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XV. — Report on the Farming of Bucldngliamshirc. By 
Clare Sewell Read, Barton Hall, Brandon. 
Prize Essay. 
The writer of the subjoined Report, having regard to the de- 
sirableness of presenting such information as he has been able 
to collect in a form most available for general readers, has aimed 
at condensing and simplifying to the utmost the result of his 
investigations. With this view, and with the further object of 
avoiding, wherever it can be done without detriment to perspi- 
cuity, all repetition of details which have already found a place 
in the transactions of the Society, he has thought it proper to 
state his general conclusions with more conciseness and less 
frequent reference to individual cases and exemplifications than 
might otherwise have been done. Tiius much he thinks it 
necessary to premise, lest it should be thought that his inductions 
have been formed hastily, and drawn from inquiries and obser- 
vations less extensive and exact than are requisite to the forming 
a reliable opinion, and that he has not bestowed upon the subject 
the pains of minute and detailed inquiry. 
In two former numbers of the Society's Journal a very long 
and detailed account is given of the farming in the county of 
Oxfoid, which, for a distance of more than 40 miles, joins the 
county of Buckingham with hardly any natural feature to point 
out the line of demarcation. Most of the belts which run across 
one county extend into the other, and form similar kinds of soil 
which receive similar treatment. If these lines ever obtain a 
place in the Journal, its readers will probably consider a minute 
description of customs and peculiarities which are common to 
both counties to be tiresome and unnecessary. Should it be 
thought that some observations are too general, such defect may 
be ascribed to the wish to avoid useless repetition. On the other 
hand, should any trifling particular be strongly dwelt upon, and 
so invested with greater importance than it may seem to deserve, 
it will probably admit of the explanation that such particular has 
not been previously brought before the readers of the Journal. 
The county of Buckingham is somewhat of an oblong form, 
with numerous indentations and projections. Some of these are 
of the most whimsical and unaccountable nature. In one spot 
near the Three Shire Hole, where a straight line of division would 
be hardly 500 yards, the county line is nearly 6 miles ; and in 
another, where the outsides of Nettleden and Hawridge are not 
above 2 miles, the county boundary perambulates a distance of 
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