214 SHROPSHIRE 



accrued. The neighbouring farms were similarly 

 stocked with milch cattle, and in one of the adjoining 

 fields a great herd of rather well-bred Shorthorns formed 

 a beautiful sight in the still morning sunlight, all gathered 

 together as they were on the summit of a sudden mound 

 to avoid the flies and to get what air was stirring. 



The farm we were visiting was the property of the 

 occupier, who had been left a widow with five sons to 

 bring up, and had not only managed to maintain it at 

 its present pitch of success, but had educated the sons 

 until each had reached either the University or an 

 Agricultural College. One son was at home, and with 

 his mother, a maid, and a hired man and his wife, did 

 the whole work of the place, no light task with nearly 

 60 cows to milk, when we remember that 1 2 cows 

 to a milker is a very usual allowance. And yet there 

 was no suggestion of the sordid toil that is often 

 associated with a small grass farm ; it was a refreshing 

 example of courage and good management, where the 

 head was made to tell as well as the arm. The farm 

 was successful in virtue of the brains that were put 

 into it ; after all there is no special virtue in manual 

 labour, though you often find masters objecting to 

 labour-saving devices for their men on some quasi- 

 moral plea of not encouraging laziness. Just in the 

 same way we have recently read a distinguished 

 personage arguing in the daily Press that English 

 agriculture will never be prosperous again until the 

 farmer does his own ploughing, while his wife scrubs 

 the floors. That a farmer can take his day's hunting 

 and give his womenfolk a piano and a dogcart is 

 surely one of the best proofs that he can make his 

 intelligence and his capital pay. Even on this small 

 farm the sons had made themselves a lawn-tennis 

 court and worked none the worse for it. 



