594 Report on the Farm-Prize Competition 
the growth of Turnips, Oats, and Seeds. The special ex- 
cellence of their practice is in the cultivation of the Turnip 
crop. This has been brought to the highest pitch of perfection. 
It is not only on soils which would be generally classed as 
turnip soils that magnificent crops of fine quality are grown, 
but on some of the stiff, intractable boulder clavs thev are sue- 
cessfully cultivated. Details of the methods of cultivation 
adopted will be given in the notices of particular farms. 
The growth of Corn is on many farms a comparatively unim- 
portant part of the business. If it were not for the value of the 
straw for food and litter, the acreage would decline still farther. 
In the neighbourhood of large towns and collieries Hav and 
Straw are readily sold at high prices, and crops of Seeds, Clover, 
(Sec, are sold for mowing green at prices which excite the envy 
of an Eastern Counties' farmer. The Judges saw crops of Seeds 
which had been sold for 14/. an acre, the buyer doing all the 
labour of mowing, bundling, and carting away. In such districts 
dairy produce, poultry and vegetables are in great demand ; 
and, on the other hand, the streets, the stables, the shambles, 
the cottage middens, the fish-curing establishments, S^c, supply 
an enormous quantity of manure, which must be got rid of, and 
is in consequence obtained at very low rates. The whole con- 
ditions of agriculture are thus modified in the urban and mining 
districts. 
The Northumbrian farmer excels in the economical manage- 
ment of labour. The labourers are physically a fine race ; they 
are independent in character, and they know how to take care 
of themselves. But they are amenable to discipline ; they will 
obey instructions, and, if they demand good pay, they are 
willing to give good work in return. The men are in the habit 
of working well together. The head ploughman sets the pace, 
and keeps his mates up to time ; he is responsible for each man 
beneath him doing a proper amount of work. 
The men are general! v hired for the year, which begins with 
Old Mav-dav (May 13th), and they are housed on the fatm. The 
wages are generally the same throughout the vear, and not, as 
in some counties, lower in winter and comparatively high in 
summer and harvest. At the present time they seem to range 
from lbs. to 20s. a week ; the house being held rent-free, and 
a certain quantity of potatoes being generally provided. As a 
rule, the hind engages to find a woman-worker (formerly called 
a bondager) at a fixed rate of pay (now Is. '6d. a day, with 
double pav for harvest time). This practice keeps many of the 
labourers" daughters and other single women at home. These 
women-workers do a good deal of the farm work. In winter 
they tic up the straw from the threshing-machine and stack it, 
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