326 EUROPEAN AGRICULTURE. 



although the grain market is always distinct from the general 

 market, sometimes in the same place but at a different hour, but, 

 in most cases, on the same day but in a different place. All 

 grain here goes under the general denomination of corn. In a 

 great many towns, large and elegant halls are erected for what is 

 called the Corn Exchange, where the farmers, millers, corn- 

 factors, and grain-merchants, assemble for this particular object 

 exclusively. In some cases, these buildings have considerable 

 pretensions to architectural elegance ; and many of them larger 

 pretensions to utility and convenience, as there are connected 

 with them extensive rooms and chambers for the storage of 

 grain. 



1. FORMS OF BUSINESS. The general standard of measure is 

 a quarter, which consists of eight imperial bushels, though still, 

 in some markets, the reckoning is by loads of three bushels. 

 The markets are of two kinds, one by sample the grain to be 

 delivered on a future day ; the others are in some parts of the 

 country called pitch markets, where the grain is brought into 

 the market, and sold and delivered at the same time. In these 

 market-houses, the factors, or sellers of grain, have their respec 

 tive stands, with the necessary appurtenances of counting desk 

 and writing implements, and with the various samples of grain 

 exhibited in boxes or bags before them. In some markets, I 

 have found many of the factors and farmers bringing their sam 

 ples of grain, in small bags, in their hands and pockets. In most 

 cases, the markets are opened and closed at fixed hours, and this 

 is notified by the ringing of a bell, to which there is universal 

 submission. Such habits of punctuality, in the transaction of 

 business, are of the highest importance ; and should there be 

 occasion, I beg leave strongly to commend them to my own 

 countrymen. The rules of commercial transactions cannot, in 

 my opinion, be too stringent and absolute ; yet certainly nothing 

 is more loose and slovenly than the ordinary modes of transacting 

 business in my own country ; and the necessary consequence is, 

 a great want of punctuality, and that dreadful curse of the com 

 munity, angry and interminable litigation. A fixed time to 

 begin and to close the market quickens both buyer and seller ; 

 but how often have I seen, especially in the country, men wast 

 ing the whole day, and chaffering, hour after hour, with all the 



