ENGLAND 



2913 



ENGLAND 



attracted the people from the 

 farms and also drew to the urban 

 nuclei large numbers from other 

 parts of England. Similar conclu- 

 sions may be drawn from an in- 

 vestigation concerning the popula- 

 tion of the W. Riding ; the farming 

 areas tend to decline in population, 

 the purely mining areas increase 

 steadily, the iron-working and 

 textile^areas increase rapidly, the 

 latter especially from the advent of 

 female immigrants. 



English towns may be divided 

 into 7 groups : 1. The ring of 

 dormitory towns round London : 

 East Ham, West Ham, Wimbledon, 

 Richmond, etc- 2. Factory towns 

 for textiles, pottery, iron goods, 

 etc. : Manchester, Leeds, Bradford, 

 Birmingham, etc. 3. Mining towns : 

 Barnsley, Nuneaton, etc. 4. Trans- 

 port centres : Crewe, Swindon, 

 Liverpool, Bristol, Hull, etc. 5. 

 Historic market towns : Oxford, 

 Chester, Bath, Canterbury, etc. 6. 

 Playgrounds : Brighton, Scar- 

 borough, Blackpool, etc. 7. Towns 

 of specialised industry : Reading, 

 Luton, Bedford, etc. 



INDUSTRIES. TRADE, COMMUNICA- 

 TION. England grows 2 p.c. of the 

 world's wheat and oats, 4 p.c. of 

 the barley, and contains 2 p.c. of 

 the world's cattle and horses, and 

 3 p.c. of the sheep. These products 

 only supply a fraction of the cereals 

 and meat required by the inhabit- 

 ants, with the result that England 

 is proportionally the greatest food 

 importing country in the world. 

 The wheat is grown chiefly N. of 

 the Thames, and E. of a line drawn 

 from London to Goole. In the 

 U.K., with a small increase in pro- 

 duction and a decrease in imports 

 of wheat during the Great War, 

 the proportion of home-grown to 

 the total consumption of wheat in- 

 creased from 22 to 21 p.c. Oats are 

 spread over the lowlands. The 

 largest count}' yields are in the E. 

 Riding and Cambridgeshire, but do 

 not equal those of E. Ulster. In 

 Cheshire three-quarters of the 

 arable land is devoted to oats to 

 supply the local needs. Only a 

 small proportion of the oats con- 

 sumed in England is grown outside 

 the U.K. Barley is grown in the 

 driest E. counties, Norfolk, Suffolk, 

 and Lincoln; thedryness of the har- 

 vest improves malting quality, and 

 the warm spring yields specially 

 valuable crops. During the Great 

 War the quantity of barley grown 

 was considerably diminished. 

 Cattle and Dairy Farming 



Cattle are most numerous in the 

 W. lowlands, extending from the 

 plains round Morecambe Bay in a 

 wide sweep along the Severn valley 

 into the Cornish peninsula, where 

 the rainfall exceeds 40 ins. an- 



nually, and the clays and alluvial 

 flats yield rich meadow grass. A 

 third of the cattle belongs to dairy 

 farmers. The great centres of popu- 

 lation have brought into existence 

 many small farmers with small 

 herds of milkers on poor grass-land. 

 The demand of London has pro- 

 duced special rly. facilities for 

 bringing the milk from as far as 

 the Vale of Pe \vsey. in Wiltshire. 

 In Cheshire the dairymen sup- 

 ply the cotton towns with milk, 

 and make cheese ; Derbyshire 

 and Leicestershire produce Stilton 

 cheese. Cornwall is almost purely a 

 cattle county, the milk being made 

 into butter and clotted cream. In 

 Devon the cattle are reared for their 

 milk as in Cornwall, but also for the 

 butcher, being sold to graziers as 

 two-year olds and sent to the Mid- 

 lands or Hampshire. During the 

 Great War the number of cattle in- 

 creased by at least 5 p.c. 



Sheep Runs and Farm Lands 



Great Britain contains probably 

 the largest number of sheep in pro- 

 portion to area of any country. 

