AG R 



24 



AGR 



mans, unlike many conqnerors, instead ] times. The various operations of hns- 

 of desolating, improved the countries bandry, such as manuring, ploughing, 

 which they subdued. They seldom or i sowing, harrowing, reaping, threshing, 

 never burned or laid waste conquered ! winnowing, &c., are incidentally men- 



countries, but laboured to civilize the 

 inhabitants, and introduce the arts ne- 

 cessary for promoting their comfort and 

 happiness. To facilitate communica- 

 tions from one district or town to an- 

 other, seems to have been a primary 



tioned by the writers of those days, but 

 it is impossible to collect from thein a 

 definite account of the manner in which 

 those operations were performed. — 

 The first English treatise on husbandry 

 was published in the reign of Henry 



object with them, and their works of j VIII., by Sir A. Fitzherbert, Judge of 

 this kind are still discernible in nume- the Common Pleas. It is entitled the 

 rous places. By employing their troops ! Book of Husbandry, and contains direc- 



in this way, when not engaged in active 

 service, their commanders seem to have 

 had greatly the' advantage over our 

 modern generals. The Roman soldiers, 

 instead of loitering in camps, or rioting 

 in towns, enervating their strength, and 

 corrupting their morals, were kept re- 

 gularly at work, on objects highly bene- 

 ficial to the interests of those whom the_v 

 subjugated. — In the ages of anarchy 

 and barbarism which succeeded the fall 

 of the Roman empire, agriculture was 

 almost wholly abandoned. Pasturage 

 was preferred to tillage, because of the 

 facility with which sheep, o.xen, &c., 

 fan be driven away or concealed on 

 the approach of an enemy. — The con- 

 quest of England by the Normans con- 

 tributed to the improvement of agri- 

 culture in Great Britain. Owing to that 

 event, many thousands of husbandmen, 

 from the fertile and well-cultivated 

 plains of Flanders and Normandy, set- 

 tled in Great Britain, obtained farms, 

 and employed the same methods in cul- 

 tivating them, wliich the^had been ac- 

 customed to use in their native coun- 



tions for draining, clearing and enclos- 

 ing a farm, for enriching the soil, and 

 rendering it fit for tillage. Lime, marl 

 and fallowing are strongly recommend- 

 ed. ' The author of the Book of Hus- 

 bandry,' says Mr. Loudon, ' writes 

 from his own experience of more than 

 forty years, and, if we except his biblical 

 allusions, and some vestiges of the su- 

 perstition of the Roman writers about 

 the influence of the moon, there is very 

 little of his work which should be omit- 

 ted, and not a great deal that need be 

 added, in so far as respects the culture 

 of corn, in a manual of husbandrv adapt- 

 ed to the present time.' — Agriculture 

 attained some eminence during the 

 reign of Elizabeth. The principal writ- 

 ers of that period were Tusser, Googe 

 and Sir Hugh Piatt. Tusser's Five 

 Hundred Points of Husbandry was pub- 

 lished in 1562, and conveys much use- 

 ful instruction in metre. The treatise 

 of Barnaby Googe, entitled Whole Art 

 of Husbandry, was printed in 1558. Sir 

 Hugh Piatt's work was entitled Jewel 

 Houses of Art and Nature, and was 



tries. Some of the Norman barons printed in 1594. In the former work, 

 were great improvers of their lands, and says Loudon, are many valuable hints 

 were celebrated in history for their skill i on the progress of husbandry in the early 

 in agriculture. The Norman clergy, : part of the reign of Elizabeth. Among 

 .ind especially the monks, did still more i other curious things, he asserts that the 

 in this way than the nobility. The ' Spanish or Merino sheep was originally 

 monks of every monastery retained such derived from England. — Several writers 

 of their lands as they could most con- | on agriculture appeared in England dur- 

 veniently take charge of, and these they ing the commonwealth, whose names, 

 cultivated with great care under their i with notices of their works, may be seen 

 own inspection, and frequently with | in Loudon's Encyclopidia of Agricul- 

 their own hands. The famous Thomas ture. From the Restoration down to 

 a Becket, after he was Archbishop of [ the middle of the eighteenth century, 

 Canterbury, used to go out into the field | agriculture remained almost stationary. 



^ith the monks of the monastery where 

 he happened to reside, and join with 

 them in reaping their corn and making 



Immediately after that period , consider- 

 able improvement in the process of cul- 

 ture was introduced by Jethro Tull, a 



their hay. The implements of agricul- ! gentleman of Berkshire, who began to 

 ^ire, at this period, were similar to 1 drill wheat and other crops about the 

 ihose in most cornmon use in modern I year 1701, and whose Horse-hoeing 



