3551. Puddle is not, as some have attempted to describe it, a kind of thin earth mortar, spread on places intended to be secured, and suffered to be quite dry before another coat of it is applied; but it is a mass of earth reduced to a semifluid state by working and chopping it about with a spade, while water, just in the proper quantity, is applied, until the mass is rendered homogeneous, and so much condensed, that water afterwards cannot pass through it, or but very slowly.

3552. The best puddling stuff is rather a lightish loam, with a mixture of coarse sand or fine gravel in it; very strong clay is unfit for it, on account of the great quantity of water which it will hold, and its disposition to shrink and crack as this escapes; vegetable mould, or top soil, is very improper, on account of the roots and other matters, liable to decay, and leave cavities in it; but more on account of the temptation that these afford to worms and moles to work into it, in search of their food. Where puddling stuff is not to be met with, containing a due mixture of sharp sand, or rough small gravel stones, it is not unusual to procure such to mix with the loam, to prevent moles and rats from working in it; but no stones larger than about the size of musket bullets ought to be admitted.

3553. That the principal operation of puddling consists in consolidating the mass, is evident from the great condensation that takes place; it is not an uncommon case, where a ditch is dug, apparently in firm soil, that though great quantities of water are added during the operation, yet the soil that has been dug out will not more than two-thirds fill up the ditch again, when properly worked as puddle. It should seem also, that puddle is rendered by that operation capable of holding a certain proportion of water with great obstinacy, and that it is more fit to hold than transmit water. It is so far from true, that puddle ought to be suffered to get quite dry, that it entirely spoils, when by exposure to the air it is too much dried; and many canals which have remained unfilled with water during a summer, after their puddling or lining has been done, have thereby become very leaky, owing to the cracks in the puddle-ditches or lining. One of the first cares of an engineer, when beginning to cut a canal, is to discover whether good puddling stuff is in plenty, and if it be not, it must be carefully sought for, and carefully wheeled out, or reserved wherever any is found in the digging; or, perhaps, procured at considerable distances from the line, and brought to it in carts. It has happened in some stone brash or loose rocky soils, that all puddling stuff for several miles of the line, required to be brought to it; but even this expense, serious as it may be, ought not to induce the copying of those, who have left miles of such banks without puddling, and have made a winter canal, but which no stream of water that is to be procured can keep full in the summer months. It is usual in canal acts to insert a clause, for the security of the landowners, to require the company to cause all the banks that need it to be secured by puddling, to prevent damage to the land below by leakage; and it would have been well for all parties, in many instances, if this clause had been enforced.

3554. History of puddling. It appears that the Dutch have been in the habit of making mud ditches to secure the banks of their canals and embankments, from time immemorial; and that operations similar to our puddling have been long known on the continent, but it is not clear at what period it was introduced into this country. We think that the fens in Cambridgeshire and Lincolnshire, in which so many works have at different times been executed by Dutchmen, are the most likely places in which to search for early evidence of its use. We cannot think that Brindley was the first who ever used it in this country, although we might admit that the Bridgewater canal was the first in which it was systematically used as at the present day. If we compare our first, fourth, and fifth cases (3550.), we shall find in all of them a water-tight stratum, as the basis; and the practice in these cases is to make a wall of puddle, called a puddleditch, or puddle-gutter, within the bank of the canal; these puddle-gutters are usually about three feet wide, and should enter about a foot into the water-tight stuff, on which they are always to be begun and they should be carried up as the work proceeds, to the height of the top water-line, or a few inches higher. Our second and third cases (3550.), evidently will not admit of the above mode, because we have no water-tight stratum on which to begin a puddle-gutter, as a bottom: in these cases, therefore, it is usual to apply a lining of puddle to the sides and bottom of the canal.

3555. Adjustment of materials. Canals set out with the care that we have recommended, will always have the proper quantity of stuff to allow for the settlement of the banks, since the united sections of the loose banks will always equal the section of excavation in the same settled or consolidated state, in which it was before the digging commenced. The slopes of made banks, it is to be observed, on account of their settling, should be steeper in the first instance than they are ultimately required to be.

