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plan that is novel. The author of this Eflay entertains no fanguinehopes that he (hall fucceed in fuch an arduous attempt : But as thisplan has been adopted in the Netherlands , and many parts of theContinent, * with great fuccefs, he is not without hopes, that fomeProprietors, of capital, (kill, and enterprize, may be induced to makethe attempt. If that attempt were made only on a fmall fcale atfirft, in fituations favourable for the purpofe, and where it can bedone at a fmall expenfe, his hopes would rife higher, as he feelsconfident that fuccefs mult crown all fuch efforts : and if in a fewcounties the experiment were made, even on a fmall fcale, he hasno doubt, that the plan would be adopted by many, and prove ofimmediate and immenfe advantage in reclaiming many of the wadesin the United Empire.
Chap. XI. Apr. No. 5.
On the Improvement of Land covered with Moss,by Removal.
By Mr Robert Kerr, Author of the Berwickshire Report.
The improvements on moss or peat-earth, or land coveredwith those substances, are a new subject in Scotch agriculture.There is one mode of improvement, by which the entire stratumof moss is removed, and a remarkably rich natural soil laid bare,which is peculiar to the neighbourhood of Stirling , of which it isproposed to give some account in this place. The particularsare principally extracted from the Reports of Stirlingshire andPerthshire, in which the circumstances are detailed at large.
The vales of the rivers Forth and Teith, which join a little a-bove the town of Stirling , and an extensive valley which stretch-es from below their junction for many miles, and extends alongthe south side of the firth or estuary of the Forth, all the wayto Borrowstownness, consists chiefly of an exceedingly rich andfertile tract of deep alluvial clay or strong loam, much resent-bling the ivarp land on the Humber, but which is not warp-ed. This species of soil is universally- called carse in Scotland ;and the tract in question is known by the names of the carses ofStirling, Bothkennar, and Falkirk . In various parts of this,val-ley, the rich carse or alluvial clay soil is buried under a consi-derable thickness of moss, by which it is rendered utterly worth-less ; and the purpose of this paper is, to detail the means whichhave been devised by some ingenious men, for removing the su-perincumbent moss, and applying the subjacent soil to the pur-poses of husbandry.
* The manner in which this operation is conducted, and the vast successwith which it is crowned, will be minutely detailed in Dr Rennie’s Essays.