STATE OI' LAND DURING THE LONG WAK. 89 



To produce the former, all tlie manure of the 

 farm was used in raising a crop of potatoes, 

 to be succeed.ed by a crop of wbeat, and in 

 succession oats, and clover, and oats again. 

 The meadow lands were starved, the only 

 help which they received being the scanty 

 deposits left by the flocks of sheep, called 

 " Winterers, " sent from the more elevated 

 and colder districts by the sheep farmers of 

 our own adjacent counties. To keep these 

 in bounds during their sojourn with you 

 until Lady-day, or from free quarters over 

 your own entire township or the adjoining 

 ones, would have been as practicable as to 

 have held your tenants bound to the restrictive 

 clauses of their lease against " over-tillage." 



There was scarcely a farm which lay at 

 a distance from any town from which manure 

 could be carted, which was not utterly ex- 

 hausted by such treatment on the part of 

 its tenant as I have here attempted to 

 describe. Lime, the best of all manure for 



