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at one time entirely done by oxen. They are still em- 

 ployed in carting, rolling, and drawing timber in tbe park, 

 where the sod being soft for their feet, they can work with- 

 out being shod. They are worked four at a time, and only 

 five days in the week, and in this manner stand their work 

 well. 



A considerable number of horses are bred in Berkshire, 

 chiefly of the cart kind ; and many colts are brought young 

 from Northamptonshire, and kept for two or three years 

 with gentle work. They are then sent to London as dray 

 horses, and in general obtain very good prices. In this 

 manner horses used in husbandry, instead of losing in value, 

 are often a source of greater profit than oxen worked two or 

 three years, and then fatted off. 



No great quantity of fat cattle is sent from Berkshire to 

 London. In the eastern part of the county a good many 

 calves are suckled, and are found on the whole more profit- 

 able than butter or cheese, and attended with much less 

 trouble ; but the chief advantage of calves is the addition 

 which they make to the dung of the yard, when they have a 

 liberal allowance of straw often renewed. This also con- 

 stitutes the chief profit of keeping pigs. 



Pig*- The breed of pigs in Berkshire is one of the best in 

 England. They are not of a very large size, although many 

 fattened at two years old wei^h twenty score when killed, 

 and some even more. The most common weight is from 

 twelve to fifteen score : the bone is small, and they fatten at 

 an early age and on little food two important qualities. 

 The true Berkshire breed is black with white spots, but 

 some are quite white : their snouts are short, jowls thick, 

 and their ears stand up. A mixed breed, produced by cross- 

 ing the Berkshire with the Chinese and Neapolitan breeds, 

 possesses improved qualities, although rather susceptible of 

 cold from being nearly without hair ; but they are superior 

 to most breeds for getting rapidly fat, and keeping in ex- 

 cellent condition on pasture, with very little additional food. 

 G. H. Crutchley, Esq. of Sunninghill Park, has a choice 

 breed of this kind ; and most of the cottagers' pigs in the 

 Forest district are of a superior description. Bacon is the 

 principal animal food of the labourers, and they are good 

 I of its qualities. 



Sheep. The Berkshire sheep called the not was a large 

 polled sheep, with coarse wool, useful for the fold on cold clay 

 soils, but coarse in the carcase. It is now almost superseded 

 by an improved breed produced by crosses from the old sheep 

 and the Leicesters, and by the South Down, which are now 

 the favourite breeds. Some of tbe Cotswold sheep, crossed 

 with the Leicester, produce a large sheep, which gets very 

 fat, and carries a heavy fleece of long wool : some of these 

 were lately purchased to send to Belgium to improve the sheep 

 in that country. Merinos were introduced by George III., 

 who had a Hock from Spain, and were at first in great request 

 on account of the fineness of their wool ; but they have qot 

 proved a profitable stock, owing perhaps to want of proper 

 management, and chiefly because they did not produce so 

 good carcasses for tbe butcher, which is now the chief profit 

 of the sheep. In Saxony the wool is the principal object; 

 and so much attention has been paid to the Spanish flocks 

 transplanted into that country, that their wool exceeds the 

 original Spanish wool in fineness. Before the inclosure of 

 Nor Forest there was a breed of small ragged-looking 

 sheep, with a light fleece of tolerably good short wnol, 

 called the heath sheep, which, when fatted at three or four 

 years old, produced tbe fine-flavoured Bagshot mutton much 

 prized by gourmands. These sheep were bred and kept in 

 the wastes of tbe forest, and sent annually in large flocks 

 into Buckinghamshire to be folded on the fallows. Not 

 being well attended to, many of them died, and sometimes, 

 in a wet spring, whole flocks were swept off by the rot; they 

 cost the proprietor little, and produced in general but sraaU 

 profit : they may still be seen, although in diminished num- 

 bers, on the heaths of Surrey and Hampshire which are 

 still uninclosed. 



We cannot close this brief account of the Berksnire agri- 

 culture without noticing the farm at Sbalburn, called Pros- 

 perous Farm, which was formerly that of the celebrated 

 Jethro Tull. The soil is a stiff chalky clay, such as must 

 be greatly benefited by being pulverized and stirred ; and 

 from this circumstance may be deduced Tull's system of 

 horse-hoeing, which at one time was thought so great a dis- 

 covery in agriculture as to be named, by way of pre-emi- 

 nence, the ' new husbandry.' But th erroneous theory which 

 be adopted with respert to tho food of plants, and his conse- 



quent neglect of manure and change of crops, led him and 

 his disciples into great mistakes, and ultimately caused his 

 ruin. (See Tull, On Horse-hoeing Husbandry.) It is 

 curious that although drilling, which was first introduced 

 by Tull, is practised pretty generally in the neighbourhood, 

 it is not so now on Prosperous Farm. 



