Fifty Years of Hop Farming. 
345 
Another estimate is given by Arthur Young, of hop-land in 
Suffolk at about the same date, which puts the production of an 
average crop at 31L Is. per acre, including duty, which was at 
that time only 10s. per cwt. 
In the " Annals of Agriculture " a somewhat remarkable 
account of three years' hop-growing is given, furnished by Lord 
Romnev, of the Mote, Maidstone. 
The average return of these three years — 1798, 1799, and 
1800 — was 8 cwt. per acre, upon which the cost as given below 
is based : — 1 
£ i. d. 
Rent . .300 
Tithe • , . 0 14 0 
Rates 0 15 0 
Poles 10 0 0 
Manures . . . . . . . .500 
Labour 5 0 0 
Ticking 4 1G 0 
Duty 8 4 0 0 
Drying and packing . . . . . 1 15 G 
Carriage . . . . . . . .300 
Interest 2 0 0 
£40 0 G 
The average profit upon forty acres of hop-land in these 
three years was 57?. 5s. per acre, according to Lord Romney's' 
figures. 
Marshall states, in his <! Rural Economy of the Southern 
Counties," that the annual average cost of cultivating an acre of 
hops at the end of the last century was about 261. 15s., exclu- 
sive of duty ; and it would be about the same from that time 
to 1840. 
At the present time the cost of hop-production, taking the 
country average throughout, is close upon 351. per acre. In 
the appended detailed estimate sulphuring is included, as it has 
practically become a part of the general course of cultivation. 
Unfortunately, washing expenses have frequently to be added. 
Upon many of the best-managed and most remunerative hop- 
farms this estimate is largely exceeded. 40/. per acre is fre- 
quently expended by growers who leave nothing undone to 
secure a crop : who cultivate thoroughly, also sulphur regularly, 
and often wash all the hop plants upon their farms two or three 
times over. 
1 Annals of Agriculture. Vol. XLI., p. 485. 
2 The "old" duty, upon which the hop-crop is calculated to this day, was 
10s. 82 ±d. per cwt. In 1802 it was increased to 11. 3s. id. per cwt. It was 
reduced in 1805 to 19s. 1\~d. per cwt., and remained so till it was taken oil 
in 18G2. 
