' FALLOWS ' AND WHAT FOLLOWS. 61 



deference to the arch&ology of the land becomes ra- 

 ther puzzling to indulge and carry out. 



Being bent upon the adoption, as far as possible, 

 of the six-course shift, I had made it one of the 

 occupations of those valuable provisions of nature, 

 the long Winter Evenings, to cut, carve, and 

 contrive, upon the map of my farm, a division of the 

 arable land into six principal fields. The task was 

 not a very easy one. The inclination of the land, 

 being very slight, had to be studied with the greater 

 care ; the fences that should remain were not always 

 the best or the straightest ; and that half-way house 

 of indecision (so well known to all busy travellers 

 on the highway of life), between making a good job 

 at once, on the one side, and economy of labour, on 

 the other, occasioned many a halting hour of doubt, 

 during which Day and Night, Map and Land, alter- 

 nately gave each other the lie, and took it back 

 again, with that quick reciprocity and alternation, 

 for whichhalf-way houses, real as well as metaphorical, 

 are not uncelebrated in fact and fiction. We are 

 told by the oldest of profane historians, that it was 

 the practice of the ancient Persians to think over 

 every important plan twice : first, in the morning 

 when they were sober, and again in the evening 



