JANUARY 49 



Indeed, I suspect that any man, however strong, who was not 

 accustomed to this kind of toil, would be utterly exhausted long 

 before his eight or ten hours were finished. 



In the lane leading to this meadow I found the wildflower 

 called green-arrow in bloom in the hedgerow ; also, nestling under 

 the shelter of the bank and white-thorn roots, the bright green 

 leaves of the vigorous black parsley (Smyrnium Olusatrum). For 

 years I have noticed that such signs of coming spring show first 

 in this lane, and very welcome is the sight of the shining 

 leaf of that weed after the long and dreary months of winter. 

 The reason that vegetation appears here so soon is that at this 

 spot the fall of the land is steep, and the rain of hundreds, or very 

 possibly of thousands, of years, has by degrees lowered the road- 

 way once, no doubt, a bridle track till at places it lies eight or 

 nine feet below the surface level of the fields that border it. 

 Therefore the banks are very sheltered, and those herbs and flower 

 roots that nestle in them can thrust out their new growths a month 

 before their companions unprotected by the bank dare even to wake 

 from the winter sleep. This year, however, vegetation is at least 

 three weeks before its time; thus, on my way home I noticed 

 bees working busily at the hives in the farm orchard, and by the 

 east windows of this house I found the Pyrus Japonica in bud 

 and bloom. This, I think, is something of a record for Norfolk 

 on the 6th of January. 



January 7. To-day was my rent audit. It is held at an inn 

 in Bungay, where the tenants of this estate, which, although not 

 large, is scattered, assemble once a year to pay their rent and dine, 

 Rent audits of late years, in the Eastern Counties, have been 

 something like the play of ' Hamlet ' without the Prince of Den- 

 mark ; that is to say, their first cause, the rent, has been, if not 

 conspicuous by its absence, at least very painfully diminished. 

 The accounts of any Norfolk estate for the year 1897 are indeed 

 a melancholy document if compared with those, let us say, of the 

 year 1867. This property is no exception. 



