266 
Farming of Hampshire. 
and are then sold out " proofey." The same pLan is pursued with 
sheep. The present stock is, 100 ewes in lamb, 100 two-tooth 
wethers, 65 barren ewes, 125 lambs, all of which will go off to 
the butcher within the year. Ten or twelve farrowing sows are 
kept, and all their litters fatted, either for pork or bacon. 
Situated on the edge of the " Hampshire Basin " stands the 
Vyne, a spot of great historical interest. Mr. Chute's Vyne farm 
consists of 500 acres of some of the heaviest and most expensive 
land to work in this neighbourhood ; 300 are arable, 200 pasture. 
The whole used to be dotted over with fine timber, chiefly oaks, 
of which some noble specimens yet remain near the house, while 
broad bands of coppice ran between the fields, and oak and hazel 
formed the hedgerows. ^ 
Mr. Chute began his improvements by thinning and singling 
out the trees, which was good neither for them nor for the land : 
not for them, because the old trees would not stand an exposure 
to which they were unaccustomed ; not for the land, because the 
timber still left, shaded and exhausted the soil to the impoverish- 
ment of the crops. He " reformed that indifferently " [z. e. pretty 
well], as he thought, by his thinning. He went on to " reform 
it altogether," by making a clearance of all the timber and 
coppice, grubbing 40 or 50 acres of hedgerows, squaring and 
dividing the fields by some miles of whitethorn hedges. This 
is avowedly his preparation for the steam-plough, to the use 
of which he looks forward with hope. " If it will pay any- 
where," he says, " it will pay here. Autumn tillage is not 
possible withoyt it. You want a power which will cultivate, 
without treading." Mr. Chute was, from theory, an advocate 
of deep draining, but is, from practical experience in this 
country, a shallow drainer ; 2i feet deep, yai'ds apart, and 
across the declivity, are his matured rules. He has effected a 
perfect cure. The water never stands on his ground, and the 
hunting men say it is a pleasure to ride over it. Mr. Chute has 
a tilery of his own, and does all the draining on his estate for his 
tenants, charging them five per cent, on the outlay. 
But even Mr. Chute cannot dispense with an open summer 
fallow every seven or eight years, any more than his neighbours. 
He has in vain tried to do so, and is the creature of circum- 
stances, only in a less degree than they. His superiority rather 
consists in having wheat more continuously, in better crops, and 
in less costly cultivation. 'He has wheat and beans alternately for 
three or four years each, while they are obliged, more frequently 
than he is, to substitute oats for wheat. Still, after all his 
improvements, he does not pretend to a definite rotation. Every 
crop is manured with rotten dung. The horses being very 
superior, two are generally sufficient to a plough ; three are enough 
