COMPENSATION 233 



uproarious, generally either deeply sentimental or 

 broadly humorous. I am bound to say that of 

 late the vulgarisms and coarseness of former years 

 have been abandoned, as also the drinking to ex- 

 cess, although there was no stint whatever. There 

 is no doubt that the harvest home, with the show 

 of vegetables, was a most popular festival. 



Whilst writing of my farm labourers I am re- 

 minded of the Act passed this last session, the 

 'Workmen's Compensation Bill,' and I am bound to 

 express my doubts as to its practicability on farms. I 

 had most of the modern improved machinery for my 

 farm, and was the first tenant farmer who bought 

 his own steam cultivating apparatus. This was the 

 so-called round-about system of Smith, of Wolstone, 

 Bucks, who was without doubt the inventor of steam 

 cultivation. The means by which this cultivator 

 worked through and over the land was by the wire 

 rope passing round a block and pulley fixed at the 

 corners of the field, and was called an anchor. It 

 was necessary to have a strong active young man at 

 each anchor, to keep the wire rope in place while 

 it was working in the groove round the pulley. 

 The strictest orders and injunctions were given to 

 this watcher, that on no consideration was he to 

 handle this rope on the travelling side of the pulley, 

 and that if the rope slipped out of the groove, he 

 was to pull it into its place after it had passed the 

 anchor, as if it was otherwise handled it tended to 

 drag the hand into the implement and would severely 

 crush it. A young man named Mason, about 



