372 Report on Steam Cultivation. [Clarke. 



boundaries, which are so conformable to the operations of 

 tillage-machinery. The engine cannot earn profit for the tenant 

 upon land in want of drainage ; and this surely is a preparation 

 to be provided by the landlord. Steam tillage is obstructed, and 

 the machinery damaged, by outstanding field-timber, and by 

 excessive hedge-row wood, more particularly ash-trees ; and the 

 tenant cannot fell these beauties of a bygone age without the 

 owner's sanction. And where tenants are forbidden the use of a 

 reaping-machine, or limited to stubble of a certain number 

 of inches' height, or, if allowed to mow, are forbidden to rake 

 after ; where the impositions of a mediaeval forestry are laid upon 

 a luckless tenantry, it is simply impossible for steam tillage to be 

 resorted to at all — the very back-bone of which is the earliest up- 

 turning of stubbles, as well as Avinter-tilths deeper and more lightly- 

 laid than the best blood and bone in a hunting-field dare venture 

 to plunge over. We have felt, too, in the progress of our Report, 

 that we have been, of necessity, revealing sources of profit to the 

 farmer, and laying open his gains to the eyes of some unprin- 

 cipled men, who are ever on the watch for a chance of profiting 

 by labours and investments which are not theirs, who have a 

 sharp eye for a fresh excuse to "send a valuer over the estate," 

 and who are forward enough to "urge," and "advocate," and 

 " introduce " agricultural improvements in this fashion — " Jones, 

 you see, by the Royal Commissioners' Report, that Nokes is 

 clearing at least a pound an acre by steam-ploughing ; you had 

 better start too, and so make farming pay better for both of us." 

 It is indeed a bitter position for an enterprising occupier to be 

 in, when any new thing he may discover to make a purse out of has 

 to be held as far as possible suh rosa ; and there would at 

 once be an end to all agricultural progress if Ave were to hush up 

 every new means of advantage for the husbandman, lest a greedy 

 proprietary should hastily demand a share in proceeds, which, 

 after all, should be considered not as making the farmer's fortune, 

 but as helping him to retrieve (in many districts at least) a 

 downcast position. Let proprietors do their part in preparing 

 estates for the steam-plough — themselves raising the value of 

 their fee-simple ; and then the tenantry will not begrudge the 

 enhanced rent due for the use of more serviceable holdings. 



In thanking all those gentlemen who have so disinterestedly 

 furnished the Society with information for the public good, and 

 have at the same time, with considerable trouble and expendi- 

 ture of time, everywhere received the Society's Inspection Com- 

 mittee with a hearty welcome and a British yeoman's hospitality, 

 we must add an acknowledgment that, in spite of our best 

 endeavours to arrive at the truth, there may still be errors in our 

 statistics and estimates. Our time and opportunities for after- 



