A JOURNAL KEPT IN THE COUNTRY. 35 



they be now. They'd give you bread and drippin' 

 at any farmhouse ; and taters was that cheap, afore 

 the blight come, why, you could have almost as 

 many as you wanted. And then, look at the work ! 

 After harvest, we'd sometimes be threshin' all the 

 year till the seed-cuttin' began ; and then if the 

 weather was rough, we could alias go back to the 

 barn again ; sometimes we had to thresh out to 

 make room for the new corn. Of course, you see, 

 that was always money comin' in. Now, when they 

 threshes with the machine, 'tis all done in a week. 

 And, oh dear, the waste of it too ! The corn falls into 

 the cavin's, and when that's laid a few months you 

 can see it all comin' up green with the wheat. In 

 the old time, if a man was threshin' and let his corn 

 get in the cavin's, in the barn, why, he'd hear on it ! 

 It was the same-like with harvest, and hayin', too. 

 That was harvest ; all mowin' no swappin' or 

 baggin'. The young chaps 'ud go upwards hay- 

 cuttin' : six shillin's a day we got, and as much stout 

 as we could drink ; and after that we'd time to get 

 back and do the cuttin' at home. I rec'lec' once 

 cuttin' all over where they built the Crystial Pallis ; 

 they let us have all the rabbits that was turned out 

 a lot on them there was, to be sure ! And once I 

 was mowin' at Nonsuch Park in Surrey, as you may 



