no A FARMER'S YEAR 



show where the trenches have been cut. The land at Bedingham 

 Looked drier to-day than I ever remember seeing it at this time of 

 year. 



February 19. There has been little to record during the 

 past week. The weather has been dull with a good deal of wind, 

 which rose to a strong westerly gale on the i6th, and on the whole 

 mild. We have been carting a quantity of manure from the 

 various yards, also delivering the wheat which was sold upon 

 the 1 2th after it had been cleaned, or dressed as we call it, in 

 the winnowing machine. On the iyth we ploughed the Ape 

 field, No. 27 (I wonder how it got that name; perhaps because a 

 monkey escaped on it in some past age). This field is to be sown 

 with barley, but as the soil has gone down tight, it was thought 

 advisable to give it a second ploughing. The three ploughs finished 

 it to-day and began re-ploughing No. 25, opposite, also for barley. 



A day or two ago the principal hotel in Bungay, called the 

 King's Head, together with another inn in Bridge Street, was 

 put up for public auction. I think that they are the last 

 ' free ' houses in the town ; that is, houses the occupiers of which 

 are entitled to sell any beer that they or their customers may 

 prefer. All the other houses, and their name is legion, are ' tied ' 

 houses ; in other words, they have been purchased by various firms 

 of brewers, and are forced to sell the beer made by their owner 

 exclusively, whether it be good, bad, or indifferent. 1 To my mind, 

 speaking as the chairman of a bench of magistrates, who has now 

 had a good many years of experience in matters connected with the 

 licensing of public houses, this ' tied ' house system is a crying 

 evil. In practice it constitutes a monopoly of the worst sort. The 

 license granted by the magistrates is nothing more or less than 



1 In some parts of England, I am told, the brewers oblige their nominees 

 in tied houses to purchase through them groceries and other goods besides 

 the drink they retail. This is an arrangement from which the firm supplying 

 the articles sucks no small advantage, but I have not heard that it is in force 

 in these counties. 



