158 A FARMER'S YEAR 



the late member, as the baker tells me that, owing to the war 

 between Spain and America, and the cornering of wheat by 

 Yankee speculators, flour has already risen threepence a stone. 

 This the agricultural labourer, who very often is not logical, will 

 be pretty sure to score up against the Government, and by way of 

 protest vote for any one who opposes them. 



Wheat has risen over four shillings, and, for the first time since 

 I know not when, stands at more than forty shillings the quarter, 

 a price at which it will pay to grow. This, however, will not benefit 

 farmers much, seeing that in these parts most of them have long 

 ago sold every grain. Indeed, the majority of the small men are 

 in such chronic want of money that, in order to pay their labourers, 

 they are forced to rush their corn on to the market immediately 

 after harvest, no matter what may be the condition of the trade. 

 Most of mine has gone also, but I believe that here and at 

 Bedingham I have a hundred coomb that is fifty quarters left. 

 We must get it thrashed as soon as possible, for I have no faith in 

 the permanence of a boom in wheat, and quite expect that it will 

 come down as fast as it went up, although perhaps not to the level 

 which it reached a few years back. 



I think it was in 1894 that we were offered only eighteen 

 shillings or a pound a quarter for good wheat. As it was ridiculous 

 to sell at this price, I fed the pigs on it, and the following year put 

 but ten acres under corn for the sake of the straw. Free Trade 

 may, as many declare, be a boon sent straight from Heaven, but I 

 cannot help thinking that there is something wrong in a state of 

 affairs which forces farmers to accept twenty-two or twenty three 

 shillings for wheat that cost them about thirty to grow. Perhaps, 

 however, this is due to my stupid agricultural way of looking 

 at the question. 



Peachey is ploughing up the strip of land where the beet-hales 

 stood on the All Hallows nine-acre, No. 36, the last of these beet 

 having been carted into the shed. This space will be sown with 

 barley like the rest of the field, and though it will come in later 

 and be a different sample, the crop can always be used as food for 



