1160 



STATISTICS OF AGRICULTURE. 



Part IV. 



or snlt sulphur spring near Durham, and another on Lord 

 Durhann's estate, with public baths and dressing-rooms. 

 Various others of less note. 



2. Property. 



Largest estates, 20,000/. to 22,000/. a year ; several from 

 1{X)U/. to 3000/., from which they descend by regular gradations 

 to the smallest sums. Some estates let by proposal ; but the 

 general mode is to ask a rent, and treat with tenants six or 

 seven months before the existing leases expire. 



3. Buildings. 

 (xenerally of stoni 



with thatch or tiles. 



4. Occupation. 



Largest farm about 1000 acres, greatest number from 150 

 to 50 acres. The larger farmers almost only those who have 

 made hnprovements ; among these, Messrs. Culley and Charge 

 first led the way, and have been followed by Messrs. Collins, 

 Mason, Taylor, Trotter, Nesham, Seymour, and many others, 

 by whose exertions and judicious selection of stock this district 

 will be lastingly benefited. 



Greatest number of small labouring farmers greater slaves 

 than their servants, being generally employed through the 

 summer, in some kind of work or other, from four o'clock 

 in the morning till eight at niijht ; and jn every other sea- 

 son of the year from twilight to twilight ; and may truly be 

 said " to rise early, take rest late, and eat the bread of 

 carefulness." 



Leases, three, five, and seven years, excepting church and 

 corjioration leases for 21 years, and lives. Those farms let for 

 short terms remain stationary, as no prudent man wiil lay 

 out his money in imjjrovements, for which, when completed, 

 he will be rewarded by an advance of rent, proportioned to 

 the improvement he has made. 



.'5. Implements. 



Swing p'oughsof the Rotherham kind; of late the Small's 

 plough ; vnrious other good implements, and in many parts 

 now (1S30) the improved forms of Northumberland and 

 Berwickshire. 



6. Enclosing. 



On dry soils hedges are frequently planted on a raised 

 mound, forty inches broad, and the height twelve inches; 

 a small ditch is cut on each side to make it, and the quicks 

 are planted in the middle. In this mode the land may be 

 p'oughed nearly to the mound, and when the thorns are 

 grown to a sufficient htight, almost close to the hedge. 

 \Vhen they are five or six years old, every other stem is cut 

 clean off, within two or three inches of the surface, and the 

 remaining ones stripped of their principal branches; then 

 stakes of thirty inches high are driven in at proper distances, 

 and the splashing stems, having a slight cut on one side to 

 make them bend easier, are wound amongst the stakes at an 

 angle of about twenty-five degrees, and a single edder is 

 wound round the top to keep the stakes tight. 



7. Arable lands. 



Ploughing generally well executed, but in some places the 

 subsoil prevents sufficient depth of furrow, t. e. six inches. 

 The turnip culture, rotations, and general manaj^ement of 

 arable land, the same as in Northuml)erland ; that is, of the 

 most improved kind ; seventeen tons of Ruta baga are equal 

 to thirty -one tons of white turnip in feeding cattle or sheep. 



Mustard was formerly much grown in this county, and 

 Durham mustard was proverbial for its excellence. At pre- 

 sent a crop of mustard is rarely met with. It is generally 

 sown upon pared and burned land in April, one pound per 

 acre. The produce about twenty bushels per acre ; and price 

 from eight to sixteen shillings per bushel. 



Potatoes in the village of Hamstely have been the principal 

 article of trade, and the principal employment of several 

 families for eighty years ; they are very particular in having 

 good sets, each with two eyes; use reddish or pink sorts, 

 plant in March and April, and both horse and hand-hoe ; no 

 curl appears among them, but sometimes they " run wild," 

 or tend to that state, producing more flowers than usual, and 

 continuing flowering much later, sometimes till Michaelmas, 

 and producing few tubers and slender stems. Whenever this 

 is observed, tlie tubers of such potatoes are no longer used 

 for propagation. 