 Kent has the most sheep per sq. m., 

 the short pasture and dryness of 

 the chalk hills being specially suit- 

 able. Wiltshire, Dorset, Lincoln- 

 shire, and the E. Riding are great 

 sheep counties for the same reason. 

 The hill slopes of Shropshire, Here- 

 ford, Monmouth, Northumber- 

 land, and Cumberland are also im- 

 portant. The number of sheep de- 

 clined by 16 p.c. during the Great- 

 War, in Wiltshire and Hampshire 

 the decline amounting to 30 p.c. 



In thousandths of the total area 

 of England the proportions of the 

 various kinds of farm lands are as 

 follow : Mountain and heath used 

 for grazing, 84 ; permanent grass, 

 392; oats, 70; wheat, 66; barley, 

 44; mixed corn and rye, 7; beans 

 and peas, 14; potatoes, 14; turnips, 

 swedes, and mangolds, 40 ; clover 

 arid other rotation grass, 62 ; bare 

 fallow, 20. The average number of 

 animals per 1,000 acres are respec- 



lation. Devon and Cheshire are 

 wet, and Cheshire is near populous 

 S.E. Lancashire. The minor crops 

 of Essex are beans, peas, potatoes, 

 and other roots; glasshouses supply 

 grapes, tomatoes, etc., to Co vent 

 Garden ; there are numerous seed 

 and fruit farms : rose culture is im- 

 portant. The cattle supply much 

 milk to London. 



t Devon has few towns ; the wheat 

 yield per acre is one of the lowest 

 in England; apples, pears, plums, 

 etc. , are largely grown ; Devon 

 cattle fetch high prices and Devon- 

 shire cream is celebrated. Cheshire 

 grows considerable quantities of 

 potatoes, and roots for winter feed ; 

 damsons are the chief stone 

 fruit; the cattle consist chiefly of 

 dairy cows. 



Lincolnshire is definitely a farm- 

 ing county ; the acreage under 

 barley roughly equals that under 

 wheat, and exceeds that of any 

 other county ; peas, beans, pota- 

 toes, and other roots are important 

 crops ; Lincoln shorthorns are good 

 milkers and Lincoln sheep are ex- 

 ported for breeding to the S. hemi- 

 sphere. A large proportion of the 

 cattle are bred for the butcher. 



Comparing the tabulated results, 

 it appears that the wetter W. has 

 a relative excess of permanent 

 grass and cattle, the cattle of Che- 

 shire being 60 p.c. above the aver- 

 age. Devon has above the average 

 number of sheep. All four counties 

 exceed the average in oats, but the 

 greater excess is in the wet west. 

 In the drier counties Essex has an 

 exceptional area under wheat and 

 Lincolnshire under barley ; the W. 

 has little of either crop. Essex has 

 below the average in both sheep 

 and cattle. 



Distribution of Coalfields 



In estimating the value of min- 

 ing in the U.K. and in England in 

 relation to the rest of the world, it 

 is necessary to consider the statis- 

 tics for the period immediately 

 preceding the Great War. The 



PROPORTIONS OF CROPS AND ANIMALS PER 1,000 ACRES 



Essex .. . 

 Devon . . 

 Cheshire 

 Lincolnshire 



tively : horses, 38 ; cattle, 166 ; 

 sheep, 420 ; pigs, 50. 



A comparison between these 

 average values for England a.s a 

 whole, and the return for four 

 selected counties, indicates roughly 

 the effect of climate and soil upon 

 the farmer's work. 



Essex is dry and near London ; 

 Lincolnshire is equally dry, but 

 distant from dense areas of popu- 



chief English mineral is coal. A 

 quarter of the world's coal was 

 mined in the U.K., one-fifth in 

 England alone. To get this coal 

 occupied about a million workers, 

 so that about 10 p.c. of the U.K. 

 population was dependent upon 

 the collieries. The distribution of 

 the coalfields depends upon the 

 presence of the carboniferous rocks, 

 but the E. coalfields, in particular 



P 4 



