64] A TOPOGRAPHICAL 



garden-plants cultivated are : potatoes, beans, pease, cabbages, 

 French or kidney beans, broccoli, savoys, turnips, carrots, onions, 

 beets, spinach, lettuce, and many other sorts of pot-herbs and sa- 

 lads. A garden should be well fenced, and sheltered from the north 

 and east winds, and the hedge-rows and corners should be planted 

 with useful fruit trees. A labourer's garden should be from a 

 quarter to half an acre : those sorts of apples and pears which keep 

 sound for a length of time should be planted, as well as those for 

 present use, together with gooseberries, currants, damsons, and 

 other plums : such articles would in pies be a cheap and wholesome 

 food for children, and might at times turn to good account for sale. 

 Suppose a labourer's garden of half an acre thrown into two equal 

 lots, the one for garden vegetables, the other for wheat alternately; 

 let the garden lot be again divided in two, the one-half for potatoes, 

 the other half for garden vegetables: the whole might be cultivated 

 with the spade and hoe without loss of time, by doing a little every 

 day, morning and evening, and in the hoeing and weeding the wife 

 and children might assist. By this plan there would be one- 

 eighth of an acre potatoes, which might produce forty bushels ; one 

 quarter of an acre of wheat might (drilled and hand-hoed) produce 

 eight bushels ; and a hog might be kept from May to Christmas on the 

 refuse of the garden and wash, and fattened after harvest with boiled 

 potatoes and bran, and ground barley from gleanings : the straw of 

 the wheat would furnish the hog with litter, and dung for the garden 

 would be produced. From these resources many family comforts 

 might be derived ; and it were to be wished that gentlemen of 

 landed property would put them in the power of industrious 

 labourers on their estates, by letting them land upon average terms ; 

 and if some premium or reward (as a store-pig in May), were given 

 to such as managed in the best style with the least loss of time, it 

 might be a stimulus to industry. 



At some intervals it might be advantageous to sow the one-half 

 with hemp, in which case half the wheat stubble, and half the potatoe 

 ground, ridged-up with the spade to lay through the winter, would, 

 on digging down in the spring, be in excellent order for hemp. 

 Half the wheat and potatoes would then be omitted for one season ; 

 but the hemp would find employment for the wife and children in 

 manufacturing, to the comfort and convenience of the family. 



The Orchards of Staffordshire are inconsiderable ; but little 

 fruit-liquor is made, and perhaps the produce is insufficient for its 

 own consumption even at table. This is certainly a great neglect, 