8. Grass. 



Not much old surface, what there is chiefly upland. 



9. Woods and Plantations. 



Scampston elm, from a place of that name in Yorkshire, 

 but supposed originally from America, will make shoots from 

 grafts, in one year, of 5 or 6 feet; introduced in young plant- 

 ations by Messrs. Falla, eminent nurserymen of Gates- 

 head ; vale of Derwent well wooded ; Sir J. Eden a great 

 plemter. 



10. Embank'incnts. 



Begun on the Tees in 1740, and about 1500 acres secured 

 between that period and 1800. 

 IL Live Stock. 



Short-homed cattle. The famous Durham ox bred by 

 Charles Colling of Kellan, in 1796. 



Sheep. Teeswater and Leicester breed ; stock bred, reared, 

 and fed in the most scientific manner, especially by the larger 

 farmers mentioned above (4). 

 1'^. Political Economy. 



Turnpike roads first made in 1742 ; materials, whinstone, 

 limestone, river gravel, and freestone. Roads excellent where 

 materials are broken sufficiently small : they are also in good 

 repair. Milestones on some roads, ITollow triangular prisms 

 of cast-iron, with projecting letters and figures. They are 

 two and a half feet high, and fixed on an oak i)ost, four and 

 a half feet long, sunk two and a half feet in the earth. Guide- 

 posts much wanted. No iron railways, and no public roads 

 or canals. 



Manufactures. Wrought iron foundries, glass-houses, pot- 

 sal ammoniac, coal tar, paper, woollen, 

 cotton, and liiien cloth. Several atiricultural societies; the 



teries, salt, copperas, sal ammoniac, coal 

 cotton, and linen cloth. Several at; 

 first established at Darlington in 1783. 



7809. NORTHUMBERLAND, including those detached parlo of the county of Durham, called 

 Northamshire, Islandshire, and Beddingtonshire, comprehends a surface of 1,267,200 acres, chiefly 

 mountainous or breeding districts, but including 450,000 acres proper for tillage. The celebrity of this 

 county both for its tillage and breeding is well known. Here turnips were first extensively cultivated 

 in tile drill manner, and the best principles of breeding practised by Culley. To this gentleman and 

 Bailey agriculture owes much : the latter was, perhaps, one of the most enlightened and accomplished 

 of modern agriculturists. [Bailey and Cullcy's General Vietv, 1803. Marshafs Review, 1808. S?nith's 

 Geological Map, 1824.) 



and keeping up a constant and regular supply, vessels called 

 smacks sail three limes a week, and being purposely con- 

 structed for swift sailing, frequently make their run in forty- 

 eight hours. These vessels are from 70 to 120 tons burden ; 

 on an average twelve men are employed in each vessel, and 

 make about fourteen voyages in a vear ; and not less than 75 

 boats and 300 fishermen are employed in taking the fish in 



1. Geographical State and Circumstances. 



Climate subject to great variation of temperature ; snow to 

 a considerable depth on the mountains, when there is none 

 in the lower districts ; weather runs in extremes ; very cold 

 in spring, and seldom mild before June. 



Soilaml Surface. Strong fertile loam alongthe coast ; sandy, 

 gravelly, and dry loam on the Tyne, from Newborn to Halt- 

 whistle, on the Coquet about Rothbury ; on the Aln, from 

 Alnwick to the sea; down Tweedside, but chiefly in the 

 vales of Breamish Hill and Beaumont. The hills surround- 

 ing the Cheviot mountains are mostly a dry sharp gravelly 

 loam. Moist loam occupies a large portion of the county, 

 unsafe for sheep, and unfit for turnips, and peat earth pre- 

 vails in the mountainous districts. 



