1170 



STATISTICS OF AGRICULTURE. 



Part IV. 



with mud, and left without rough-cast, or whitewash, to con- 

 ceal the native colour of the loam." 



1115 



4. Occupation. 

 Farms of all sizes from 10/. 



to 600/. a year. 



5. Implements. 

 Plough of the swing kind, 



with a wooden mould board. 

 Scarifiers, called tormentors. 

 Two sorts of grubbing mat- 

 tocks are in use tjig. 1115.0,6), 

 one called the hoe mattock 

 (a), and the other a two-bill 

 or double-bitted mattock (6). 

 Paring-shovels (c) are very 

 well constructed. Corn-stacks 

 in harvest secured from tlie 

 sudden and heavy thunder 

 showers to which this coun- 

 try is liable, by canvass cover- 

 ings, like those used in Mid- 

 dlesex for covering hay ricks. 



6. Arable Land. 

 Much less than the grass 



land ; not much to be learned 



from its culture ; artificial herbage not generally sown, and 



rotations bad. 



7. Grass Lands. 



In the low tracts of good quality ; application, breeding and 

 the dairy ; butter good, cheese indifferent, emd generally con- 

 sumed in the county. 



8. Orchards, Woods, and Plantations. 



Very abundant in most parts of the county, and excellent 

 cider made hi the Herefordshire manner. Fruit trees rather 

 neglected than otherwise ; generally pasture beneath ; often in 

 the hedgerows. 



The forest of Dartmoor is parcel of the Duchy of Cornwall'; 

 extensive improvements have lately been proposed, and in part 

 carried into execution, under the direction of Sir J. Tyrwhitt, 

 the steward of the Duchy. Extensive salt marshet on some 

 parts of the coast. 



9. Improvements. 



Draining and irrigation not much practised. The Rev. M. 

 Froude, of Darlington parsonage, communicated to Vancouver 

 a mode of emptying the water from a pond without the ne- 

 cessity of attending to it personally when full. It is more matter 

 of curiosity than ingenuity or use. The water, when the pond 

 is overflowing, flows by a gutter into a basin, suspended be- 

 jond the head, which when full, by means of a lever, raises 

 a plug at the bottom of the pond. After a time, the box being 

 leaky, it becomes empty, and when the pond is nearly 'empty, 

 the plug re-drons in its place. If the plug were placed nearer 

 the surface of the water, it would in general .cases be more 

 useful, and less likely to lose the fish. 



10. Livestock. 



The North Devon cattle well known for their superior adapt- 

 ation, both for feeding and draught. For the uses of the dairy 

 or for milk, it is a breed by no means held in general estimation, 

 as their aptitude to look well (without being fleshy) is derived 

 from the peculiar nature of the animal, which disposes its se- 

 cretions in the accumulation of fat, rather than in the produc- 

 tion of milk. For the purposes of labour, this breed can no- 

 where be excelled for docility, activity, or hardihood, in proof 

 of which no stronger circumstance can be adduced, than that 

 it is a common day's work, on fallow land, for four steers to 

 plough two acres with a double-furrow plough ; and that a 

 general use is thus made of them, and for most of the other 

 purposes of draught in the county where tliey were originally 

 found, and in others to which they have been since trans- 

 planted. 



The rules generally pursued in breeding and raising this va- 

 luable animal,may be considered as follows : The gi-eatest num- 

 ber of calves fall between Candlemas and May, and some much 

 later ; but, among the best breeders, such late calves are not 

 so generally approved of. The usual mode of raising them is, 

 to let the calf suck as much as it will three times a day, for the 

 first week; then bring it to the finger, and feed it wi'th warm 

 new milk, in like mariner for three weeks longer. This is the 

 ordinary treatment for the first month, and the calf is then 

 fed for two months longer, twice a day, with as much 

 warm scalded skim-milk as it will drink ; when, gradually 

 abating its morning and evening meals, at the end of four 

 months the animal is weaned from all milk draughts, and left 

 to itself. Small portions of finely pounded linseed cakes are 

 often used, and recommended to be mixed with the skim- 

 milk, particularly in the first period of its being given in the 

 place of new milk. 



