Notes on canal-making, with a large survey drawing
Pile-driving and enlarging a canal from a small channel; where to cross a stream
Folio 149r is dominated by a large, faint drawing covered with numeric measurements along winding courses, read here as a survey of a waterway or canal site. Two short corner notes give practical rules: how to drive the piles, and how to make a great canal by first cutting a small one and letting the water, aided by a wheel, enlarge it. A further note advises always crossing water at the beginning of its motion and where it is widest. Much of the sheet's lettering and numbering is untranscribed.
On this page
Stage a great canal by first cutting a small one
A corner note instructs how to drive the piles and advises making the great canal by first making the small channel and giving it water, which with the wheel will make the great one.
Where to cross a stream
Always cross the water at the beginning of its motion and at its widest point — a rule set down in the lower corner of the sheet.
Measured survey drawing filling the sheet
The whole leaf carries a large charcoal drawing threaded with numeric distances along its branching courses, consistent with a topographic survey of the waterway; its labels and figures are not transcribed in the bundle.