466 Saddle and Sirloin. 



home for the wild duck and the hern. Its inhabitants, 

 contrary to the old belief, are not web-footed, and 

 ague is unknown. Oats have long since lost their 

 monopoly of the soil. The carrot yield has been 

 thirty tons to the acre ; and wheat on warp land has 

 touched nine quarters. Woad with its seven-inch 

 leaves, springing from a carrot-like root, yields its 

 triple harvest for three years, and when pulled and 

 dried on wicker flakes is packed off to Leeds as a 

 mordant for blues and blacks. It lays no tax on 

 the wheat-feeding properties of the soil, and hence 

 wheat can be taken after it for three years in succes- 

 sion. 



The warrens on the wolds above Alford have been 

 enclosed and cultivated within the last thirty years. 

 At " Hairby Hill" thousands of rabbits were slaugh- 

 tered yearly for the sake of their silver-grey pelts, 

 which were forwarded to St. Petersburgh, and their 

 carcases disposed of for ^d. to 8d. a couple at Louth, 

 Alford, Spilsby, and Boston. Between Burgh or 

 " Boro" (as many term it) and the sea is a portion of 

 a tract of marsh land extending from Grimsby to 

 Boston, which is considered the finest grazing land in 

 England. It is truly the land of " twenty thorpes," 

 and a tale still lingers among those parishes of a parson 

 who resided at a distance from his cure, and was called 

 to account by his bishop for having omitted to hold 

 service for several Sundays. He replied to his lord- 

 ship after this fashion, " The roads are so bad, my 

 lord, that I defy the devil himself to get to the parish ; 

 but when the spring sets in and the roads are passable, 

 I promise to be there in time, and give his majesty a 

 dusting." It was in this neighbourhood that an 

 eccentric farmer lived, who, rather than pay the nag- 

 horse tax, which was levied in the height of the French 

 war, sold his nag-horses and rode regularly to Spilsby 

 market on a saddled cow. Spilsby was the early 

 home of Sir John Franklin, and a fcw miles further 



