78 



Farming of Northamptonshire. 



each of these districts there are several grazing farms of feeding 

 land, with but a small proportion of arable. 



Small inclosures of this land adjoining a homestead or village 

 are often mown for haj, and have a dressing of manure every two 

 or three years, or are grazed and mown alternately ; but where the 

 land is occupied for the feeding of beasts it is not mown, but kept 

 in a continual system of grazing, and does not receive much 

 attention from the occupier. Spreading the manure made by 

 beasts, or, to use a provincial phrase, " knocking the clots" — mow- 

 ing the thistles, which are often very abundant — and keeping the 

 fences in condition — these, with a light attention to the drainage, 

 form the principal manual labour employed on rich grazing land. 



The stock kept are principally feeding beasts, turned into the 

 pastures in the month of May, and sold off fat the latter part of 

 the summer. About 2 acres of land are generally allowed to each 

 beast, and a few sheep are also kept with them, consisting of 

 wether tegs, or ewes and lambs, which are to be sold off fat during 

 the summer. 



In the autumn, when the feeding beasts are gone off fat, either 

 the whole or part of the next year's stock is purchased and turned 

 on the land to eat the rough knawing " up to Christmas, when 

 they are put into the strawyard, or they remain on the land, re- 

 ceiving a supply of hay until the ensuing May. But few sheep 

 are kept when beasts are grazed, they being found to prevent the 

 rapid feeding of neat cattle when lying too thick in the same 

 pasture. It is always a great point with the grazier to get his 

 beasts to market as early as he can, thereby being enabled to ob- 

 tain a better price, and to get them off the land. 



3. Second-rate and inferior Grass Land. — This is the character 

 of the principal part of the grass land in the county, and it is 

 spread very uniformly throughout its entire length and breadth, 

 varying in quality in different localities, and often on the same 

 farm. A considerable portion of the second-rate land will be 

 found in connexion with the rich grazing districts before men- 

 tioned, and in the northern and southern extremities of the county. 

 The woodland and wet districts of Rockingham, Salcey, and 

 Whittlewood forests supply the greatest part of the inferior 

 grass land. 



Land of the above quality comprises the dairy-farms and sheep- 

 walks, from which the sheep are frequently folded during the 

 summer on to the arable land. The following is the general sys- 

 tem pursued in the management of a dairy-farm. 



A certain number of calves are reared every year, which re- 

 ceive some new milk for the first two or three weeks ; they are 

 then reduced to skim milk, boiled daily for them, with an allow- 

 ance of good hay. They are kept on the farm until three years 



