AGRICULTURE 



fallow was seldom ploughed till April or May, and then the ploughing was done at such times as 

 suited the farmer, without much reference to what suited the soil, so that fallows were badly 

 executed, frequently in moist weather, and the seed sown under unfavourable circumstances. Wheat 

 followed the summer fallows or green crop, then oats, which were sown with clover and grass seeds, 

 and then mown for hay the two following years. Many farmers ' are never troubled with fat stock 

 or overflowed with milk and butter.' " The produce of crops under such management was 

 necessarily scanty and the returns from dairy stock fed on such miserable pastures were unremunerative. 



Low prices then prevailing were compelling the smaller farmers to part with many of their 

 dairy cows, the only available capital they possessed, and their prospects were gloomy in the extreme. 

 However, there were better farms, such as that of Mr. W. Longton at Rainhill near Prescot, 

 1 60 acres in extent, of which two-thirds was held on a yearly tenancy, and the whole had been 

 drained at the tenant's expense. The main drains were laid with tiles and slate soles, the others 

 were made at intervals of 21 ft. apart, and from 32 in. to 3 ft. in depth, filled i ft. deep with 

 cinders. 



The cropping on a soil partly a strong loam with clay subsoil and partly a sandy loam on a 

 porous subsoil was (i) green crop after grass ; (2) wheat ; (3) barley ; (4) seeds ; (5) grass mown for hay ; 

 (6) grass again cut for hay, or pasture, according to circumstances. The returns from which were 

 in the year 1850 ; potatoes, 220 measures of 90 lbs. each per acre selling at 2f. bd. per measure ; 

 wheat, 40 bushels of 70 lbs. per acre, with 2 tons of straw worth then £z a ton; barley, 

 60 bushels per acre ; seeds, first cut 2 tons of hay per acre, second cut i^ tons, selling at ^^5 per 

 ton ; grass yielded i^ tons of hay per acre. To obtain these returns 800 tons of manure were 

 purchased annually at a cost of 5^. per ton, and roadside scrapings, old banks, &c., were made good 

 use of. 



There were many farms in South Lancashire equally or more productive than this, the inex- 

 haustible supplies of manure from the manufacturing towns being wisely taken full advantage of ; 

 Rothwell in his Agricultural Report of Lancashire mentioning a farm of 156 acres within six miles 

 of Manchester for which 2,000 tons of manure were purchased in a single year. 



On a large dairy farm near Halewood the cows were house-fed winter and summer, in winter 

 receiving a mixture of steamed straw, ground turnips, and i lb. per head of boiled Egyptian bean 

 meal poured over the mixture. In addition they received a good supply of turnips and fodder, and 

 2 lb. of oil cake daily. 



The higher portion of the county along its eastern boundary was nearly all in grass, and used 

 for dairying, the land fetching as much as £2 and £1 per acre, chiefly owing to its nearness to 

 good markets. 



The rotation of crops in South Lancashire in the middle of the nineteenth century was not 

 orthodox, two white crops following one another, then two green crops, with successful results. 

 The rent of land within six miles of Liverpool and Manchester in 1850 was from 405. to £^ per 

 statute acre. Beyond that distance, unimproved farms fetched 20/. to 30J. per acre, and improved 

 farms, 30X. to 40J., but in addition to this the tenants paid all the rates, tithe and land tax, 

 amounting to loj. or 12s. bd. per acre more. On the cold clay soils, however, the rents were 

 much lower. From 1830 to 1850 rents as a rule had varied little, though there were instances of 

 large increases, the competition for small farms being very keen and forcing up the rents, the great 

 majority of holdings being under 1 00 acres. 



In 1850 there was no custom in the county securing to the tenant any compensation for 

 unexhausted improvements, but if he left the farm at Candlemas he was allowed to return and reap 

 the crop at his own expense, being allowed half of it for his trouble, and he was allowed the price 

 of his clover seeds sown with the last crop.^^ 



At this date thousands of acres of the peat mosses of the county were unreclaimed, two-thirds 

 of Chatmoss lying waste and unproductive, in spite of the efforts of Lord Ellesmere, Colonel Ross, 

 Messrs. Baines, Reed, and others. 



If left to the native farmers, the reclamation will be slow, for as a class they are individually possessed 

 of little capital and of no great enterprize, and when allotments are made to them they show 

 no readiness to improve them." 



Turning to North Lancashire, it is worthy of note that as late as 1830 many parts of the 

 Fylde district were almost inaccessible, and even twenty years later some parts of it were difficult 

 to traverse. Farms in the Fylde then ranged from 40 to 160 acres, the fields were small, and the 



" Caird, Engl. Agric. in 1850-1, p. 267, and Rothwell, Agric. Rep. of Lanes. 1850. 



" Caird, Engl. Agric. in 1850, p. 273, but in leases compensation clauses for unexhausted improvements 

 were customary. See Roy. Agric. Soc. Engl. Journ. (,iS^<)), 37. r l . 



« Caird, op. cit. 277. It is satisfactory to be able to state in 1 907 that the greater part of the peat 

 mosses are now under cultivation. 



429 



