204 THE DAILY LIFE OF OUR FARM. 



delighted her, making her teeth water in more senses 

 than one. 



During this period of flood, the boatmen to whom 

 the salmon-fishery is let, are considerably occupied in 

 netting the pools formed upon hollows of the meadow- 

 land, wherein they take at almost every haul a quantity 

 of trout and " coarse fish " as they invariably answer if 

 you make inquiry, which means, I suspect, anything 

 they can catch. A winter or two back a salmon ran up 

 a ditch, where it got frozen in, and was discovered by 

 the children, who had been down to skate. One of the 

 workmen had it given to him, and it was discussed, he 

 told me, with amazing gusto by his little ones at dinner. 

 It weighed about eight pounds and was in excellent 

 condition, having been preserved by the ice. This 

 pleasurable devoration of an animal that had died a 

 natural death, reminds me of an intention we have of 

 shooting a few chickens instead of bleeding them to 

 death, as the common mode is. They must assuredly 

 taste less insipid from having been so slaughtered. 

 I fancy I have seen that the plan has been tried before. 



I have just had the offer of a l^rge quantity of lime 

 refuse from a tanyard, which, having been used to dress 

 the imported hides, has also a considerable mixture of 

 salt and hair in it. The price being only one shilling a 

 horse for every load, I shall put a lot on my turnip 

 fallow. 



I am sorry to have to record that the clover crop, 

 thick where 1 planted swedes with home-made compost 

 of wood-ashes, salt, soot, and bone-dust, all saturated 

 with liquid manure, is upon the piece adjoining, of two 

 acres, which I dressed with over five cwt. per acre of 

 superphosphate, feeble beyond measure. I shall rely 



