452 Oil the Cost of Ilorse-poicer. 



saddler's, farrier's bill per horse, tog-ether with the cost of main- 

 taining the value of the animal undepreciated; (4) the number 

 of horses worked upon the farm ; (5) tlie total cost of liorse-keep 

 on the farm, as made up of food and " extras ;" (6) the cost of 

 maintaining the implements in use at an undepreciated value — 

 viz. (except where I have been particularly instructed), 10 per 

 cent, upon an estimated expenditure of 11. per acre of the 

 arable land ; (7) the amount of wages paid to team-men, as cal- 

 culated from the particulars supplied to me, and explained in 

 sundry notes extracted from these reports ; (8) the total cost of 

 horse-labour on the farm ; (9 and 10) the total acreage of the 

 farm in arable and pasture land : (11, 12, 13, and 14) the acreage 

 of the several crops cultivated on the arable land, — fallow and 

 fallow crops including bare fallow, turnips, carrots, mangold- 

 wurzel, cabbage, &c. ; grain, including wheat, barley, oats, &c. ; 

 clover, including clover, sainfoin, lucerne, &c. ; and pulse, &c., 

 including beans, peas, and flax — the labour of cultivation given 

 to this last crop being considered equal to that given to beans or 

 peas. Lastly, we have (15 and 16) the cost of the horse-labour 

 of the farm per acre of the arable land, and per acre of the 

 actually ploughed land^ — i. e. excluding clovers, &c., as well as 

 permanent pastures. I must, however, direct attention to the 

 loot-note appended to the table, which points out the influence 

 of the pasture land upon the accuracy of these figures. 



I must not attempt here to read through all this table in detail, 

 so as to point out the information it contains : some words of 

 explanation will, however, be permitted me. Column 3 contains 

 the amount of annual depreciation per horse, together with 

 the cost of blacksmith's, saddler's, and farrier's bills. The sum 

 stated is generally an estimate, but upon a very commonly allowed 

 scale. The horse is valued at 30/., and the estimated annual 

 loss of value is 10 per cent., which will provide for the renewal 

 of the stock at a sufficiently short interval of time. To this 3/. 

 there is added 10s. a-year for the farrier, 10s. a-year for the 

 saddler, and 30s. a-year for the blacksmith — these all being sums 

 I have known contracts to be founded on. In many of the 

 reports which I received, the value of the horse is stated, but 

 either in so vague a way (as, for instance, " from 15/. to 45/."), 

 or with such limitations as to time (as, for instance, " if you had 

 asked me last year I should have stated 36/. instead of 26/."), 

 that it was better, so I thought, to assume a common value for 

 them all. One of the cases in which the actual fact, and not mere 

 estimate, is stated in this column, is that of my father's farm at 

 Whitfield, Gloucestershire. I have the accounts of that farm for 

 four of the earlier years of his occupation, during which 9 horses 