The full-sized North Devon cow, when fattened to its frame, 

 will not exceed eight score per quarter; and the ordinary 

 average of its ox, at five years old, and equally well fatten'.d, 

 must not be rated higher than three score per quarter above 

 the weight of its fattened mother. 



The usual practice in this district, is to sell the steers, at four 

 or five years old, to the graziers in the county of Somerset, who 

 feed them for a supply, to the Bath, Bristol, and London mar- 

 kets. Very few in the proportion raised are fed in the district, 

 which may in a great measure be ascribc-d to the great indif- 

 ference hitherto manifested in the culture of green food for a 

 winter supply ; and for which, indeed, a sufficient reason may 

 be draWn, from the deplorable wet state in which the lands are 

 suffered to remain from the want of draining. 



In South TJeron we find a mixture of the North Devon with 

 a larger animal of the same kind, called the Old Marlborough 

 Red. This breed is said to have originated from the South 

 Malton stock, although at this time they differ very materially 

 from them in size, and in having a dirty brown, or rather 

 blackish colour at the ears, nose, and encircling the eyes, and 

 in all such parts as the orange hue prevails in the genuine 

 North Devon breed. A cross with this breed is, however, much 

 preferred, as it produces a greater aptitude to fatten in a given 

 time than is experienced in the South Devon stock, which in 

 all its points is a much coarser animal, and produces a greater 

 offal. There does not appear to be any particular choice with 

 regard to colour in this breed. 



Sheep, the Exmoor breed, a homed animal, with a moder- 

 ately long staple of wool, which heretofore, and before the cloih 

 manufacture fled from this county into Yorkshire, was much 

 used by the clothiers of North and South Malton, Collumpton, 

 Thorverton, Tiverton, and other places in the county. 



The sheep most approved in the di vision of Tivei ton are the 

 Bampton Notts. The first cross of this breed with the New 

 Leicester is growing greatly in esteem, from its improving the 

 form, and bringing the animal three months sooner to market. 



The sheep generally depastured on the moorlands are the 

 Exmoor, Dartmoor, and the light hardy breed of the lower 

 moors and commons in the county. ITie autumnal rains fre- 

 quently inundating the cold clay lands, are very apt to occasion 

 the caw, or rot, among them, and which has been sometimes 

 sxperienced to an alarming extent. 



TheJlerinos, Ryelands, Downs, and other fashionable breeds 



have been tried by amateurs ; but Devon i 



; sheep than a 



cattle county. Native breed of hogs large, and long-legged. 



Horses, a small compact breed ; with the exception of the 

 farm-horses in Ireland, those in Devonshire have perhaps as 

 hard a measure of neglect and ill-usage dealt out to them, as 

 is any where to be met with in the united kingdom. 

 11. Political Economy. 



Had the roads of this county been laid out in the judicious 

 manner practised by the Indians of North America, they 

 would have l>een found to follow the water courses in all cases 

 where they might lead in their general direction, towards the 

 point assigned for carrying them. In doing this, infinitely 

 more judgment would have been displayed, and a far greater 

 benefit secured to posterity, than in that which has been 

 adopted by the original projectors of some of the most important 

 and most frequented roads in this country. This is clearly de- 

 monstrated by the road between Barnstaple and Chumieigh, 

 which, instead of being conducted through the valley of the 

 Taw, is c:arried over the highest brows of the river hills, where 

 the traveller is unceasingly compelled to ascend and descend 

 the sharpest hills in the county. The same may be said of the 

 road between Bideford and Torrington, by the great omission 

 of its not being carried along the foot of the river bills, and 

 through the vallev of the Torridge river. 



Manufactures of woollen of various sorts were formerly com- 

 mon ; but are at present on the decline ; many manufactures 

 and works employing numerous hands at Plymouth. Two 

 agricultural societies, but both ill attended and on the de- 

 cTme. 



