310 RURAL ECONOMY OF ENGLAND. 



dition. " There was scarcely a road which was passable 

 in the whole country," says a local writer ; " everywhere 

 the cottages were built of mud and thatched with straw, 

 the fire in the centre, with an opening in the roof to 

 serve as a chimney, and surrounded with a dunghill, 

 while the land was covered with all sorts of weeds. No 

 green crops nor sown grasses, nor even carts, were to be 

 seen. The only vegetable cultivated consisted of a few 

 Scotch cabbages, which, with milk and oatmeal, formed 

 all the food of the population. Successive crops of oats 

 were taken off the same field as long as it continued to 

 produce anything beyond the seed sown, after which it 

 remained in a state of absolute sterility, until it was 

 again fit for producing another miserable crop. The 

 rent was usually paid in kind, under the name of half- 

 fruits. The cattle were famished in winter ; and when 

 spring arrived, could scarcely rise without assistance. 

 There was not a farmer with money sufficient to im- 

 prove this state of things, and proprietors had not the 

 means either." Might we not almost fancy we were 

 reading a description of one of our poorest and most 

 remote provinces, where a bad state of metayage still 

 reigned, and where escape from the common wretched- 

 ness seemed impossible ? 



The Ayrshire country now ranks among the most 

 flourishing districts of Great Britain. It is there where 

 that grand innovation in English agriculture the dis- 

 tribution of liquid manure by means of subterranean 

 pipes was originally tried upon a large scale, and 

 where we find the small farm of Cunning Park, the 

 present wonder of the United Kingdom. This radical 

 change has all been effected in the space of sixty years. 

 To be sure, the district is close to Glasgow; this is the 

 great secret of it all. Like the English, the Scotch con- 



