66 Improvements in Farming 



book in 1831 called Remarks on Thorough Draining and Deep 

 Ploughing, in which he advocated the system. He advertised his 

 success and people came long distances to see the evidences of it. 

 Smith's drains were 16 to 21 feet apart and 30 inches deep. 

 They were filled with stones to the depth of several inches, not 

 with straw as Simpson's were. It was later that the use of fire- 

 clay pipes or tiles became general. They were then subject to 

 a tax which made them expensive. 



8 



The Revolution in Agriculture 



MANUFACTURERS and merchants were as busy as farmers during 

 this period. Outside agriculture the woollen industry was still 

 the largest. The counties in which it chiefly flourished in the 

 early part of the eighteenth century were Norfolk, Yorkshire, 

 Gloucester, Wiltshire, Somerset, and Devon. Weavers generally 

 had their hand-looms in their houses, and there were few factories 

 until steam was discovered and labour-saving machinery invented. 

 Towards the end- of the century this change took place. Steam 

 was used to drive machines in which the labour had previously 

 been done by hand or occasionally by water-power. It was 

 then that the woollen industry was drawn from the eastern and 

 s Duth-western counties of England to the West Riding of York- 

 shire, and that the cotton industry took its strong hold in 

 Lancashire. We have seen how gradually agriculture took on its 

 modern form. The younger industries made more rapid progress. 

 Between 1770 and 1820 most of them chose the places where 

 they flourish to-day. 



Agriculture, with which they had nearly all been linked up as 

 little offshoots, found that they were growing into great and 

 apparently independent rivals. Men were no longer part-time 

 farmers and part-time weavers or tailors or shoemakers. They 



