im, he was enforced
to remove further and seek for better pasture. And this was the British
custom, as I learn, at first. It hath been commonly reported that the
ground of Wales is neither so fruitful as that of England, neither the
soil of Scotland so bountiful as that of Wales, which is true for corn and
for the most part; otherwise there is so good ground in some parts of
Wales as is in England, albeit the best of Scotland be scarcely comparable
to the mean of either of both. Howbeit, as the bounty of the Scotch doth
fail in some respect, so doth it surmount in other, God and nature having
not appointed all countries to yield forth like commodities.

But where our ground is not so good as we would wish, we have--if need
be--sufficient help to cherish our ground withal, and to make it more
fruitful. For, beside the compest that is carried out of the husbandmen's
yards, ditches, ponds, dung-houses, or cities and great towns, we have
with us a kind of white marl which is of so great force that if it be cast
over a piece of land but once in threescore years it shall not need of any
further compesting. Hereof also doth Pliny speak (lib. 17, cap. 6, 7, 8),
where he affirmeth that our marl endureth upon the earth by the space of
fourscore years: insomuch that it is laid upon the same but once in a
man's life, whereby the owner shall not need to travel twice in procuring
to commend and better his soil. He calleth it _marga_, and, making divers
kinds thereof, he finally commendeth ours, and that of France, above all
other, which lieth sometime a hundred foot deep, and far better than the
scattering of chalk upon the same, as the Hedui and Pictones did in his
time, or as some of our days also do practise: albeit divers do like
better to cast on lime, but it will not so long endure, as I have heard
reported.

There are also in this island great plenty of fresh rivers and streams, as
you have heard already, and these thoroughly fraught with all kinds of
delicate fish accustomed to be found in rivers. The whole isle likewise is
very full of hills, of which some (though not very many) are of exceeding
height, and divers extending themselves very far from the beginning; as we
may see by Shooter's Hill, which, rising east of London and not far from
the Thames, runneth along the south side of the island westward until it
come to Cornwall. Like unto these also are the Crowdon Hills, which,
though under divers names (as also the other