1112 



STATISTICS OF AGRICULTURE. 



Part IT. 



congresatsd together in towns ; for the Iwaees of their labour 

 depends, in most cases, as the wages of all labour ought to do, 

 on the demand and the supply ; whereas the weekly wages of 

 the agricultural labourer depends but too often on the decision 

 of the parochial vestry. The consequences of this state of 

 things are ruinous to the rustic labourer, and call loudly for 

 legislative interference, and general sympathy. The extraor- 

 dinary exertions at present making by the different classes of 

 mechanics, to enlighten and ameliorate themselves, cannot 

 fail in a short time to awaken the dormant powers of the 

 country labourer. 



15. Means of Improvement: 

 t There are reading societies in most of the principal towns : 



to be regretted that the funds of the board of agriculture do 

 not permit it to circulate cheap agricultural books ; agricul- 

 tural books have as large a sale m Derbyshire as in most other 

 counties; some take the " Farmers' Magazine", and a great 

 number the " Farmers' Journal" ; which, if the stamp dutv 

 were taken off, would greatly increase in circulation, and \ye 

 an incalculable soiurce of improvement. An agricultural soci- 

 ety at Derby, since 1794; a society for fat wether sheep at 

 Repton: at Hay field, a society of mountain sheep keepers,, 

 since 1790. A list given by Farey of ninety-three agricultural 

 societies in England and Wales. 'The late Earl of Chesterfield's 

 premiums annually to his tenants, as recorded in the Farmers* 

 Journal, 27th December 1813, and 15th January 1816. 



7015. NOTTINGHAMSHIRE. 480,000 acres of uneven or hilly surface, in great part a sandy soil, and 

 more a corn than a pasture county. It contains the Forest of Sherwood, the only one belonging j,to the 

 Crown, north of the Trent The report is one of the most defective and least interesting which the board 

 have published, and is besides above a fourth of a century old. {Lowe's Report, 1798. Marshal's Review j 

 1812. Smith's Geological Map, 1821.) 



1. Geographical State and Circumstances. 

 CKtna<e, comparatively dry. 

 Soil, chiefly sandy, great part clayey, and the remainder a 



lime and coal district. 

 Minerals. Stone, lime, coal, gypsum, and marl. 



2. Property. 

 Estates from 12,000/. a year, downwards. 



3. Buildings. 

 Few countries contain more gentlemens' seats in proportion 



to its size. Alston Grove, a noble residence ; the gardens 

 formerly in the ancient ;style, but lately. modernised. Clum- 

 ber Park, contains four thousand acres. Newstead Abbey, 

 celebrated as having been the residence of the Byron family ; 

 but now sold and divided. Thoresby Park, thirteen miles 

 round. Welbeck Abbey, the scene of the horticultural im- 

 provements of Mr. Speechly. Woolaston Hall, a singular 

 mansion of the date of Queen Elizabeth, by Thorpe, the same 

 architect who built Holland House, near London. Farm- 

 houses " not very spacious," of brick and tile, sometimes 

 thatched ; now and then of stud and mud. Good farmeries, 

 and centrical on the new enclosures. 



7016. LINCOLNSHIRE. 1,848,320 acres of uplands, vale and water formed lands. The soil in most 

 places rich, and chiefly devoted to grazing : yielding on an average more beef and mutton per acre, than any 

 county in the island. Examples of embanking, draining, and warping, are numerous along the sea-coast 

 and the Humber. {Stone's Report, 1799. Arthur Young's, 1794. Marshal's Review, 1812.) 



