INTRODUCTION 9 



masters and servants sat down together and ate their food without 

 the slightest distinction being made. 



On all the larger farms the barley was made into malt, the malt- 

 mill being fixed in a corner of either the ' down house ' or barn to one 

 of the beams. In appearance the mill was like a large coffee-mill with 

 a big wheel. These farmers brewed their own ale which was drunk at 

 every meal and they prided themselves upon its goodness and were 

 " never so happy as when their friends had taken as much of it as they 

 could carry home." 



The meat which was eaten by the farmers was killed in large 

 quantities in the autumn, generally about Martinmas, and was either 

 pickled in the large pickling tubs or dried and smoked in the chimney. 

 Gray writing in October, 1769, says : " Fell mutton is now in season 

 for about six weeks ; it grows fat on the mountains, and nearly resembles 

 venison." Very few animals were killed after Christmas till the 

 ensuing summer, with the exception of bull calves, which were always 

 sent to the market when two to three weeks old, and killed for veal 

 before they were half fit. Between August, 1810, and August, 1811, 

 3915 calf hides were inspected in Kendal by the market lookers, and 

 fines were imposed for bad ' flaying.' Pigs were slaughtered between 

 Christmas and Candlemas. In 1750, at Burton, as many as eighty 

 beasts were slaughtered in a day at Martinmas and bought to be 

 salted for winter provisions ; at that time the price was ijd. to 2d. 

 per lb. At Penrith, at the end of the seventeenth century, according 

 to J. Denton, who wrote about 1690, " the market abounds with all 

 sorts of grain, corn, meal, fruit and butchers' meat, especially about 

 Martinmas ; they kill 300 to 400 beeves every market day." This 

 custom is referred to by Dickinson in 1852 — he writes : " It was usual 

 for a butcher or grazier to slaughter a number of cows at Martinmas 

 and supply customers with a quarter or (rarely) a side of beef, part of 

 which was consigned to the chimney to dry, for summer use, and the 

 rest to the brine-tub as a winter store. This, with a side of bacon 

 and a few dried mutton legs and as many salmon as could be caught, 

 formed a year's store of meat for the farm-house." In 17S7 Clarke 

 says he saw seven sheep hanging by their hind legs in one chimney in 

 Borrowdale and was told of much greater numbers, and as late as 

 1822, J. Briggs writes : " So strong, however, are ancient habits, that 



