which the merits and uses of the several best known--especially of the Scotch swing-ploughs--are explained and discussed. Here our young farmer is taught which variety of plough he ought to select for his land, why it is to be preferred, and how it is to be used, and its movable parts (plough-irons) tempered and adjusted, according to the effect which the workman is desirous of producing. We are quite sure that the writer of such parts of this chapter as refer to the practical use of the plough, must himself have handled it for many a day in the field.
The part of this chapter, again, which relates to the theoretical construction--to the history of the successive improvements, and to the discussion of the relative merits of the numerous varieties of ploughs which have lately been recommended to notice--is drawn up by Mr. James Slight, curator of the museum of the Highland Society, a gentleman whose authority