In the marshland district of the county of lying between the rivers 11ry11 an I 0 use, lin -;e tracts or the nurst rich laud, such as is composed of the muddy depositions left lie the titles and floods, which is there called siltinq, been by means of embanking. This kind of work has sometimes been undertaken ho the tenants on a Pleee of in consideration Of having the land free for twenty. one y cars, But in these cases the banks have often been very imperfectly made, not having cost more than forty shillings a rod. And those which were constructed by the landhirds were indeed frequently but little better, being mostly deficient in not having slope enough given them towards the water. Count Bentinek, and his son, who succeeded him in the estates, undertook the drainage of the marsh lands upon a scale never practised in that part of the island before, and by their successful operations have increased the old estates by more than 1,000 acres.
The base orthe embankment, in this case, is about 50 feet, the slope to the sea :36 feet, forming an angle, of' about 25 or 30 degrees. The crown is 4 feet in width, and the slope to the fields 17 feet, in an angle of about 50 degrees ; the slope towards the sea being very nearly turfed over. The first expense incurred in forming this bank was £4 per rod, but a very high tide coining before it was finished, not only made several breaches, but occasioned an additional height and slope to be given to several different parts, in order to bring it to the dimensions mentioned above, all of which made the gross expense to amount to about £5 the rod. The whole cost was something more than £5,000. The expense of the houses, firrni buildings, and other things, was about as much more, for five new farms, which was a greater expense than was necessary, as the laud would have Jet as well in two or three as lite fiirms. Supposing, therefore, the expense at £10.000 and the new rental at £1,000 a year, it is just 10 per cent for the capital laid out. The expense here, however, seems to ha% e run too high, when the neces sary repairs of the hank are taken into the account. The representation, given at Figure 22, in the Plate, fully explains the nature of the embankment formed in this ease.
lu another new embankment, in which 273 acres of marsh land, and 18 of bank, were gained, the men were paid 4s. 6d. a tithe. of 400 culdeal feet, finding o heeling planks. barrows, trussels, else. \\ hen it is thus tOrmed, the front slope is sodded, for which they are paid in addition -Is. a floor of 400 square feet. earning from 5s. 6d. to 7s. a day, and there is some little further expense necessary for beating it down in a Min manner. The whole of the expense of the bank, sluice, and every thing else, was about £3.300. The laud was immediately offered to be rented at finir pounds an acre for four years, or three pounds an acre for six years ; which, in the burner case, would amount to £4,36S in that length of time, or 1,000 guineas more than the whole of the capital laid out on the undertaking.
On this coast the operation of silting up, or raising the surface of the marsh-land by the repeated depositions of muddy matters from the sea, is performed in a more rapid manner than in many others ; and the little holynva and creeks are tbund from experience to silt up much faster where the tide-waters are speedily taken off by proper cuts and channels framed for the purpose, than where the contrary is the ease.
One of the most extensive reclamations of land in England, is the large tract of country known by the name of the Great Bedford Level. This great expanse of rich and fertile country is bounded by the high lands of the counties of Norfolk, Sullblk, Cambridge, I luntington, Northampton, Lincoln, and the Isle of Ely, and contains upwards of 300,000 acres of fen-land, bey and which are about a dozen very huge marshes also .similarly reclaimed. The drainage of the whole level is effected by innumerable dikes and drains of all sizes communicating with, or gathered together into three great channels, the main outfalls into the sea. One of these outt'alls is at Boston, in Lincolnshire ; one at Wisbeaeh. in Cambridgeshire ; and the other at Lynn Regis, iu Norfolk.
In Holland, however, is exhibited the most prominent illustration of the successful redemption of land from the sea ; and probably in no part of the world has it keen carried to so great an extent. Indeed, the whole country has been rescued, as it were, from the waves of the ocean, and has been secured and held only by the constant care and super intenden•e of the persevering conquerors.
There is little dotild that the inhabitants of Ilolland were obliged, in the first instance fir their own preservation, to erect barriers against the encroachments of the sea. On the invasion of their country by the Haile.: and Normans, the latter soon discovered the superiority of these lands to those adjacent to them, and at once applied all their energies to the proper reclaiming of so fertile a property. Thus, by the steady perseverance ()rages, has I 1 olland heroine pre-eminent for the extent of her drainage works, dimwit the manner in which their embankments are constructed is very far from equal to similar works executed in this country. V It is said by those who have made it their business to examine the mode of making these banks, that in those made of stone, the materials are not economically distributed. hut are heaped Si) confusedly on each other, as not only to weaken the bank, but occasion great waste. They have, however, a very ingenious method of facing their banks where there is a scarcity of stone, with straw, formed into ropes, about an inch or two in thickness, laid in regular courses. These courses fit closely together from top to bottom, and are fas tened down to the bank with woodditfiril•s.