3556. The letting of the cutting of certain lengths of the canal to contractors, who will employ a number of navigators under them, in digging and puddling the canal, is the next business. It is usual to let the work at a certain price per cubic yard of

digging, and to pay for the puddling or lining either at a certain price per cubic yard, or per yard run of the canal. The engineer ought to inform himself thoroughly of the difficulties and facilities which attend the work he is about to let, and to draw up a short but explicit contract to be signed by the contractor. The prices allowed ought to be fair and liberal, according to the circumstances, so that the contractor may have no pretence, on account of low prices, to slight his work, particularly the puddling; and they ought in every instance to be strictly looked after; and made to undo and renew immediately any work that shall be found improperly performed. We recommend it to the engineer to keep a strict account, by means of his overseers or counters, of all the men's time that are employed upon the works; distinguishing particularly the number upon each work, and whether employed by the day, under the company, or upon the work that is let to contractors. These particulars are most essential towards knowing what money ought to be advanced to the contractor during the progress of his job, and towards informing and maturing the judgment of the engineer, in the length of time that a certain number of men will be in performing any future work he may have to direct; and a calculation ought to be made in every instance of the day-work, and compared with the contract price, by which alone a correct judgment can be formed of the proper prices at which work ought afterwards to be let, so that the laborers may receive proper wages, proportionate to their exertions, and the contractor be amply paid for his time, skill, and superintendance; and yet economy, and the interest of the company, be duly consulted.

3557. Barrows and wheeling planks, horsing blocks, and other implements, are generally found by the company; and it is usual to consider twenty to twenty-five yards to be a stage of wheeling, and a price per cubic yard to be fixed according to the number of stages that the soil is to be moved: where this distance exceeds 100 yards, it will not often be eligible to perform it by wheel-barrows and runs of plank with an easy descent, if the same is practicable, should be laid for large two-wheeled barrows, or trucks to be used thereon.

3558. Where the line of a canal is to cross an extensive stratum of valuable brick earth, or one of good gravel for making of roads, it will often be advisable, especially if the line can be rendered more direct thereby, when setting out the canal, to cut pretty deep into such materials, and even quite through the gravel, if the same is practicable; for although considerable expense will in the first instance be incurred in digging and in damage done for spoil banks, yet such materials as good brick earth and gravel, will in almost every instance find a market as soon as the canal is opened. Such a situation of the canal may prove of essential service to its trade, by enabling the adjoining proprietors to work the whole thickness of their brick earth, gravel, or other useful matters, and destroy but very little of the surface of the ground, and without being annoyed by water, but which the canal would catch in very considerable quantities, perhaps, instead of losing water by preserving a high level through porous stuff. In districts where stone and gravel for making and repairing of roads are scarce, it will be proper to pay the laborers certain rates per cubic yard for all the stones or gravel that they may collect out during the work, and stack in proper places; as resources for making of the towing-path, and for making good the landing or ascent to the several bridges, and the several pieces of new road that the engineer will have to form, near to the canal bridges; the lock banks, and all wharfs and landing places, should also be covered with good gravel to render them safe and convenient for use: if good gravel can in places be intersected in deep cuttings, much of the above expense, as well as of cartage, may be saved, by an early use of dirt boats in the bottom of the canal.

3559. How important and various the duties of the resident engineers are, must have struck every reader; but would be much more apparent, could we enter into the subject of reservoirs, feeders, aqueducts, embankments, culverts, safety gates, weirs, tunnels, deep cuttings, locks, substitutes for locks, inclined planes, railways, bridges, towingpaths, fences, drains, boats, towing or moving boats and trams, cranes and implements; but these, as less important for our purpose, we must leave the reader to study in the works of Philips, Fulton, Chapman, Plymley, Badeslade, Kindersly, Anderson, Telford, and from the article Canal, in the three principal Encyclopædias.

CHAP. VI.

Of the Improvement of Estates by the Establishment of Mills, Manufactories, Villages,

Markets, &c.

3560. Connected with the laying out of roads and canals, is the establishment of different scenes of manufactorial industry. The forced introduction of these will be attended

with little benefit; but where the natural and political circumstances are favorable, the improvement is of the greatest consequence, by retaining on the same estate, as it were, the profits of the grower, manufacturer, and to a certain extent of the consumer.

3561. The establishment of mills and manufactories to be impelled by water, necessarily depends on the abundance and situation of that material, and it should be well considered before hand, whether the water might not be as well employed in irrigation; or how far irrigation will be hindered by the establishment of a mill. In the state of society in which water corn-mills were first erected, they were doubtlessly considered as a blessing to the country. There were, then, no flour manufactories: and it was more convenient for the inhabitants to carry their corn to a neighboring mill, than to grind it less effectually, by hand, at home. Hence, the privileges and immunities of manorial mills. To secure so great a comfort, every tenant of a manor would willingly agree to send his corn to be ground at the lord's mill: and, perhaps, was further obliged to stipulate to pay toll for the whole of his growth; though it were sent out of the manor, unground.

3562. In Scotland, this impolitic, and now absurd custom, was only lately given up: till when no farmer dared to send his corn to market, until he had delivered a proportional quantity to the proprietor, or the occupier, of the mill to which he was thirled; or had previously stipulated to pay him thirlage, for what he might send away; this arbitrary regulation operating like tithes, to decrease the growth of corn.

