* Farming of Bedfordshire. 27 



the scene of labour, is in many parishes a crying evih The wear 

 and tear undergone by a labourer in traversing three or four miles 

 a-day, to and fro, in addition to his toil on the farm (as is com- 

 monly the case) is a most heavy drag upon the living machine. It 

 might and should be obviated, by the erection of suitable cottages 

 in the immediate vicinity of farms lying at a distance from the 

 village, and where there is but little difficulty in attaching a suffi- 

 cient plot for a garden. 



Allotmerds to Labom-ers for the growth of their vegetables, Sac, 

 when judiciously and liberally carried out, are doubtless an 

 essential benefit, and since the date of Bachelor's Survey have 

 become more or less general. A large portion of the labourers, 

 where the soil is at all suitable and let at a moderate rent, occupy 

 them well. In other instances it is exactly the reverse. You 

 may occasionally see a tract of poor clay land, set out at a 

 considerable distance from the village, and at a rent double its 

 worth for farming purposes. The consequence is, in such cases, 

 that if the land was worth anything previously, yet, after the 

 lapse of a few years, its annual value for a long subsequent 

 period might be reduced to a cipher, and the farmer has to take 

 it back in a state of wretched impoverishment. In some few 

 instances I have seen the glebe lands so appropriated, and it 

 would be charitable to hope with a benevolent object, but under 

 circumstances that could hardly fail to render it an utter abortion ; 

 for it is possible that good intentions may be spoiled by the 

 manner in which they are performed. It is quite true that a 

 gentleman cannot allot land more convertible than that which he 

 possesses ; and the great proportion of clay land, which abounds 

 in this county, is a barrier to the fullest and most salutary opera- 

 tion of the allotment system. Small portions of moderately 

 strong land, well drained and in convenient situations, may be so 

 applied ; but any considerable quantity of this kind of land only 

 harasses the labourer, without yielding any corresponding benefit ; 

 indeed, about a rood of the more temperate soil is found to be 

 about as much as a labourer can well attend to, consistently with 

 his duties to his master, and quite as much as he can keep in 

 good condition. In all cases situation is scarcely secondary to 

 rent in point of importance. 



If judiciously carried out by men who sincerely desire to 

 benefit their workmen, these allotments cannot fail to promote 

 the comfort and well-being of a class of men whose interests are 

 identified with the interests of all, and whose improvement should 

 be the aim of all. 



In conclusion, a comparison of the past with the present 

 cannot fail to show that the county of Bedford has made within 

 the present century no small progress in Agriculture. But, in 



