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little, or rather no good, in the lowermost beds, as it would leavethe best of its nutricious particles on the uppermost bed; fromwhich it appears that the contents of the water thus- used wouldnot be equally distributed over all the meadow, which it shouldbe. But by continuing the feeder to the end of the meadow, asbefore directed, and described on Fig. 2. and 3. of last pkte, andshifting the water from one bed to the other occasionally, thisdefect is remedied.
One or other, or a part of one or other of the figures on theseven foregoing plates, will be found applicable as a rule bywhich to form floated meadows in the North of Scotland ; theybeing- designed on the principles of the floated meadows alreadyformed there, and on the natural position of the country.
It must be observed that the size of the feeders, gutters,drains, &-e. are not in exact proportion to the length and breadthof the beds, but are a little larger, to make the plans more intel-ligible ; the scale being too small to admit of keeping the exactproportion, and at the same time illustrate the work. But theexact proportion that they bear to each other, will be found iuFig. 1. of Plate I. \
It may be observed, that where large floated meadows areformed on a large and rapid river, care must be taken to allowthe water room by which to flow over the banks in floods, be-twixt the wear and the hatches in the mouth of the conductor.In this case, the hatches should be at some distance in the con-ductor from the river, as in Plate III.; at least some plan mustbe adopted to give the water scope, and to keep it from gettingin behind the hatches in the conductor, as it would hurt the grassor hav in the summer time, as observed in the explanation ofPlate III.
Plate VIII.
This plate is designed to represent the simple hatches men-tioned at page 130. They may be made of any size, from 3foot and an half wide to feet wide single, and to 6 or 7 fee*wide double, but not above 2 feet deep.
Fig. 1. of this plate shows the frame, made of four pieces ofwood, of 4 or 5 inches square each ; or, which is better, 3-Jinches thick, and 5 broad, as the additional breadth gives theside-boards a better hold of the posts. A, is the top of theframe, into which the two side-posts B B are tennerod. C, thesole of the frame, about 12 or 13 inches above the end of theposts at the black line. After this frame is tenncred togetherand pinned, side-boards about or 2 feet long, are joined intoone another by ploughing, and are nailed upon the sides, as re-presented in Fig. 2.; and also, upon the ends of the posts at thebottom, two boards are joined together, and nailed on. Thus,in Fig. 2, A represents the top of the frame; C C, the side and