140 



THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



RECENT IMPROVEMENTS IN, AND PRESENT 



AGRICULTURE. 



PROSPECTS OF, 



At the annual dinner of the Hexham Farmers' Club on 

 Tuesday, Jan. 11, Mr. Grey, in proposing " Success to the 

 Club," said : Gentlemen, as to the subject of discussion, 

 I iieed not turu your eyes back to the time — the time gone by, 

 happily for us — when the country which we occupy, and which 

 is so richly studded with farm buildings and with full stack- 

 yards, and so well cultivated, was almost a barren waste. I 

 ueed not refer to the time when the couutries on both sides of 

 the border were the subjects of devastation from one side or 

 the other ; when the fruits ol industry were far too precarious 

 to allow of industrious habits among the people ; when cattle 

 were carried away and crops destroyed by an invading enemy 

 from the other side ; but I shall just turn back the thoughts of 

 those who are old enough with myself to recollect what things 

 wereaboutthebeginningofthi8century,aud direct your attention 

 to the great changes which have taken place, the change which 

 the farmer could not be blamed for not having anticipated, 

 because what would have been the use of increasing your pro- 

 duce to such an amazing extent as it has been increased, 

 unless there were people to feed, mouths to be filled, and 

 money to pay for it ? But I would rescue the farmers from 

 the imputation of slowness in this, because, the moment the 

 impulse was given, the moment remuneration was shown, the 

 moment it was seen we had a population to feed which could 

 afford to buy their beef and mutton as they do now, the farmer 

 put the spur to the wheel, aud he has been found to produce 

 that which is sufficient for them. You will recollect, I dare 

 say, gentlemen, at the time I speak of, when it was the habit 

 to allow young cattle and sheep to go in a very meagre way 

 upon very poor pastures; and after they had attained 

 an age when it was fancied they might be matured and 

 brought to market, they were taken up aud fattened. Now, 

 gentlemen, that wont do in the present day. We bad then 

 a scanty fleece of wool every year from the sheep, and when 

 the sheep got to be two or three years older they were fed. 

 But what is the fact now? On high ground you see that 

 they are taken a year sooner than they were at those times ; 

 on low ground you can hardly say that a sheep is allowed 

 to go till he is two years old. We should consider that a 

 perfect waste. Sheep are brought to market at fourteen or 

 fifteen months old, and you are deriving from sheep of that 

 age as much wool as you derived from sheep that had 

 gone two years longer, and occupied your ground more 

 unprofitably. In the same way it is with cattle ; and the 

 secret of raising the greatest amount of produce, whe- 

 ther in beef or mutton, I believe to be this, that you never 

 ought to allow the animal to be so pinched or starved as that 

 it retrogrades in the least. You should keep it progressing 

 from the first month of its birth, and never let it lose the 

 flesh it baa acquired, because if you have an animal losing for 

 one month, it takes another month to make it up, and then a 

 month more to bring it into a regular healthy condition. The 

 secret, then, I believe is, and it is now pretty well understood, 

 that from their birth forward the animals ought to be brought 

 forward to the condition which they are intended to be in, 

 without ever losing one day. And thus you see the practice 

 of some of my neighbours, of storing their turnips in the fields in 

 heaps, so that the hardest frosts that come will not make the 



sheep have a hungry day — they have always fresh food to go 

 to. In this way it is, gentlemen, that we find we have it 

 in our power to supply to a considerable degree the greatly 

 increased consumption of the people ; but yet we do not find 

 that this is overdone, for wheu I talk, as I do at present, upon 

 the head of stock, I would just turn your view to the different 

 prices which beef and mutton have maintained for a long 

 period, as compared with other articles of farming produce. 

 When I first recollect farming, the common way was for a 

 man to select a portion of his fallow which was best suited 

 for turnips. That portion got all the manure which was 

 made upon the farm ; it was not so much as might ha' e been, 

 I am sorry to say, because we recollect the quantities that 

 were lost, as the gtubble of the field, as compared with now- 

 a-days, when the machine cuts it so close that my friends 

 that are sportsmen complain that a partridge cannot find 

 a hiding-place from one end of the farm to another upon a 

 stubble-field. Well, that portion of fallow received the whole 

 of the manure ; what was left, perhaps, got a little scanty 

 dose of lime, aud then it was expected to grow a crop of wheat. 

 We know what kind of crops were grown ; we know that, as 

 compared with now, there was not above two-thirds, or perhaps, 

 iu many cases, not one-half, of the produce of coru. There 

 was not, certainly, nearly one-half of the produce of butchers' 

 meat which there is at this moment. Then with regard to 

 wool. Look at the prices which wool is maintaining, and the 

 desirability there is for the cultivation of that kind of stock 

 which not only gives you the carcase at the end, but gives 

 you an annual produce of wool. It is said, and 

 may be said truly with regard to some farms, that it 

 is impossible that the farmer can thrive with the average 

 price of wheat at 403. and below it. I saw it stated in 

 one of cur periodical papers the other day that the farmer would 

 be ruined by the price of wheat. So say I, if there are farms 

 which have nothing else but wheat to depend upon. This is 

 the case, certainly, on some small farms of cold land ; but it 

 will hardly be the case, as it might have been if beef and 

 mutton were at 4d. a pound instead of 7d. and 8d., and had 

 wool been at ISs. or 203. the stone instead of 363,, as we have 

 had it formerly, or instead of 423. as it is now ; for, gentle- 

 men, it may be of some consequence for you to know, and 

 some consolation to those who have much to sell, that I 

 know of one person who has been offered for his next year's clip 

 of between 200 and 300 stones 423. a stone, to be paid within 

 a fortnight of his clipping it. I think there is a lesson taught 

 by that, when I have directed your attention to the low price 

 ruling for wheat and other grain, though oats and barley 

 are not so depressed; but when I have drawn your atten- 

 tion to the low price of wheat and to the high comparative 

 price of butchers' meat, I think this lesson meets you — and 

 that you will take it to yourselves — that there are countries 

 more favourable as to soil and climate for the production of 

 wheat than our own; that wheat is an article which can 

 be transferred from one part of the world or one part of 

 the country to another, and is of small bulk as compared 

 with its value, but that no one can injure or come up to us 

 either in beef or mutton, or in the growth of wool. We have 

 pastures for summer feed : we have capabilities for rearing 



