50 DAYS STOLEN FOR SPORT 



I saw stacks of sweet old meadow hay, ricks of well- 

 saved corn, upstanding gates and well-trimmed 

 hedges, housed carts and implements ; and all had 

 a tongue to say : " There is heart and pride in our 

 farming." 



Sleek coats on horses' backs, fat bullocks' level 

 rumps, restful pigs and chuckling hens all told of 

 plenty. Rabbits' ear-tips amongst the grass ; hares 

 springing from their forms and going away with a 

 sideway gallop ; partridges calling their newly 

 hatched broods, and cock pheasants strutting and 

 pecking near the coppice, showed that their market 

 value had not been needed by my friend. And 

 last, but by no means least, the growing crops were 

 free of weeds and the fallows clean. 



The farm is an extensive one, with about 200 

 acres of arable land, rich, deep, and responsive 

 to its treatment. It is possible that my friend's 

 good fortune in possessing such fruitful fields 

 is responsible for his pronounced opinion that 

 there is more merit in muck than in science, for 

 he spoke with some warmth on the subject : 



" Our scientific friends who would teach us how 

 to farm have made us think and talk a bit but, 

 unfortunately, they don't stay long enough on a 

 place to show us that their scientific methods are 

 better than our old-fashioned ways. Going to an 

 Agricultural College they get matured opinions as 

 to the capabilities of a farm, by a few experiments, 

 before they are twenty-one, while it has taken us 

 all our lives to learn the temper of our fields. 

 Artificials are all very well as a tonic, but we rely 

 on something more substantial to give us weight 

 and quality at harvest." 