There are numerous fairs and markets in the county of 

 Berks, some of which are very antient, and others of later 

 institution. The fairs at Reading are noted, especially that 

 for horses on the 25th of July, and for cheese on the 21st of 

 September. Ilsley sheep fairs are some of the largest after 

 the great fairs on the Wiltshire Downs : one is held on the 

 26th March, but the largest, called Lamb Fair, is on the 

 26th of August. On the market days, which are on Wed- 

 nesdays, a sheep fair is held every fortnight, from Easter till 

 shearing time, where large quantities of sheep are penned. 

 There are fairs also at Abingdon, Newbury, and all the pro- 

 vincial towns and villages, as the following list will show : 



Abingdon, first Monday in Lent, May 6, June 20, Au 

 gust 5, September 19, Monday before Old Michaelmas, 

 December 1 1 ; Arborfield, October 5 ; Aldermaston, May 6. 

 July 7, October 11 ; Bracknell, April 25, August 22, Octo- 

 ber 1 ; East Ilsley, March 26, Wednesday in Easter week, 

 and every other Wednesday till Whit- Wednesday, August 

 26, first Wednesday after September 29, Wednesday after 

 October 17, November 12; Farringdon, February 15, Whit- 

 Tuesday, October 29 ; Hungerford, last Wednesday in 

 April, August 10 : Lambourn, May 12, October 2, Decem- 

 ber 4; Mortimer, April 27, Nov. 6 ; Maidenhead, Whit- 

 Wednesday, September 29, November tfo ; Newbury, Holy 

 Thursday, July 5, September 4, October 14, November 8; 

 Oakingham, April 23, June 11, October 10, November 2; 

 Reading, February 2, May 1, July 25, September 21 ; 

 Thatcham, second Tuesday after Easter Week, first Tuesday 

 after September 29 ; Wallingford, June 24, September 29, 

 December 17 ; Wantage, first Saturday in March and May, 

 July 18, October 10 and 17; Windsor, Easter Tuesday, 

 July 5, October 24. 



Divisions, Towns, if-c. When the Domesday survey was 

 made, Berkshire was divided into twenty-two hundreds. 

 Wallingford and Windsor were assessed separately. The 

 hundreds have since been reduced to twenty, of which eleven 

 retain their antient names under a somewhat modernized 

 form. We give the antient hundreds, placing in a line with 

 them the modern hundreds with which they for the most 

 part coincide, and also the part of the county in which they 

 are situated. N. north ; S. south, &c. ; C. central. 



Antient. Modern. 



Benes, or Beners . . . Barnesh, or Beynhurst, E. 

 Blitberie (Blewbury) . . Moreton, N.E. 

 Borchedeberie, or Borchelde- \ Faircross, C. and S., and 

 berie (Bucklebury) . . ) Reading, N.E. 



Bray Bray, E. 



n , , iCharlton, S., Sonning, or 



' { Sunning, E., Wargrave, E. 



Cheneteberie,\ 



Eglei, 



Kentbury-Eagle, C. and S.W. 



Eletesford, Helitesford, or 1 Moreton, N.E., and Cook- 



Hesliteford .... I ham, S.E. 

 Gamesfel ..... Ganfield, N.W. 

 Hilleslau ..... Shrivenham, N.W. 

 Hornimere ..... Hormer, N. 



Lamborne, or Lambourn 

 Merceham (Marcham) . 



Nachededorne . . . 

 Radinges, or Redinges 



Lambourn, W. 

 Ock, N. and N.E. 



(Compton, C., and Faircross 

 \ C. ai 



and S. 



Reading and Theale, N.E. 

 Riplesmere . ~. RiplesmereandWargrave.E. 



Roeberg Faircross, C. and S. 



Seriveham, or Shrivenham Shrivenham, N.W. 

 Sudtone (Sutton) . . . Qck, or Oke, N. and N.E. 



Tacceham (Thatcham) . . fS^E* S " a " d 



Wanating, or Wanting . Wantage, C 



wt , (Faringdon, N.W., and Shri 



Wlio1 ' \ venham, E. 



Camden gives the number of parishes in the county at 

 140; Lysons gives them at 14S. By a comparison of the 

 list contained in tbe population returns with the best maps, 

 the number may be thus stated : Parishes wholly in Berks, 

 142; parishes partly in other counties, but which have either 

 the church or the principal group of bouses in Berkshire, 

 and may be therefore reckoned in that county, 9 ; parishes 



