44 THE FRUIT INDUSTRY 



holding between 10 and 20 acres, and 2,000 by occupiers 

 holding over 20 acres, among the last-mentioned being 

 a few large growers who have from 100 to 500 or 600 

 acres each. Most of the fruit is consigned to provincial 

 markets, little of it coming to London, and the general 

 results are so good that when one of the witnesses before 

 the Committee Mr. William Welchman, a solicitor 

 of Wisbech, who himself farms 35 acres cf orchards 

 was asked, ' Do you know what is the return of money 

 to your district throughout the year ?' he replied : ' It 

 must be something enormous. It acts and reacts 

 throughout the whole of the district. It employs the 

 husband, the wife, the children, the baker, the grocer, 

 the merchant, the shopkeeper, the retailer, and the 

 wholesale man. It means a benefit all along the line. 

 It is astonishing/ 



I can supplement this very brief digest of the evidence 

 given before the Departmental Committee concerning 

 the Wisbech district by a few figures which may further 

 interest the reader, and will, at least, show that the 

 witnesses did not exaggerate. 



The total consignments of fruit despatched by rail 

 from Wisbech alone during the course of an average 

 season may be put at from 14,000 to 15,000 tons. A 

 record for a single night, taking both the Great Eastern 

 and the Midland and Great Northern Joint systems, 

 gives a total despatch (by passenger and goods trains) of 

 380 tons of fruit. The season starts in June with goose- 

 berries (of which 200 tons have been sent from Wisbech 

 in one day), and goes on with various crops until the 

 end of October. Strawberries are handled in very 

 large quantities, and even raspberries produce their 

 30 to 40 tons a day. The fruit is despatched in special 

 trains, running either ' passenger ' or ' goods,' and is 

 consigned mainly to such centres as Liverpool, Man- 



