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ON INCLOSING LAND

pasture, this temporary fence is also often employed with ad-vantage.

The feal-dike is often constructed in a hasty and carelessmanner, in which case it soon moulders down. When thesods are carefully cut, and attentively laid, each course madeto cover the seams or joinings of that immediately below, to-gether with ties or thorough-bands at frequent intervals, andthe whole properly packed in the heart, with a sufficient cop-ing of long sods on the top to keep out rain, this fence istolerably durable. Frequent repairs are necessary, but, ifthese are carefully executed every spring, and when anybreach occurs, this fence may occasionally answer a goodpurpose in particular situations; more especially as the origi-nal expence is very low, seldom amounting to a fourth part ofthe expence of stone-walls. It does not seem requisite to giveany minute account of the method of forming this species offence, as it is not in universal use, and falling fast into desue-tude. A detailed description of the best mode of constructionwill be found in Anderson’s Essays relating to Agriculture,vol. i, p. 7, and in the Communications to the Board of Agri-culture, vol. ii, p. 76, PI. v, fig. 38.

In several parts of Scotland , where the soils or circumstan-ces are not favourable to the growth of thorns, and wherestones are scarce, a kind of compound fence is used, con-sisting of a wall composed of sod, and stones, laid in alter-nate layers, and compactly built together. The stones aremostly small and rounded, the worst that can be conceivedFor building, and the rough grassy turf and surface earth areemployed to hold them firm. If these walls are carefully con-structed, the largest and heaviest stones forming the founda-tion, and the faces having a sufficient talus or batter, andbuilt in spring when the sod is tough, it is surprising howlong they will last, with occasional repairs. In peculiar cir-cumstances, such fences often answer well for defending oneside of a young hedge, while the other is guarded by thefence ditch, or even for protecting young plantations.