3563. In England and Ireland, however, no restriction of this sort at present exists. But, in the remote parts of the north of England, there are mills which claim (or lately claimed) the exclusive right of grinding the whole of the corn which the inhabitants of the respective parishes or manors required to be ground, for their own use: suffering none to be sent out of the parish, for the purpose of grinding. And in the more western counties, where grist mills are still the schools of parochial scandal, something of this sort remains, and is piously preserved in modern leases. But, in the kingdom' at large, grist mills are now going fast into disuse. Even working people purchase flour, instead of corn; and, whether in a private or a public light, this is an eligible practice. They can purchase a sort which is suited to their circumstances; and they know the quality and the quantity of what they carry home. Whereas, in the proverbial rascality of grist millers, they have no certainty as to either. Beside, in a flour mill there is no waste. Every particle may be said to be converted to its proper use.

3564. A valuable property belonging to modern flour manufactories is their not requiring every brook and rivulet of the kingdom to work them. In Norfolk, a great share of the wheat grown in that corn county, is manufactured into flour by the means of windmills. And such are modern inventions, that neither wind, nor water, is any longer necessary to the due manufacture of flour; the steam engine affording, if not the most eligible, the most constant and equable power.

$565. The most eligible species of water-mill, are the tide-mill, and the current-mill: the former placed in creeks, inlets, bays, estuaries, or tide rivers; and the latter in the current of a river. There are many situations, Marshal observes, in which these species of mills may be erected with profit to proprietors, and the community; and without an injury to the landed property, or the agricultural produce of the country. He is of opinion, that the numerous river mills existing in different parts of the country, are unnecessary to the present state of society.

3566. Grist mills in some remote situations, may be still required: but seeing the number of flour mills which are now dispersed over almost every part of the kingdom, seeing also the present facility of carriage, by land and water, and seeing, at the same time, the serious injuries which river mills entail on agriculture, Marshal recommends land proprietors to reduce their number, as fast as local circumstances will allow.

3567. The inducement to establish manufactories depends on a variety of circumstances, as well as on a supply of water. Among these may be mentioned the price of labor, convenience for carriage, export or import, existence of the raw material at or near the spot, as in the case of iron works, potteries, &c. In England, while the poor laws exist, the establishment of any concern that brings together a large mass of population will always be attended with a considerable risk to land owners; though it is a certain mode, in the first instance, of raising the price of land, and giving a general stimulus to every description of industry.

3568. A populous manufactory, even while it florishes, according to Marshal, operates mischievously in an agricultural district: by propagating habits of extravagance and immorality among the lower order of tenantry, as well as by rendering farm laborers and servants dissatisfied with their condition in life; and the more it florishes, and the higher wages it pays, the more mischievous it becomes in this respect. Lands bear a rental value in proportion to the rate of living, in the district in which they lie; so that while a tem

porary advantage is reaped, by an increased price of market produce, the foundation of a permanent disadvantage is laid; and whenever the manufactory declines, the lands of its neighborhood have not only its vices and extravagancies entailed upon them; but have the vicious, extravagant, helpless manufacturers themselves to maintain. This accumulation of evils, however, belongs particularly to that description of manufacture which draws numbers together in one place; where diseases of the body and the mind are jointly propagated; and where no other means of support is taught than that of some particular branch or branchlet of manufacture.

3569. Cottages. Wherever cottages for any class of men are built, whether singly or congregated, they ought never to be without an eighth or a tenth of an acre of garden ground. It is observed in The Code of Agriculture, that "where a laborer or country tradesman has only a cottage to protect him from the inclemency of the weather, he cannot have the same attachment to his dwelling, as if he had some land annexed to it; nor is such a state of the laborer so beneficial to the community, When a laborer has a garden, his children learn to dig and weed, and in that manner some of their time is employed in useful industry. If he is possessed of a cow, they are taught early in life, the necessity of taking care of cattle, and acquire some knowledge of their treatment. But where there is neither a garden to cultivate, nor any cows kept, they are not likely to acquire either industrious or honest habits. So strongly were these ideas formerly prevalent, that by the 43d of Elizabeth, no cottage could be built on any waste, without having four acres attached to it. This is now by far too much. If the quantity were reduced to half an acre for a garden, and if no person could gain a settlement who was not a native, or, if a stranger, who did not fairly rent in the same parish, a house and land worth twenty, instead of ten pounds per annum, both the poor and the public would thence derive very essential benefit.

3570. Cottagers in England have often no land or garden, but a right of common. This is of little or no real benefit to them, unless to obtain fuel, the advantage of which is great, and not easily compensated. With a common-right for a cow, or a few sheep, cottagers get an idea of visionary independence, which renders them unfit for the duties of their station. A laborer of this description is entirely spoiled for industry, and the generality of experienced persons in country matters must have seen many cases in point. Forest-side cottages in particular, are nurseries of idleness, and seminaries of mischief. In some cases, the cottager has good summer pasture, or can hire it in the neighborhood, and can raise, on arable land in his occupation, turnips and other winter food for a cow. This plan is adapted to countries, where there is a mixture of arable and grazing land; but it is objected to, in the more cultivated districts, as taking up too much of the time

of the laborer.

