142 AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND. 



farmers, of whom there are many, are suffering most severely, 

 as they have not saved any thing in good times to fall back 

 upon now. Some of them are, indeed, greatly reduced, and 

 we heard of one who had applied to his parish for relief. 

 Others have sold every thing off their farms, and some, we 

 were told, had not even seed corn left with M hich to sow 

 their fields. 



&quot; In a fine country, with a gently undulating surface and a 

 soil dry and easy of culture, laid into large fields moderately 

 rented, one is surprised to hear that there is so much com 

 plaint and so much real suffering among the poorer class of 

 farmers. It is only in part accounted for by the devastation 

 of game, which on this and some other noblemen s estates in 

 North Northamptonshire is still most strictly preserved. On 

 the 24th of January last, seven guns, as we were told, on the 

 marquis s estate killed 430 head of game, a most immoderate 

 quantity at such a late period of the season. The fields are 

 all stuck about with bushes to prevent the poachers netting; 

 and the farmers feel most severely the losses they sustain in 

 order that their landlord and his friends may not be deprived 

 of their sport. The strict preservation of game on this and 

 some other estates in the northern parts of the county was 

 described to us in the bitterest terms, as completely eating 

 up the tenant farmer, and against which no man can farm or 

 live upon the farm. It is the last ounce that breaks the 

 camel s back, and men who might have made a manful 

 struggle against blighted crops and low prices, are overborne 

 by a burden which they feel to be needlessly inflicted and of 

 which they dare not openly complain. 



&quot; In consequence of the distress among the small farmers 

 many of the labourers would have been thrown out of em 

 ployment had work not been found for them by the marquis 

 in stubbing and clearing woodland, which will thus be re- 



