4.
similar material by then, and this activity
continued apace in the spate of Norman and
later abbey-building, until the advent of the
small, "one-hand" brick at the end of the 13th
century - but that is another story.
L. S. HARLEY

---oOo---
HOLLOW DRAINING
While reading "General View of the Agri-
culture of the County of Essex" drawn up for
the consideration of the Board of Agriculture
and Internal Improvement and dated 1807, I
found the following mention of hedgerow
removal in volume II on page 267.
"The country about Belchamps, Borely,
Gestingthorpe, Bulmer &c. very much improved
in 20 years: in hollow draining; in the use
of chalk; in converting to tillage all waste
scraps of land and in throwing many little
enclosures, crowded with pollards together in
open airy fields."
Hollow draining was the practise in the
late 18th century of digging a ditch, part
filling with straw and wood and backfilling.
After several years the straw rotted to leave
a subsurface channel to take water out of the
land. This was common practise on heavy
boulder clay soils. About 1800 the use of the
mole plough was becoming more common especially
as wood became scarce and expensive.
RON ALLEN
---oOo---