240 



Fanning of Cumherland, 



female servants, especially as regards household duties, have 

 long been a just cause of complaint among farmers ; and their 

 want of training in the cottages of the poor, from w^hence they 

 spring, is not likely to remedy the evil without the intervention 

 of more competent teachers. I'here are many honourable ex- 

 ceptions, and several steady, industrious servants of both sexes, 

 who regularly deposit a portion of their earnings in the Savings 

 Banks ; and this habit ought to be encouraged by masters. 



Emigration has been draining a portion of our labourers avt^ay 

 for many years, and the current still continues, at present setting 

 towards Australia. 



Implemeiits. — It is believed that the plough has passed through 

 a number of transformations since the days of our Saxon an- 

 cestors. In their time it was ordained that no one should be 

 permitted to guide a plough who could not make one. These 

 transformations we are unable to trace, but in 1805, when Bailey 

 and Culley reported on the farming of Cumberland, they stated 

 that " the plough of this county is the swing plough." This, 

 with the modern improvements, is the plough of the county at 

 the present day. The greatest improvement is the substitution of 

 iron for wood, and Wilkie's plain and simple pattern is the model 

 from which most of the ploughs are made. 



Almost every parish has its plough-maker, who watches the 

 agricultural exhibitions, ferrets out and compares the alterations 

 and improvements, adopts and applies such as his judgment or 

 fancy approves, and has them tested by some favourite plough- 

 man before submitting to public scrutiny. Most of these home- 

 made ploughs are simple and light in construction, yet strong 

 enough for the stiff and stony soils they encounter ; are neatly 

 finished, and fit to compete, in the hands of a Cumberland plough- 

 man, in any trial-field in the kingdom. 



The plough of ancient husbandry required but the work of a 

 day to construct, from the growing timber to the finished imple- 

 ment. It was fastened together with wooden pins, had its mould- 

 board of wood, and all the iron in its composition was the 

 coulter, the sock, and sometimes the bottom plate. Wooden 

 ploughs, of excellent construction, may still be seen in use, and 

 the only objection to them is their greater liability to decay. 



Double mould-board ploughs are found on nearly every farm, 

 and are much approved in turnip husbandry, &c. The turn- 

 wrest is also in use for hill-side work. 



Of harrows there are a multitude of patterns and names, with 

 probably less difference in effect than in any other kind of imple- 

 ment. 



" Thrashing machines, drills for sowing the various kinds of 

 grain, and horse-hoes," are said by Bailey and Culley, in 1805, 

 to have not " yet found their way into this district." 



