788 PRACTICE OF AGRICULTURE. Part III. 



4865. Of the plants which the farmer has to choose for stock, the chief is the potato ; 

 and every one knows. that no circumstances in the soil, climate, or culture will compen- 

 sate for planting a bad sort. The potato requires a climate rather humid than otherwise, 

 and rather moderate and equable in temperature than hot : hence the best crops are 

 found in Lancashire, Dumfriesshire, and Ayrshire in Britain, and in Ireland, where the 

 climate is every where moist. Excellently flavoured potatoes are also grown on mossy 

 lands in most parts of the country. The prudent farmer will be particularly careful in 

 choosing this description of plant stock, and also in changing it frequently, so as to en- 

 sure prolificacy and flavour. The general result of experience is decidedly in favour of 

 unripe tubers for the purpose of propagation. A number of important papers on this 

 subject will be found in the first and second volumes of the Gardeners Magazine, all 

 confirmatory of the advantages of selecting tubers which are immature. 



Sect. III. Choice of Servants* 



4866. On the moral and professional character of his servants much of the comfort of 

 the farmer depends ; and every one who has farmed near large towns, and at a distance 

 from them, knows how great the difference is in every description of labourers. The 

 servants required in farmeries are, the bailiff or head ploughman, common ploughmen, 

 shepherds, labourers of all-work, herdsmen, and women. Sometimes apprentices and 

 pupils are taken ; but their labour is not often to be much depended on. 



4867. J[ baUiff"is required only in the largest description of farms, occupied by a pro- 

 fessional farmer ; and is not often required to act as market-man. In general young 

 men are preferred, who look forward to higher situations, as gentlemen's bailiffs or land 

 stewards. Most farmers require only a head ploughman, who works the best pair of 

 horses, and takes the lead of, and sets the example to, the other ploughmen in every 

 description of work. 



4868. Ploughmen should, if possible, be yearly servants, and reside upon the farm; if 

 married, cottages should be provided for them. Weekly or occasional ploughmen are 

 found comparatively unsteady ; they are continually wandering from one master to an- 

 other, and are very precarious supports of a tillage farm : for they may quit their service 

 at the most inconvenient time, unless bribed by higher wages ; and the farmer may thus 

 lose the benefit of the finest part of the season. Where ploughmen and day labourers, 

 however, are married, they are more to be depended upon than unmarried domestic 

 servants, more especially when the labourer has a family, which ties him down to regular 

 industry. 



4869. The mode of hiring servants at what are called public statutes, so general in 

 many parts of England, is justly reprobated as having a tendency to vitiate their minds, 

 enabling them to get places without reference to character, exposing good servants to be 

 corrupted by the bad, promoting dissipation, and causing a cessation of country business 

 for some days, and an awkwardness in it for some time afterwards. When hiring ser- 

 vants, it would be extremely important, if possible, to get rid of any injurious perquisites, 

 which are often prejudicial to the interests of the inaster, without being of any advantage 

 to the servant. For instance, in Yorkshire and in other districts it is a custom to give 

 farm servants liquor both morning and evening, whatever is the nature and urgency of 

 the work. Nothing can be more absurd than permitting a ploughman to stop for half 

 an hour in a winter day to drink ale, while his horses are neglected and shivering with 

 cold. 



4870. The folloiving plan (f maintaining the hinds or ploughmen in the best cultivaied 

 districts in Scotland, is found by experience to be greatly superior to any other mode 

 hitherto adopted. 



4871. Proper houses are built for the farm servants contiguous to every farmstead This gives them an 

 opportunity of settling in life, and greatly tends to promote their future welfare. Thus also the farmer 

 has his people at all times within reach for carrying on his business. 



4872. The farm servants, when married, receive the greater part of their wages in the produce of the 

 soil, which gives them an interest in the prosperity of the concern in which they are employed, and in a 

 manner obliges them to eat and drink comfortably ; while young men often starve themselves in order to 

 save money for drinking or clothes, in either of which cases they are deficient in the requisite animal 

 strength. At least under this mode of payment they are certain of being supplied with the necessaries of 

 life, and a rise of prices does not affect them ; whereas, when their wages are paid in money, they are 

 exposed to many temptations of spending it which their circumstances can ill afford, and during a rise of 

 prices they are sometimes reduced to considerable difficulties. From the adoption of an opposite system, 

 habits of sobriety and economy, so conspicuous among the farm servants of Scotland, and the advantages 

 of which cannot be too highly appreciated, have arisen and still prevail in these districts. 



4873. A most important branch of this system is, that almost every married man has a cow of a mode- 

 rate size kept for him by the farmer all the year round. This is a boon of great utility to his family. The 

 prospect of enjoying this advantage has an excellent effect upon the morals of young unmarried servants, 

 who in general make it a point to lay up as much of their yearly wages as will enable them to purchase a 

 cow and furniture for a house when they enter into the married state. These savings, under different cir- 

 cumstances, would most probably have been spent in dissipation. 



4874. They have also several other perquisites, as a piece of ground for potatoes and flax (about one- 

 eighth part of an acre for each) ; liberty to keep a pig, half a dozen hens, and bees ; their fuel is carried 

 home to them ; they receive a small' allowance in money per journey when sent from home with corn, or 

 for coals or lime ; and during the harvest they are maintained by the farmer, that they may be always at 

 hand. 



