in New York, at
several places in Massachusetts, Ohio, Michigan, and many other States.
The first drain-tiles used in New-Hampshire, were brought from Albany,
in 1854, by Mr. William Conner, and used on his farm in Exeter, that
year; and the following year, the writer brought some from Albany, and
laid them on his farm, in the same town.

In 1857, tile-works were put in operation at Exeter; and some 40,000
tiles were made that year.

The horse-shoe tiles, we understand, have been generally used in New
York. At Albany, and in Massachusetts, the sole-tile has been of late
years preferred. We cannot learn that cylindrical pipes have ever been
manufactured in this country until the Summer of 1858 when the engineers
of the New York Central Park procured them to be made, and laid them,
with collars, in their drainage-works there. This is believed to be the
first practical introduction into this country of round pipes and
collars, which are regarded in England as the most perfect means of
drainage.

Experiments all over the country, in reclaiming bog-meadows, and in
draining wet lands with drains of stone and wood, have been attempted,
with various success.

Those attempts we regard as merely efforts in the right direction, and
rather as evidence of a general conviction of the want, by the American
farmer, of a cheap and efficient mode of drainage, than as an
introduction of a system of thorough drainage; for--as we think will
appear in the course of this work--no system of drainage can be made
sufficiently cheap and efficient for general adoption, with other
materials than drain-tiles.

CHAPTER III.

RAIN, EVAPORATION, AND FILTRATION.

Fertilizing Substances in Rain Water.--Amount of Rain Fall in
United States--in England.--Tables of Rain Fall.--Number of Rainy
Days, and Quantity of Rain each Month.--Snow, how Computed as
Water.--Proportion of Rain Evaporated.--What Quantity of Water Dry
Soil will Hold.--Dew Point.--How Evaporation Cools
Bodies.--Artificial Heat Underground.--Tables of Filtration and
Evaporation.

Although we usually regard drainage as a means of rendering land
sufficiently dry for cultivation, that is by no means a comprehensive
view of the objects of the operation.

Rain is the principal source of moisture, and a surplus of moisture is
the evil against which we contend in draining. But rain is also a
principal source of fertility, not only because it a