Farm drainage Part 34

The statute provides that the proprietors, or a greater part of them in interest, may apply, by pet.i.tion, to the Court of Common Pleas, setting forth the proposed improvements, and for notice to the proprietors who do not join in the pet.i.tion, and for a hearing. The court may then appoint three, five, or seven commissioners to cause the improvements to be effected. The commissioners are authorized to cause dams or dikes to be erected on the premises, at such places, and in such manner as they shall direct; and may order the land to be flowed thereby, for such periods of each year as they shall think most beneficial, and also cause ditches to be opened on the premises, and obstructions in any rivers or streams leading therefrom to be removed.

Provision is made for a.s.sessment of the expenses of the improvements, upon all the proprietors, according to the benefit each will derive from it, and for the collection of the amount a.s.sessed.

"When the commissioners shall find it necessary or expedient to reduce or raise the waters, for the purpose of obtaining a view of the premises, or for the more convenient or expeditious removal of obstructions therein, they may open the flood-gates of any mill, or make other needful pa.s.sages through or round the dam thereof or erect a temporary dam on the land of any person, who is not a party to the proceedings, and may maintain such dam, or such pa.s.sages for the water, as long as shall be necessary for the purposes aforesaid."

Provision is made for previous notice to persons who are not parties, and for compensation to them for injuries occasioned by the interference, and for appeal to the courts.

This statute gives, by no means, the powers necessary to compel contribution to all necessary drainage, because, first, it is limited in its application to "meadow, swamp, marsh, beach, or other low land." The word _meadow_, in New England, is used in its original sense of flat and wet land. Secondly, the statute seems to give no authority to open permanent ditches on the land of others than the owners of such low land, although it provides for temporary pa.s.sages for the purposes of "obtaining a view of the premises, or for the more convenient or expeditious removal of obstructions _therein_"--the word "therein"

referring to the "premises" under improvement, so that there is no provision for outfalls, under this statute, except through natural streams.

By a statute of March 28, 1855, the Legislature of Ma.s.sachusetts has exercised a _power_ as extensive as is desirable for all purposes of drainage, although the provisions of the act referred to are not, perhaps, so broad as may be found necessary, in order to open outfalls and remove all obstructions to drainage. As this act is believed to be peculiar, we give its substance:

"An Act to authorize the making of Roads and Drains in certain cases.

"SECT. 1. Any town or city, person or persons, company or body corporate, having the owners.h.i.+p of low lands, lakes, swamps, quarries, mines, or mineral deposits, that, by means of adjacent lands belonging to other persons, or occupied as a highway, cannot be approached, worked, drained, or used in the ordinary manner without crossing said lands or highway, may be authorized to establish roads, drains, ditches, tunnels, and railways to said places in the manner herein provided.

"SECT. 2. The party desiring to make such improvements shall file a pet.i.tion therefor with the commissioners of the county in which the premises are situated, setting forth the names of the persons interested, if known to the pet.i.tioner, and also, in detail, the nature of the proposed improvement, and the situation of the adjoining lands."

SECT. 3 provides for notice to owners and town authorities.

SECT. 4 provides for a hearing, and laying out the improvement, and a.s.sessment of damages upon the respective parties, "having strict regard to the benefits which they will receive."

SECT. 5 provides for repairs by a majority of those benefitted; and Sect. 6 for appeals, as in the case of highways.

By an act of 1857, this act was so far amended as to authorize the application for the desired improvement, to be made to the Select-men of the town, or the Mayor and Aldermen of the city, in case the lands over which the improvement is desired are all situated in one town or city.

It is manifest certainly, that the State a.s.sumes power sufficient to authorize any interference with private property that may be necessary for the most extended and thorough drainage operations. The power which may compel a man to improve his portion of a swamp, may apply as well to his wet hill-sides; and the power which may open temporary pa.s.sages through lands or dams, without consent of the owner, may keep them open permanently, if expedient.

LAND DRAINAGE COMPANIES.

Besides the charters which have at various times, for many centuries, been granted to companies, for the drainage of fens and marshes, and other lowlands, in modern times, great encouragement has been given by the British Government for the drainage and other improvement of high-lands. Not only have extensive powers been granted to companies, to proceed with their own means, to effect the objects in view, but the Government itself has advanced money, by way of loan, in aid of drainage and like improvements.

By the provisions of two acts of Parliament, no less than $20,000,000 have been loaned in aid of such improvements. These acts are generally known as PUBLIC MONEYS DRAINAGE ACTS. There are already four chartered companies for the same general objects, doing an immense amount of business, on _private_ funds.

