APRIL 133 



although the beet upon the same field were splendid. Of course, 

 this may have been owing to the drought, but a tenant of mine 

 showed me some beautiful roots, long, straight, and clean, that he 

 had grown on light unmanured land. We have been dragging 

 this Thwaite field vigorously to get the twitch out of it, which upon 

 this soil is a fearsome and persistent weed. I wonder how many 

 turnbril-loads of twitch I have burnt upon the Thwaite field since 

 I began its cultivation ? And still the smoke of those fires goes 

 up ! 



The back lawn is being rolled also. It has been fed for either 

 two or three years, and is now to be set for hay. This pasture 

 has indeed a different face on it to that which it wore when I took 

 it in hand some eight or nine years ago. Then it was waterlogged 

 and mossy ; moreover, the tenant, I believe, had mown it for nine 

 years in succession, which of course he had no business to do. 

 Since then it has been pipe-drained at a cost of 5/. per acre, dressed 

 with basic slag, sown with trefoil seed, three pounds to the acre, 

 and heavily grazed, with the result that it is now as good a pasture 

 as any in the parish. I am always grateful to that back lawn, since 

 it was owing to a difference of opinion with my late tenant 

 concerning it that I took to farming, which, if as yet it has not 

 enriched me, has at least taught me many things about the ways of 

 Nature that seem good for a man to know, 



To-day is, in fact, the first of spring, whatever the calendar 

 may say to the contrary, the air being many degrees warmer not- 

 withstanding the high sou'-west wind. It is perfectly astonishing 

 to see the difference caused by only twenty-four hours of warmth 

 and sunshine. Fields that were brown, or only just tinged with 

 green, are now almost verdant ; the tulips have begun to blow, 

 and the primroses to appear in yellow clusters of tight buds and 

 star-like blooms. When, amidst the long succession of vile 

 samples that make up the English climate during the months of 

 March, April, and May, we do chance to ' happen on ' as they 

 say here a perfect day, how perfect it is ! How glad it makes us 

 also ; worries that seemed heavy enough before become suddenly 