Education of Vie Poor, or Lower Classes, Vancouver concludes 

 his report by some pages of observations which, happily, are 

 seldom equalled in illiberality ; and, viewing the subject as we 

 do, they compel us to look on him as an enemy to human na- 

 ture, and to turn from his book, his name, and memory, with 

 feelings of dislike. " It is an incontrovertible truth," he says, 

 " that the restless disposition of the Irish, and their emigration 

 to America, is owing to their being generally instructed to read 

 and write. The disposition of the Scotch and Germans to 

 emigrate arises from the same reason, and the English pccisant 

 under the same influence will be acted on in the same man- 

 ner." He " respectfully submits to the consideration of tlie 

 Honourable Board, the proi)riety of opposing any measure that 

 may rationally be supposed to lead to such a fatal issue." This 

 man, like Charles X. and his ordonnances of 1830, and Wel- 

 lington, with his speech against reform of the same year, may 

 have done good without knowing it. 



Marshal, whose considerate and humarie spirit justly objects 

 to the term peasantry, as at all applicable to the operative 

 classes of Britain, has the following excellent remarks on this 

 subject: 



With respect to the emigration of the Irish, " well it is," he 



says, " for Ireland and America, that they do so. The one is 

 overstocked with the class that furnishes work-people ; the 

 other wants enlightened workmen. Of slaves and savages it 

 has enow. The unlettered Irish stay at home, to riot, plot, 

 and murder ; to commit acts of treason, stratagem, and spoil ; 

 or emigrate to England, to revel awhile in outrage, and be 

 banned." 



On Vancouver's ideas on education. Marshal observes, " After 

 some other groundless arguments, the reporter sums up in 

 Italics, and with the aid of foreign tongues, in the following 

 ultra-royal manner : ' In short, the peasant's mind should 

 never be inspired with a desire to amend his circumstances 

 by the quitting of his cast' (this, says Marshal, is Hindoo), 

 ' but every means the most benevolent and feeling heart can 

 desire should be employed to make that situation as comfort- 

 able and as happy to him as possible ; and to which end nothing 

 more essential could contribute than by exciting a general 

 emulation to excel in all their avocations, even to those 

 of breaking stones for a lime-kiln, or for repairing the high- 

 ways.' 'Hear, hear!' says Marshal ' This is English.' 

 Good heaven ! And is there an Englishman ^or a Dutchman 

 they are brothers in sentiment) with nerve enough to write 

 the two first lines above quoted ! .' ! He surely could not 

 know that many men of ' the brightest genius,' and who are 

 much more estimable members of a community, many great 

 and good men have, in England, been moulded and nuitured 

 in the ' peasant cast.' " 



" Fortunately for society in England, the writer's exotic 

 notions have not taken root. Seminaries, for civilising the 

 children of the labouring classes, have been, and are rapidly 

 increa-sing." 



" In a civilised nation, early schooling tends to reclaim 

 children from savage propensities, and to prepare them for 

 civilised society ; inculcates a propriety of behaviour, one of 

 the very first lessons a child should be uiduced to learn in a 

 civilised nation. In the savage state, savage manners may be 

 deemed a virtue, as being, in that state, conducive to self- 

 preservation." 



" Attendance in a school inures children to a requisite degree 

 of restraint ; and a division of time employs their minds, and 

 prevents idleness, and other vicious habits, from taking root; 

 thus tending to raise them to the rank of rational beings. 

 "While the unfortunate offspring of indigence, that are suffered 

 to loiter away their earlv days on commons, in lanes, and bye- 

 places, acquire habits of indolence and pilfering ; give a loose 

 to their own wills and unrestrained tempers; commit acts of 

 mischief, and add to them the guilt of lying (the seed-bed of 

 fraud) to screen them from correction." 



" The discipline of a well-governed school impresses on 

 youthful minds subordination, industry, patience, and its 



