I'AKM FENCES. 239 



these enclosures was stated as vai-ying from six to eight and ten 

 acres. I nm disposed to give another of these fence descriptions 

 from Devon which, like the first, seems to have largely borrowed 

 from the art of the militarj' engineer : 



"The outside and partition of all the new allotments in the Black Down Tlills, are 

 laid out on a ten feet base, upon which a mound sodded on both sides is raised fiv^ 

 leet high and left six feet wide at the top. These banks are all enclosed with a ditch 

 four feet wide and three feet deep. On each brow of the mound a wattled fence about two 

 feet high, within whii^h is planted a double hedge row On the top of the njound two 

 rows of withy or sallow cuttings placed about thr(!e feet apart. Cclween these are 

 planted oak, ash, beech, birch, alder, hazel, dog wood, or thorns, and at a distance of 

 every ten feet along the middle of the mound alternate Scotch and spruce firs are 

 planted. The size of these enclosures varies from five to eight acres." 



"We have an excellent and painstaking review of I-Cnglish farm 

 fencing forty years ago in the two volumes that are the fruits of 

 Henr3' Colman's tour in Europe. His reputation as Commissioner 

 of Agriculture in Massachusetts gives authentic value to his state- 

 ments. He says, writing in the year 1844 : 



"The farm inclosures in England are of various extent, from ten to twenty and fifty 

 acres. In some parts of England they resemble the divisions of New England farms, 

 and are of various sizes, but generally small and of all shapes, often not exceeding 

 four or five acres. It is reported of a farmer of Devonshire that he lately cultivated 

 over one hundred acres of wheat in fifty difi'erent fields. On a Staffordshire farm a 

 sixty-five acre turnip field was in eight inclosures. It was subsequently divided into 

 three fields, and nearly half a mile of fence saved. Ninety-one acres in the same 

 neighborhood were originally in twenty-seven inclosures. Some of the fences in the 

 latter instance occupied land from three to four yards wide that the plough never 

 touched. In parts of Lincolnshire inclosures average fifty acres each, and in the fens, 

 or redeemed lands, the ditches are the only fences. In Northumberland and the 

 Lothians the inclosures are extensive, and, excepting on the outlines, there are no 

 fences. In Berkshire, it has latterly become the practice to remove inner fences, and 

 leave the fields open." 



The same intelligent writer declares his disappointment at the 

 condition of the hedges throughout England : 



"There are exceptions, but, in frequent instances, they are neglected greatly; are 

 broken, straggling, weedy, and full of rubbish, and are often seen with these per- 

 nicious acccompaniments occupying more than a rod in width." 



Mr. Colman got no better answer why these were left in this con- 

 dition, than that ''they are valuable for the protection of game, 

 and make excellent covers for partridges and foxes." 



In 1862 Hon. Ezra Cornell, President of the New York State 

 Agricultural Societ3', derived from an extended tour some careful 

 observation on fence practices abroad. He had been favorabl}^ 

 impressed with the hedge until he saw it in use in England. He 