It will be sufficient, perhaps, to state, in general terms, the mode of operation under these several acts.

Most lands in England are held under inc.u.mbrances of some kind. Many are entailed, as it is termed: that is to say, vested for life in certain persons, and then to go to others, the tenant for life having no power to sell the property. Often, the life estate is owned by one person, and the remainder by a stranger, or remote branch of the family, whom the life-tenant has no desire to benefit. In such cases, the tenant, or occupant, would be unwilling to make expensive improvements at his own cost, which might benefit himself but a few years, and then go into other hands.

On the other hand, the remainder-man would have no right to meddle with the property while the tenant-for-life was in possession; and it would be rare, that all those interested could agree to unite in efforts to increase the general value of the estate, by such improvements.

The great object in view was, then, to devise means, by which such estates, suffering for want of systematic, and often expensive, drainage operations, might be improved, and the cost of improvement be charged on the estate, so as to do no injustice to any party interested.

The plan finally adopted, is, to allow the tenant or occupant to have the improvement made, either by expending his private funds, or by borrowing of the Government or the private companies, and having the amount expended, made a charge on the land, to be paid, in annual payments, by the person who shall be in occupation each year. Under one of these acts, the term of payment is fixed at 22 years, and under a later act, at 50 years.

Thus, if A own a life-estate in lands, and B the remainder, and the estate needs draining, A may take such steps as to have the improvement made, by borrowing the money, and repaying it by yearly payments, in such sums as will pay the whole expenditure, with interest, in twenty-two or fifty years: and if A die before the expiration of the term, the succeeding occupants continue the payments until the whole is paid.

A borrows, for instance, $1,000, and expends it in draining the lands.

It is made a charge, like a mortgage, on the land, to be paid in equal annual payments for fifty years. At six per cent., the annual payment will be but about $63.33, to pay the whole amount of debt and the interest, in fifty years. A pays this sum annually as long as he lives, and B then takes possession, and pays the annual installment.

If the tenant expend his own money, and die before the whole term expire, he may leave the unpaid balance as a legacy, or part of his own estate, to his heirs.

The whole proceeding is based upon the idea, that the rent or income of the property is sufficiently increased, to make the operation advantageous to all parties. It is a.s.sumed, that the operation of drainage, under one of these statutes, will be effectual to increase the rent of the land, to the amount of this annual payment, for at least fifty years. The fact, that the British Government, after the most thorough investigation, has thus p.r.o.nounced the opinion, that drainage works, properly conducted, will thus increase the rent of land, and remain in full operation a half century at least, affords the best evidence possible, both of the utility and the durability of tile drainage.

CHAPTER XXII.

DRAINAGE OF CELLARS.

Wet Cellars Unhealthful.--Importance of Cellars in New England.--A Glance at the Garret, by way of Contrast.--Necessity of Drains.--Sketch of an Inundated Cellar.--Tiles best for Drains.--Best Plan of Cellar Drain; Ill.u.s.tration.--Cementing will not do.--Drainage of Barn Cellars.--Uses of them.--Actual Drainage of a very Bad Cellar described.--Drains Outside and Inside; Ill.u.s.tration.

No person needs to be informed that it is unhealthful, as well as inconvenient, to have water, at any time of the year, in the cellar. In New England, the cellar is an essential part of the house. All sorts of vegetables, roots, and fruit, that can be injured by frost, are stored in cellars; and milk, and wine, and cider, and a thousand "vessels of honor," like tubs and buckets, churns and was.h.i.+ng-machines, that are liable to injury from heat or cold, or other vicissitude of climate, find a safe retreat in the cellar. Excepting the garret, which is, as Ariosto represents the moon to be, the receptacle of all things useless on earth, the cellar is the greatest "curiosity shop" of the establishment.

The poet finds in the moon,

"Whate'er was wasted in our earthly state, Here safely treasured--each neglected good, Time squandered, and occasion ill-bestowed; There sparkling chains he found, and knots of gold, The specious ties that ill-paired lovers hold; Each toil, each loss, each chance that men sustain, Save Folly, which alone pervades them all, For Folly never quits this earthly ball."

In the garret, are the old spinning wheel, the clock reel, the linen wheel with its distaff, your grandfather's knapsack and cartridge-box and Continental coat, your great-aunt's Leghorn bonnet and side-saddle, or pillion, great files of the village newspapers--the "_Morning Cry_"

and "_Midnight Yell_," besides worn out trunks and boxes without number.

