A Sixteenth- Century Farm. 321 



set in rows for future transplanting as quickset hedges. Sloes 

 and brambles were also cultivated, the former for verjuice, the 

 latter to be boiled with powdered chalk, as medicines for the 

 cows. 



The following month was the time for slaughtering the fat 

 cattle, which the superabundance of offcorn, beans and pease, 

 consequent on the recent harvest, had rendered prime for the 

 butcher. The mixture of oats and barley termed " dredge," 

 was thrashed out and malted, their straw used for winter 

 cattle feeding, and the overplus thrown on the yard to be 

 trampled into manure. Meat and fish were next smoked, 

 dried, and stored for winter consumption. Beans and garlic 

 were sown in the fields, gardens trenched, and the house 

 chimneys cleaned. 



The month of December having ushered in the winter, the 

 field husbandry ceased, and all hands were employed on 

 hedging and ditching, or the repairs and renovation of im- 

 plements. The Tudor farmer seldom troubled the tradesman. 

 He was his own blacksmith, and possessed a buttrice for 

 paring hoofs, and all the paraphernalia of the smithy. So 

 also in the saddlery department, where the " whit lether," 

 "nal" or " awl," ^ etc., were familiar to every husband- 

 man. Carpentry, joinery, and wheelwright's work occupied 

 others of the farmer's household. It was a capital oppor- 

 tunity for repairing all kinds of farm implements, carts 

 especially. Roads in winter were too "noyous" for wheel 

 traffic, and the maid took the butter to market, or the boy the 

 corn to the mill, on horseback, fitted with a short saddle raised 

 before and behind, called a pannel, and strapped to the horse 

 by means of a leathern girdle, technically termed a " wanty." 

 The ped, which was longer, served for heavier loads, and the 

 pack saddle, used up to late years in the North, was principally 

 in request for the conveyance of wool. Meanwhile the men 

 were renovating the cart's body, repairing the cart and wheel 

 ladders used during hay harvest, reclouting the axle-trees 

 with iron plates, and reshodding the felloes with iron stakes or 



^ See Glossary. 



