Farming of Lincolnshire. 



371 



portion to others, the tenants being- perhaps four times as nume- 

 rous as the freeholders. As is the case with Larger estates, many 

 of these small properties are mortgaged ; but those persons who 

 imagine that small parcels of land and allotment-farming tend to 

 poverty, and that prosperity is found only on larger domains and 

 occupations, need not seek in this district for a confirmation of 

 their notions. It is the owners who have mortgaged that are in 

 the most depressed circumstances, having purchased more land 

 than they had capital for ; and thus where poverty is felt it is 

 from possessing too much land rather than too little. Let it 

 not be supposed that these statements are made with a view 

 of deprecating the employment of capital in agriculture on a 

 large scale — they are brought forward as a matter of fairness; 

 for, having shown the success of large farms where they seem 

 to be actually needful for cultivation at all, it is proper to 

 exhibit the equal success of garden farms in localities just suited 

 , for the system. The trampling of the flock and the expenditure 

 of cash in manures are required on the Heath and Wolds, and 

 there the man whose chief capital is in his sinews v\^ould be at 

 fault : on the rich loams of the Isle, however, toil is the principal 

 requisite ; and the working farmer is far more qualified than 

 the man of money, scientific implements, and improved breeds, 

 to follow out the comparatively microscopic detail of spade 

 husbandry. 



This Seport is unavoidably hasty and incomplete owing to the 

 variety of subjects it embraces, and the number of districts in con- 

 nexion with which those subjects have to be considered; but 

 however hasty and superficial, an account oi the process of wayying 

 cannot be omitted, forming as it does a remarkable peculiarity of 

 the district around the upper end of the H umber, and along the 

 great streams which communicate with it. A detailed account 

 of this process, and of its improvements in Yorkshire, has already 

 appeared in the Journal,* but a much more extensive tract of land 

 has been thus treated in Lincolnshire ; and this part of the Re- 

 port has been chosen for making a few observations on this sub- 

 ject, although it is difficult to say whether warping is most allied 

 to draining or farm management, or whether it ought not rather to 

 be noticed under the head Soils." It appears that warping was 

 first practised about eighty or ninety years ago, though only in a 

 very small way; and previous to the year 1800 probably not more 

 than 1000 or 1500 acres in this county had been warped."]" 



* Journal, vol. v. 1S45, by Ralph Creyke, Esq. of Rawcliffe, near Selby, York- 

 shire. 



f In the "Annals of Agriculture," vol. xxxvli., 1801, are some extracts from "An 

 Hydraulic Essay on Embankments, by Signore Al. Leonardo Ximenez, Hydrographer 

 to his Royal Highness tiie Grand Duke of Tuscany," from which it appears that tliough 



2 B 2 



