Science in Short Chapters

by W. Mattieu Williams

The bog-burning method of reclamation is easily explained. In the first place, the excessive vegetable encumbrance is reduced in quantity, and the remaining ashes supply the surface of the bog on which they rest with the non-volatile salts that originally existed in the burnt portions of the bog. In other words, they concentrate in a small space the salts that were formerly distributed too sparsely through the whole of the turf which was burnt.

As there are great differences in the composition of different bogs, especially in this matter of mineral ash, it is evident that the success of this method must be very variable, according to the locality.

On discussing this method with Mr. MacAlister (Mr. Henry’s steward, under whose superintendence these reclamation works are carried out), he informed me that the bogs on the Kylemore estate yield a very small amount of ash—a mere impalpable powder that a light breath might blow away; that it was practically valueless, excepting from the turf taken at nearly the base of the bog. The ash I examined where the bog-burning is extensively practiced in Donegal, was quite different from this. The quantity was far greater, and its substance more granular and gritty. It, in fact, formed an important stratum, when spread over the surface of the ridges. These differences of composition may account for the differences of opinion and practice which prevail in different districts. It affords a far more rational explanation than the assumption that all such contradictions arise from local stupidities.

There is one evil, however, which is common to all bog-burning as compared with liming—it must waste the ammoniacal salts, as they are volatile, and are driven away into the air by the heat of combustion. Somebody may get them when the rain washes them down to the earth’s surface again; but the burner himself obtains a very small share in this way.

We may therefore conclude that where lime is near at hand, bog-burning is a rude and wasteful, a viciously indolent mode of reclamation. It is only desirable where limestone is so distant that the expense of carriage renders lime practically unattainable, and where the bog itself is rich in mineral matter, and so deep and distant from a fuel demand, that it may be burned to waste without any practical sacrifice. Under such conditions it may be better to burn the bog than leave it in hopeless and worthless desolation.

I cannot conclude without again adverting to the importance of this subject, and affirming with the utmost emphasis, that the true Irish patriot is not the political orator, but he who by practical efforts, either as capitalist, laborer, or teacher, promotes the reclamation of the soil of Ireland, or otherwise develops the sadly neglected natural resources of the country.

With Mr. Mitchell Henry’s permission I append to the above his own description of the results of his experiment, originally communicated in a letter to the Times; at the same time thanking him for his kind reception of a stranger at Kylemore Castle, and the facilities he afforded me for studying the subject on the spot.

“The interesting account you lately published of the extensive reclamations of His Grace the Duke of Sutherland, under the title of ‘An Agricultural Experiment,’ has been copied into very many newspapers, and must have afforded a welcome relief to thousands of readers glad to turn for a time from the terrible narratives that come to us from the east. If you will allow me, I should like to supplement your narrative by a rapid sketch of what has been done here during the last few years, on a much humbler scale, in the case of land similar, and some of it almost identical, with that in Sutherlandshire.

“The twelve corps d’armée under the Duke’s command, in the shape of the twelve steam-engines and their ploughs, engaged in subduing the stubborn resistance of the unreclaimed wilds of Sutherlandshire, suggest to the mind the triumphs of great warriors, and fill us with admiration—not always excited by the details of great battle; but, as great battles can be fought seldom, and only by gigantic armies and at prodigious expense, so reclamation on such a scale is far beyond the opportunities or the means of most of us; while many may, perhaps, be encouraged to attempt work similar to that which has been successfully carried out here.

“And, first of all, a word as to the all-important matter of cost. Does it pay?