10 AWAKENING OF ENGLAND. 



we learn that it was on the slopes of Ink pen 

 Beacon that Jethro Tull, the great agri- 

 culturist, used the first drill, and wrote the 

 book which revolutionised English agricultural 

 methods ! 



On the other side of the valley, instead of 

 fields growing corn, as I have no doubt they 

 did in Tull's day, we see acres and acres 

 covered with young fir-trees as covert for 

 game. 



" This is to my taste," wrote Cobbett, 

 "and here in the north of Hampshire it has 

 its full gratification. I like to look at the 

 winding side of the great Down with two or 

 three numerous flocks of sheep on it, belonging 

 to different farms ; and to see lower down the 

 folds in the fields ready to receive them for 

 the night." I wonder what Cobbett would 

 have said to the winding side of the great 

 Down to-day, converted into a rabbit-warren 

 and a pheasant preserve ! 



Though he always had an eye for beauty, 

 it had, as I have said, to be the beauty of 

 agricultural fecundity. He could see no 

 beauty where poverty stalked the land. In 

 1822 wages at Hurstbourne Tarrant, at the 

 other end of this valley, had dropped from 8s. 