3571. The most advantageous system for keeping a cottage cow is that adopted in grazing districts, where a cottager has a sufficient quantity of enclosed land in grass, to enable him to keep one or two cows both summer and winter, grazing the one half, and mowing the other, alternately. Nothing tends more materially to teach the poor honesty, than allowing them to have property which they can call their own. Feeling how intensely they would deprecate all infringement upon it, they are less likely to make depredations upon the property of others; and this will produce more honesty among them than the best delivered precepts can instil. By the cultivation of a small spot of land, a cottager not only acquires ideas of property, but is enabled to supply himself with that variety of food, as fresh vegetables in summer, and roots in winter, which comfort and health require. If he should fortunately be able to keep bees in his garden, and if its surplus produce should also enable him to rear, and still more to fatten a hog, his situation would be much ameliorated. But if, in addition to all these advantages, he can keep a cow, the industrious cottager cannot be placed in a more comfortable situation.

3572. Cottages and villages necessarily result from manufactories, as well as from extensive mines, quarries, or harbours. A few cottages will necessarily be scattered over every estate, to supply day laborers and some descriptions of country tradesmen. Villages are seldom, in modern times, created by an agricultural population; it being found so much more convenient for every farm to have a certain number of cottages attached to it. 3573. A village may be created any where, by giving extraordinary encouragement to the first settlers; but unless there be a local demand for their labor, or they can engage in some manufacture, the want of comfortable subsistence will soon throw the whole into a state of decay. Fishing villages, and such as are established at coal and lime works, are perhaps the most thriving and permanent in the kingdom. Some fine examples of fishing villages, recently established, occur on the marquess of Stafford's estates in

Sutherland.

3574. Informing the pian of a town or village, the first thing, if there is a river or other means of communication by water, is to fix on a proper situation for a quay or harbour; and next, at no great distance from it, an open space as a market. Round the latter ought to be arranged the public buildings, as the post-office, excise or custom-house,

police-office, the principal inn and the principal shops. Near the harbour ought to be placed the warehouses and other depositaries for goods: in a retired part of the town the school; and out of town on an eminence (if convenient) the church and churchyard. There ought to be a field or open space as a public recreation ground for children, volunteers or troops exercising, races, washing and drying clothes on certain days, &c. Public shambles ought to be formed in a retired and concealed spot, and public necessaries, and proper pipes, wells or other sources of good water, with the requisite sewers and drainage. Buckets, in case of fire, ought to be kept at the market-house.

3575. The village of Bridekirk on the Annan, in Dumfrieshire (fig. 451.), was begun

in 1800, by Gen. Dirom, and is thus described by him in the survey of the county. "It is situated at a part of the river, which affords falls and power, capable of turning any weight of machinery; and I have had it in view to give encouragement to manufacturers, to whom such a situation is an important object. A woollen manufactory (a) upon a large scale, and the most approved plan, has been established there for ten years, and is gradually increasing its machinery. In this village there are already, in the course of that time, about two hundred and fifty industrious inhabitants, and it has every appearance of a further rapid increase. On the opposite side of the river a situation is fixed on for corn-mills (b), where a complete set has been built upon the best construction, including wheat and barley mills. Half of the water there is reserved for any other works, and is likely to be let for a mill for dressing and for spinning flax, and for machinery required in bleaching, there being at the foot of the mill-race a holme of six acres (c), well calculated for a bleach field; and I propose to let part of it for such a manufactory.

3576. The lots for building and gardens in the village, each consisting of from nine to ten falls of ground, are granted in perpetuity at the rate of six pounds the English acre, either upon leases for 999 years, or feu-rights, as the settlers choose: the former being generally preferred, as being the holding or title, attended with least expense. This rent would of itself be no object when the waste of ground in streets and enclosures is considered; but the great advantage to be derived from such an establishment is the increased value that lands acquire from having a number of industrious people settled in the heart of an estate. Each person who feus a house-stead is obliged to build with stone and lime, according to a regular plan; and a common entry is left between every two lots for access to their offices, which are built immediately behind their houses; and the whole of the buildings are covered with slate. The feuers are also bound to make a common sewer through their property when required; to pave ten feet in front of their houses, between them and the street; and to pay at the rate of a penny per fall yearly, according to the extent of their lots, to form a fund for keeping the streets and roads in repair, and for making small improvements. No person is allowed to sell liquor of any kind without my permission; nor can any shop or chandlery, tannery, or other work, that might be considered as a nuisance, be set up or built, unless in places allotted for these purposes; and to prevent all interference on the part of the feuers, I reserve to myself full liberty to