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The Country Gcntkinan's Magazine 



GARDEN ALLOTMENTS. 



And first by way of garden allotments. In 

 some parts of England it is the custom to 

 attach to every cottage a considerable and 

 sufficient garden of say j4 or J-i of an 

 acre. This is chiefly the case, where 

 the cottages are scattered and not 

 grouped together in villages, but there are 

 many more districts where the garden 

 attached to a cottage is miserably insufficient. 

 Now, it is in the power of every landlord and 

 every farmer to remedy this state of things, 

 at no perceptible loss to himself, by letting 

 off in portions of say ^ of an acre, some 

 ■field or part of a field. In has practically 

 been done in many counties in England, and 

 wherever judiciously managed it has been 

 found to work well, and the plot of ground 

 has come to be highly prized by the la- 

 bourers. The rent paid is considerably 

 higher than the farmer can afford, and ex- 

 perience shews that they are willing to pay 

 even an exorbitant rent for land at an incon- 

 venient distance, so greatly do they prize the 

 advantage. Some approach to such an 

 arrangement is made in many places by a 

 grant of potato ground, cultivated by and 

 rented from the farmer ; but this is in no wise 

 equal to the allotment on which a labourer 

 can work and invest his spare time, coming 

 by degrees to take a permanent personal in- 

 terest in it. The produce of the ground, 

 generally potatoes and grain, makes a con- 

 siderable addition to his income, but the 

 human aspect of the system and the content- 

 ment produced, with the attachment and in- 

 terest in the soil, are what is most striking in 

 the result, and the time snatched perhaps 

 from the public-house, and the zeal and care 

 called forth in the labourer elevating him as 

 a man and improving him as a workman. 

 Some little personal direction and care are 

 useful where many allotments are made, as 

 some few labourers will be found unfitted to 

 hold such ; and there should be a stringent 

 rule to give notice where the rent is in arrear. 

 But in the case of the farmer with his 

 labourers, he would have no difficulty in 

 cutting off an acre or two of his farm and 



sub-letting it at a fair or even recuperative 

 rent; and it seems a very small matter, 

 where such advantage and contentment are 

 • found to ensue, for the labourer to ask or for 

 the farmer to concede so much of interest in 

 the soil on which he lives. It might be worth 

 while to mention, as it might easily be shewn, 

 that by thus allowing large garden allotments 

 to labourers, they v/ould be enabled to pay 

 a fair rent for cottages, say a return of 4 or 5 

 per cent, on the outlay, and this would solve 

 another difficult problem for landlords. 



GRANTING COW LAND. 



Then to some few select and thrifty la- 

 bourers, and, under strict precautions, a 

 further boon can be accorded in the grant of 

 a few acres of grass to keep a cow. In some 

 parts of Northumberland it is the habit to 

 allow the run of a cow to some or all of the 

 labourers ; in the Agricultural Commissions 

 Report I find one case where a farmer had 

 ten labourers, each of whom kept his cow on 

 the farm. Besides being a source of con- 

 siderable profit to the man, tln-ough the la- 

 bour of his wife, it enables him to rear 

 strong healthy children ; and possibly to that 

 cause may partly be attributed that fine type 

 of agricultural labourer, that race of perma- 

 nent giants there found, though something 

 also must be due to nationality, and their 

 superior education and ^ thrift ; but the 

 elements are not so dissimilar but that 

 conditions may gradually produce else- 

 where like consequences, for it has been 

 observed by competent judges, that this 

 northern workman, though earning much 

 higher wages than his southern neigh- 

 bour, is not an expensive labourer, but rather 

 the contrary, as he does far more and better 

 work. Now concerning this allotment of 

 cow lands, it has been found on an estate 

 where many such places exist, that by hold- 

 ing them out as prizes to those labourers who 

 had saved money, who actually had an account 

 at the Savings' Bank amassed by themselves, 

 very considerable inducemement was afibrded 

 to thrifty habits, and opportunities for invest- 

 ment with a prospect of comparative comfort 

 were held out which indirectly has had a 



