194 THE DAILY LIFE OF OTJR FARM. 



counsel (as quoted above) respecting the use of mangold- 

 wurzel, fully confirmed the statement from his experience 

 this year. An Aldemey cow, seven months gone in- 

 calf, slipped it only last week, and from no cause that 

 he could ascertain. It was, however, the fact that he 

 had been feeding her of late a good deal upon mangold 

 leaves. We talked about chaffing, and in the course of 

 further conversation he said that he had been sadly put 

 out by " the earthquake about three years since." He 

 had had new machinery to be worked by water, of which 

 a pool served him with an ample supply. After the 

 earthquake, however, the springs on the upper land 

 failed, and the outflow has most provokingly taken 

 a fresh course upon the other side the hill— another 

 of the vexatious uncertainties to which the vicissitudes 

 of the earth's crust subjects the agriculturist. 



The winter is coming on apace here. The leaves have 

 gone all of a run, and the wild -fowl are beginning to 

 make their appearance in small bodies. I shot a teal 

 upon the river close under the house yesterday, and 

 disturbed a woodcock upon the gardener's leaf-mould 

 heap. We had a beautiful pheasant hen upon the 

 lawn just now, very much pied, almost white. I hope 

 we shall find her nest in the spring. The tame ones 

 keep as yet so faithfully about the house, and continue 

 to feed out of our hands. 



It will soon be time to have the brood mares off the 

 moorland. One pet hunter that I was obliged to turn 

 out last summer, has never thriven at all ; being natu- 

 rally a healthy animal, I have been quite puzzled to 

 know why. Last week, however, the groom showed me 

 that her tongue must, a few months since, have been 

 nearly severed. It has healed now ; but it must have 