4. Occupation. ' 



Few farms exceed 300/. per annum : generally from 10L. 

 to 20/. Few leases .J . _ _ 



5. Implements. " 

 Rotheram plough general ; waggons have wide frames move 



able for harvest use., 



6. Various. 



Enclosing going on rapidly; in arable culture, rotations 

 good, but no remarkable practice mentioned ; various hop 

 grounds and orchards, many woods and plantations ; exten- 

 sive woods raised from seed on the Welbeck and Clumber 

 estates; the ground is first cleared of surface incumbrances, 

 then cropped with corn two years, and turnips one year ; the 

 fourth year, acorns, at the rate of four or six bushels, ash keys 

 four, hawthorn berries one, and Spanish chestnuts one bushel, 

 are sown broadcast on an acre, and ploughed in. The stock- 

 ing trade, cotton and silk manufacture, potterv, and various 

 others carried on at Nottingham and other towns. 



1. Geographical State and Circumstances, 

 airmie, formerly unhealthy in the low parts, now the ague 



much less frequent. N. E. winds prevail in spring ; much of 

 the rain in summer from the northern and eastern quarters. 



Surface, a great extent of low land, once marsh, and fen 

 along the coast, now rich land in consequence of the embank- 

 ments and drainage, which have been going on for nearly two 

 centuries. Adjoining the lowlands are the wolds or calcareous 

 hills, and the mainland part of the country is in general flat 

 and uninteresting. Some parts of the county, however, as 

 abou tEalby, Spilsby, Stainton, &c. are varied and wooded, 

 and command fine views of the low country. 

 . SoU. There are larre districts of clay, sand, loam, chalk, 

 peat, and considerable extent of mixed soils. 



2. Property. 



Very much divided in the isle of Axholm ; inhabitants col- 

 lected in hamlets and villages, and almost every one is pro- 

 prietor and farmer of from one to forty acres, as in France ; 

 and as in that country, every farm cultivated by the hands of 

 the family, and the family poor as to money, but happy as to 

 their mode of existence. " Theipoorer farmers and other fe- 

 milies work like negroes, and do not live half so well as the 

 inhabitants of a poor-house ; but all is made amends by pos- 

 sessing land." Lord Carrington, Sir John Sheffield, and 

 Goulton, Esq. great proprietors in the county ; largest estate 

 25,000/. a year, others of 14, 11, 10, 8, 7, &c. and six of 

 2000/. a year. Lacely, a pretty vHlage, " where each man lives 

 on his own." , , , . 



In the management of a great estate, " 1 remarked a circum- 

 stance at Revesby, the use of which I experienced in a multi- 

 tude of instances. The liberality of Sir Joseph Banks opened 

 every document for my inspection ; and admiring the singular 

 facility with which he laid his hand on papers, whatever the 

 subject might be, I could not but remark the method that 

 proved of such sovereign efficacy to prevent conftision. His 

 office, of two rooms, is contained in the space of thirty feet by 

 sixteen ; there is a brick partition between, with an iron plated 

 door, so that the room in which a fire is always burning, might 

 be burnt down without affecting the inner one ; where he has 

 156 drawers of the size of an ordinary conveyance, the inside 

 being thirteen inches wide, by ten broad, and five and a half 

 deep, all numbered. There is a catalogue of names and sub- 

 jects, and a list of every paper in every drawer ; so that whether 

 the enquiry concerned a man, or a drainage, or an enclosure, 

 or a farm, or a wood, the request was scarcely named before a 

 mass of information was in a moment before me. Fixed tables 

 are before the windows (to the south), on which are spread 

 maps, plans, &c. commodiously, and those labelled, are ar- 

 ranged against the wall. The first room contains desks, ta- 

 bles, and book-case, with measures, levels, &c. and a wooden 

 case, which when open, forms a book-case, and joining in the 

 centre by hinges, when closed, forms a package ready for the 

 carrier's waggon, containing forty folio paper-cases in the form 

 of books ; a repository of such papers as are wanted equally in 

 town and country. Such an apartment, and such an appa- 

 ratus, must ba of incomparable use in the management of any 

 great estate : or, indeed, of any considerable business. At 

 Wintringham, Lord Carrington has a man employed, whose 

 only business is to be constantly walking over every part of the 

 estate in succession, in order to see if the fences are in order : 

 if a post or rail is wanting, and the quick exposed, he gives 

 notice to the farmer, and attends again to see if the defect is 

 remedied." (Young's Report.) 



