FRUIT AND VEGETABLES 173 



ately wiped out of existence which would by this time 

 have developed such appropriate varieties, methods of 

 cultivation and manufacture, as would give it a stable 

 position in the general market. Nowadays, if tobacco 

 growing is to be re-established in the United Kingdom, 

 not only have the processes to be worked out by experi- 

 ment, but the product, however good intrinsically, has 

 to conquer an introduction into a highly organized and 

 conservative trade. 



The current interests of the Evesham country are, 

 however, fruit and vegetables, in virtue of which the 

 district has become one of the most highly specialized 

 areas of English farming. The favoured region forms 

 a belt on either side of the Avon, extending on the one 

 side almost as far as Stratford and beyond Pershore 

 on the other, with offshoots into the Cotswolds along 

 several tributary valleys, Evesham and Pershore being 

 the two chief markets. Near the river the soils are 

 alluvial and on the light side, but their situation 

 renders them subject to damaging spring frosts, and 

 the most desirable land lies a little back from and 

 elevated above the river level. On the north side of 

 the river some of the soils are derived from the New 

 Red Sandstone, but in the main the fruit lies on a stiff 

 calcareous loam derived from the Lias clay, though in 

 places there are lighter ridges with rock not far from 

 the surface. Until it has been broken up and put 

 under intensive cultivation this Lias land appears to 

 be of comparatively small value, and mostly carries 

 poor grass at a comparatively low rent. It is very 

 striking to see how the highly cultivated orchards are 

 abruptly exchanged for poor-looking dairy farms that 

 certainly show no evidence of quality, though in the 

 prevailing drought one would be inclined to under- 

 estimate their stock-carrying capacity. 



