446 
Farm Reports. 
seldom taken off the grass to fold before Christmas. Sometimes 
the wether hoggs have the best of the turnips, and the ewes 
follow them. The ewes had oats this year and some rape and 
mustard which were sown on wheat stubble as a last resource. 
Lambs out of grass last winter cost -Jrf. a week in corn and cake. 
Their fare was also eked out with dried grains from London at 
7/. 15s. a ton with delivery. The shearling hoggs generally 
kill at about 18 lbs. The wool goes to Bradford, and the hogg 
fleeces generally count three to the tod. On the clay at Leyfields 
the ewes clip quite as well as the hoggs, but on the sand tliey 
fall behind them. As a general thing ewes do best at Leyfields 
and hoggs at Hexgrave. About 1500 sheep are clipped 
annually, and their wool made lOOOZ. last year, which is BOO/, 
below what it realised in the previous year. The lambing shed 
(with its walk down the middle) is worthy of notice, and very 
ingeniously run up with poles, hurdles, and straw. It serves- 
for 20 ewes at a time, and is put up at about 6s. expense ; the- 
poles and hurdles will do again, and the straw for thatching. 
The horses are of the big Lincolnshire breed, and if well got 
up they would sell as dray horses in the London market. There 
are ten at Leyfields, and 22 at Hexgrave. The harvest is 
worked with two-horse waggons, and a heavy load of wheat 
goes to market with six horses, two a-breast. The heavy 
waggons weigh about 35 cwts. Two or one-horse Scotch carts 
are also used, and sometimes three horses to the waggons on the 
clay. Since Mr. Rogers of Ranby's day no bullocks have been 
worked in these parts. During summer the horses are generally 
turned into the fields for a few hours after work, and have cut 
clover and beans in the stable. Chopped clover hay is their 
principal winter fare. If the pastures are bad during a heavy 
turnip sowing 14 bushels of oats a week is the allowance for ten. 
When there is no great pressure in summer the hours for the 
carters are from 6 to 2. Very few women are employed, and 
the rate of labour, which was once 15s., is now 13s. 6rf. per 
week, and poor rates, highway rates, &c., amount to about 2s. ^d. 
in the pound. Ploughmen are hired by the year at from 11. to 
20/., and are boarded with the bailiff 
The farm of Leyfields, which has been in Mr. Thomas Park- 
inson's occupation since his father's death in 1861, is in the 
parish of Rufford, about two miles from the Abbey, and on the 
high road between Newark and Worksop. It is held under Mr, 
Henry Savile, and comprises 400 acres, of which 110 are in 
old pasture. The late Mr. Parkinson entered on it when he was 
21, and farmed it for 56 years. His father, who had also a long 
term of it, handed it over to him in a very primitive state, as there 
was hardl}' a decent fence upon the place, and not even the sem- 