3. Buildings. , , 

 Several good new farm-houses ; old cottages of shed and 



roud, thatched; but new ones of brick, and tiled. 



4. Occupation. 



Farms on the Wolds, from 300 to 1500 acres, on the rich 

 lands 400 and 500 acres, downwards ; many very small. The 

 late Sir .roseph Banks declined throwing his farms together, 

 because he would not distress the occupiers, though he lost 

 considerably in rentat by it. Farmers met with at ordinaries, 

 liberal, industrious, active, enlightened, free from all foolish 

 and expensive show, or pretence to emulate the gentry ; they 

 live comfortably and hospitably, as good farmers ought to 

 live ; and in my opinion, are remarkably void of those rooted 

 prejudices which sometimes abound among this race of men. 



1 met with many who had mounted their nags, and quitted 

 their homes, purposely to examine other parts of the kingdom ; 

 and had done it with enlarged views, and to the benefit of 

 their own cultivation." Leases rare. 



5. Implements. 



Plough with wheel coulter used in the fen tract as in other 

 tens ; the wheel coulter being considered as better adapted for 

 ploughing among stubble and couch grass than the sword one. 

 Plans given of a cover of canvas and boards for ricks, and a 

 boat with a net fence round for conveying sheep ; at best, we 

 fear, but an expensive incumbrance on agriculture. 



6. Arable Land. 



Near Market Deeping the common fields in alternate ridges 

 of pasture and. arable, the latter gathered high ; three 

 to five horses used in both plough and cart teams ; wood 

 extensively cultivated by Cartwright, at Brotherstoft farm, 

 near Boston. Parsley sown along with clover to prevent the 

 rot. 



7. Various. 



" Rich grazing land the glory of Lincolnshire." In some 

 places will carry six sheep per acre, or four bullocks to ten acres. 

 One of the most extensive graziers is T. Fydell, Esq., M.P. at 

 Boston. Very few orchards ; some considerable young plan- 

 tations on the Wolds, but not much old timber. 



8. Improvements. 



Most extensive drainages and embankments. Deeping fen- 

 drained, which extends eleven miles to Spalding. 10,000 acres 

 taxable, for maintaining the drains and banks, which are ma- 

 naged by a commission. Through all the fens what is called 

 the soak exists ; viz. water, supposed to be that of the sea, rising 

 and falling in a substratum of silt ; hence low-lying land al- 

 ways charged with moisture to a certain height. Sticklebacks 

 sometimes sold at a half-penny a bushel, and used as manure. 

 In the Wolds dry straw spread on the land and burned. 



Embankments. Since 1630, 10,000 acres have been saved 

 from the sea in the parish of Long Sutton, and 7000 acres more 

 might now be taken in, by altering the channel of the river. 

 Holland fen is a country that absolutely exists but by the secu- 

 rity of its banks; they are under commissioners, and very well 

 attended to. 



At Humberstone there is a large piece taken in from the sea 

 by a low bank, which is well sloped to the sea, but too steep to 

 the land, so that if the sea topped it, the bank must break. 

 Great tracts of valuable land remain yet to be taken in from the 

 sea about North .Somercots, and other places on that coast ; 

 but " I do not find that any experiments have been made in Sir 

 Hyde Page's method of making hedges or gorse facines, and 

 leaving the sand to accumulate of itself into a bank. Men- 

 tioning this to Neve, he informed me, that he had ob- 

 served at least a hundred times, that if a gorse bush, or any 

 other impediment, was by accident met by the sea, it was sure 

 to form a hillock of sand." The extent of sand dry at low 

 water on this coast is very great ; the difference between high 

 and low water mark extending even to two miles. 