In the cellar, are the substantiate--barrels of beef, and pork, and apples, "taters" and turnips; in short, the Winter stores of the family.

Many, perhaps most, of the cellars in New England are in some way drained, usually by a stone culvert, laid a little lower than the bottom of the cellar, into which the water is conducted, in the Spring, when it bursts through the walls, or rises at the bottom, by means of little ditches scooped out in the surface.

In some districts, people seem to have little idea of drains, even for cellars; and on flat land, endeavor to set their houses high enough to have their cellars above ground. This, besides being extremely inconvenient for pa.s.sage out of, and into the house, often fails to make a dry cellar, for the water from the roof runs in, and causes a flood.

And such accidents, as they are mildly termed by the improvident builders, often occur by the failure of drains imperfectly laid.

No child, who ever saw a cellar afloat, during one of these inundations, will ever outgrow the impression. You stand on the cellar stairs, and below is a dark waste of waters, of illimitable extent. By the dim glimmer of the dip-candle, a scene is presented which furnishes a tolerable picture of "chaos and old night," but defies all description.

Empty dry casks, with cider barrels, wash-tubs, and boxes, ride triumphantly on the surface, while half filled vinegar and mola.s.ses kegs, like water-logged s.h.i.+ps, roll heavily below. Broken boards and planks, old hoops, and staves, and barrel-heads innumerable, are buoyant with this change of the elements; while floating turnips and apples, with, here and there, a brilliant cabbage head, gleam in this subterranean firmament, like twinkling stars, dimmed by the effulgence of the moon at her full. Magnificent among the lesser vessels of the fleet, "like some tall admiral," rides the enormous "mash-tub," while the astonished rats and mice are splas.h.i.+ng about at its base in the dark waters, like sailors just washed, at midnight, from the deck, by a heavy sea.

The lookers-on are filled with various emotions. The farmer sees his thousand bushels of potatoes submerged, and devoted to speedy decay; the good wife mourns for her diluted pickles, and apple sauce, and her drowned firkins of b.u.t.ter; while the boys are anxious to embark on a raft or in the tubs, on an excursion of pleasure and discovery.

To avoid such scenes as the above, every cellar which is not upon a dry sandbank, should be provided with a drain of some kind, which will be at all times, secure.

For a main drain from the cellar, four or six-inch tiles are abundantly sufficient, and where they can be reasonably obtained, much cheaper than stone. The expense of excavation, of hauling stone, and of laying them, will make the expense of a stone drain far exceed that of a tile drain, with tiles at fair prices. The tiles, if well secured at the inlet and outlet of the drain, will entirely exclude rats and mice, which always infest stone drains to cellars. Care must be taken, if the water is conducted on the surface of the cellar into the drain, that nothing but pure water be admitted. This may be effected by a fine strainer of wire or plate; or by a cess-pool, which is better, because it will also prevent any draft of air through the drain.

The very best method of draining a cellar is that adopted by the writer, on his own premises. It is, in fact, a mere application of the ordinary principles of field drainage. The cellar was dug in sand, which rests on clay, a foot or two below the usual water-line in winter, and a drain of chestnut plank laid from the cellar to low land, some 20 rods off. Tiles were not then in use in the neighborhood, and were not thought of, when the house was built.

In the Spring, water came up in the bottom of the cellar, and ran out in little hollows made for the purpose, on the surface.

Not liking this inconvenient wetness, we next dug trenches a few inches deep, put boards at the sides to exclude the sand, and packed the trenches with small stones. This operated better, but the mice found pleasant accommodations among the stones, and sand got in and choked the pa.s.sage. Lastly, tiles came to our relief, and a perfect preventive of all inconvenient moisture was found, by adopting the following plan:

The drain from the cellar was taken up, and relaid 18 inches below the cellar-bottom, at the outlet. Then a trench was cut in the cellar-bottom, two feet from the wall, a foot deep at the farthest corner from the outlet, and deepening towards it, round the whole cellar, following the course of the walls. In this trench, two-inch pipe tiles were laid, and carefully covered with tan-bark, and the trenches filled with the earth. This tile drain was connected with the outlet drain 18 inches under ground, and the earth levelled over the whole.

This was done two years ago, and no drop of water has ever been visible in the cellar since it was completed. The water is caught by the drain before it rises to the surface, and conducted away.

Vegetables of all kinds are now laid in heaps on the cellar-bottom, which is just damp enough to pack solid, and preserves vegetables better, in a dry cellar, than casks, or bins with floors.