The aspect of the surface is marked with great variety ; 

 along tha sea-coast it is nearly level ; towards the middle 

 more diversified, and thrown into large swelling ridges, 

 formed by the principal rivers. These parts are well enclosed ; 

 in some places enriched with wood and recent plantations, 

 but the general appearance is destitute of those ornaments. 

 The western part (except a few intervening vales) is an ex- 

 tensive scene of open mountainous district, where the hand 

 of cultivation is rarely to be traced. Of the mountainous 

 districts, those around Cheviot are the most valuable, being 

 in general fine green hills, thro\fn into numberless variety 

 of forms, enclosing and sheltering many deep, narrow, and 

 sequestered glens. 



Minerals. Coal in abundance in the greatest part of the 

 county : it is like that of Durham of the caking kind, antl is 

 found in the south-east quarter of the best quality ; quan- 

 tity exported, chiefly for the London market, 956,250 London 

 cha'ders. Calculated that the whole coal of the counties of 

 Newcastle and Durham will be exhausted in 550 years. Lime- 

 stone, stone-marl, clay-marl, lead- ore, and ore of zinc in small 

 quantities ; freestone, whinstone, and iron are all worked. 



Water. The Tyne and Tweetl have been long celebrated 

 for their salmon fisheries : in the latter a rent of 800/. a year 

 is paid for a fishing of two hundred yards in length, near the 

 mouth of the river ; and the same rent is paid for each of two 

 other fishings above the bridge, not more than two hundred 

 and fifty yards in length each. The fish taken here are, the 

 salmon, bull-trout, whiting, and large common trout, and 

 nearly the whole of them sent to London ; in the conveyance 

 of which, a great improvement has taken place of late years, 

 by packing th?m in pounded ice ; by this means they are 

 j>resLnted nearly as fresh at the London market, as when 

 taken out of the river. For the purpose of carrying them. 



the River Tweed. 



2. Property. 



One estate upwards of 40,000 acres, tlie rest vary from 

 10 to 20,000 ; small estates rare in the northern part of the 

 county. Few counties in which estates have been so rapidly 

 improved ; several instances of the value trebled in forty 

 years ; principal cause letting large farms on twenty-one years' 

 leases. Usual mode of letting farms is to fix a rent six or 

 twelve months before the expiration of the lease; but upon 

 one of the largest estates in the county (the Earl of Tank- 

 erville's), the tenants have an offer of their farms two years 

 and a half or three years before the expiration of the lease, 

 which is a mutual benefit to both landlord and tenant, and 

 is attended with so many advantages, that it is in a fair way 

 of being generally adopted. 



3. Buildings. 



Farmeries formerly very shabby and ill contrivetl, now totally 

 ditferent. The most approved form of distributing the various 

 offices is, on the east, west, and north sides of a rectangular 

 parallelogram (.^A'- 1011.) which is geneirally divided into two 

 ibld-yards for cattle of ditierent ages, the south being left open 

 to admit the sun ; and for the same reason, and also for the 

 sake of cleanliness and health, the fwrn-house () is removed 

 in front thirty or forty yards; lietween which and the south 

 wall of the fold is a small court for coais and yqung poultry ; tl^e 

 bam (b) is 18 feet by 60, with threshing-machine driven by 

 horses, water, wind, or steam ; on each side are sheds (c c), 

 ov^r which are granaries; beyond these, as wings to the main 

 square, are sheds (</ </), ujion which are built corn-stacks. One 

 of these sheds is for wintering yearling calves, the other for 

 holding implements of the larger kind. On the east of the 

 main square is the stable (e), and in the west a house for cows 

 and fatting oxen (/), each 16 feet by 48 feet. Over the pig- 

 sties (g) are poultry houses which open into the court-yard of 

 the house, as the piggeries do into the fold-yards for winteriiig 

 young cattle (/ h). 



Ciiitiiges of stone and lime and tiled ; floor of lime and san^ ; 

 the living room fifteen feet by sixteen, and the cow-house nine 

 feet by sixteen. 



