186 
JOURNAL  OF  HORTICULTURE  AND  COTTAGE  GARDENER. 
August  20,  1903. 
measure  the  result  of  generations  of  better  feeding  and 
better  education,  combined  with  much  natural  shrewdness 
and  acumen.  He  is  a  quicker  worker,  a  more  adaptive  man, 
rather  inclined  to  value  himself  highly.  There  is  nothing 
like  having  a  good  opinion  of  oneself.  If  you  mean  to  get 
on  have  a  good  opinion  of  yourself,  and  make  your  work 
such  as  will  justify  that  good  opinion  in  the  eyes  of  your 
emnloyer. 
In  our  own  limited  experience  we  have  known  so 
many  cases  where  an  employer  going  south  found  it  abso¬ 
lutely  impossible  to  get  his  work  done  either  as  quickly  or 
as  well  by  the  southern  labourer,  as  by  the  men  he  had  left 
behind.  His  only  way  out  of  the  difficulty  has  been  to 
import  some  of  his  old  labourers  and  by  degrees  to  train  the 
new  men,  with  better  methods.  We  soon  find  out  a  Scotch¬ 
man  by  his  accent,  but  the  accent  of  a  northern  labourer  is 
not  so  pronounced,  and  therefore  his  presence  is  not  so 
quickly  detected. 
The  high  price  of  corn  during  the  Crimean  war  caused 
a  corresponding  rise  in  wages — the  old  standard,  with  modi- 
ficatious,  was  a  day’s  wage  =  stone  of  fiour,  and  the  upward 
movement  was  maintained  and  intensified  during  the 
Franco-German  war.  Then  came  our  Civil  War,  if  we  may 
speak  of  it  as  such,  where  Joseph  Arch  was  the  labour  leader 
ae-ainst  the  landowners  and  farmers.  This  kept  wages  high 
until  1879,  when  prices  went  tumbling  down  and  crops  were 
ruined  by  a  wet,  cold  summer,  and  a  harvest  untowardly 
late.  The  farmers  were  hard  hit,  and  the  labourer,  through 
them,  was  hit  too. 
In  1889  things  looked  a  little  brighter,  and  wages  rose 
again,  and  so  far  have  kept  at  a  steady  figure,  not  because 
the  farmer  can  afford  it,  but  simply  because  labour  is  scarce 
and  he  is  obliged  to  have  men  at  any  price,  as,  spite  of  all 
labour-saving  appliances,  there  is  still  work  that  the  genus 
homo  alone  can  do.  The  wages  now  average  17s.  to  18s.  per 
week,  and  a  good  man  need  never  be  out  of  employment. 
The  usual  system  with  the  married  men  is  engagement 
by  the  year,  and  the  wage  is  paid  without  deductions  for  wet 
days  or  ordinary  sickness.  This  means  a  great  deal,  as  we 
have  found  to  our  cost  once  or  twice,  when  we  have  had  a 
man  laid  up  for  so  long  a  period  as  three  months.  The 
advantage  to  the  farmer  lies  in  securing  efficient  workers 
all  the  year  round,  and  he  is  not  dependent  on  the  casual 
and  often  very  unsatisfactory  workman.  It  is  the  custom 
to  hire  young  unmarried  men  also  by  the  year,  and  to  board 
them  in  the  house  of  the  foreman  hind,  or  farm  bailiff,  as  he 
is  called,  according  to  the  neighbourhood  in  which  he  is 
found.  These  lads  are  well  fed,  well  housed,  and,  above  all. 
well  paid,  and  if  they  ever  have  a  chance  of  saving,  and  they 
should  save,  it  is  at  this  period  of  their  lives.  We  have  only 
been  speaking  now  of  the  rank  and  file  of  agricultural 
labourers  ;  not  the  head  craftsmen,  as  we  may  term  the 
bailiff,  shepherd,  or  herdsman.  These  men,  by  reason  of 
their  office,  receive  much  better  pay  ;  indeed,  it  is  a  question 
not  so  much  of  money  as  of  men.  A  bailiff  or  foreman  has 
the  difficult  task  of  making  all  under  him  work  in  unison. 
He  often  has  a  voice  in  the  choice  of  men,  and  he  it  is  who 
under  the  master  plans  out  the  day’s  work,  with  the  view  of 
doing  the  most  necessary  thing  first,  and  to  take  advantage 
of  every  exigency  of  weather.  As  to  a  shepherd  where  a 
high-class  breeding  stock  is  kept,  his  wages  would  make 
many  a  man  green  with  envy ;  indeed,  the  worthy  flock  is 
not  put  off  with  an  attendant  of  much  less  rank  than  a 
Nestor  metaphorically  speaking — a  man  of  special  training 
and  great  experience.  We  have  often  heard  it  stated  that 
So-and-So  would  never  make  the  prices  he  does  for  his  sheep 
were  it  not  for  Thomas,  or  Robert,  or  William,  as  the  case 
may  be.  Naturally,  their  office  is  no  sinecure,  and  they 
fully  earn  their  handsome  wage.  The  same  applies  also  to 
those  men  whose  masters  own  pedigree  cattle,  or  who  “  go 
in  ”  for  the  best  shire  blood.  Once  a  farmer  gets  hold  of  the 
right  man  he  is  a  fixture  ;  that  is,  if  money  will  keep  him. 
We  have  before  us  while  we  write  extracts  from  a 
farmer’s  wage-book,  both  in  N.  Yorkshire  and  Durham.  In 
1851  the  weekly  wage  of  a  yearly  man  averaged  £30  per 
annum  ;  in  1901  it  had  risen  to  £43  in  Yorkshire.  In  Durham 
ttie  wages  of  1851  was  a  trifle  higher,  i.e.,  £31  per  annum  ; 
in  1901,  £55.  In  both  cases  cottage  and  garden  free,  with 
potatoes  and  coal,  and  in  many  instances  milk. 
The  labourer  of  to-day  makes  a  complaint  as  to  extra 
expense  in  the  clothing  of  children  for  school  attendance. 
True,  he  has  this  to  do,  but  at  the  same  time  he  has  no  school 
fee,  and  clothing  of  all  sorts  is  marvellously  cheap,  and  the 
average  number  of  the  children  per  family  is  very  much  less. 
We  were  surprised  the  other  day  when  we  reckoned  up  the 
small  number  of  children  to  be  found  in  one  half  of  a  large 
agricultural  village.  We  fancy  it  may  be  that  so  many  of 
the  young  married  folks  go  off  to  the  large  centres,  leaving 
the  village  for  the  middle-aged,  whose  families  are  grown 
up.  We  seldom  hear  of  families  now  whose  numbers  run  into 
two  figures.  We  have  a  neighbour,  a  hard-working  woman, 
who  was  one  of  eighteen,  and  the  greater  part  of  these 
eighteen  attained  man’s  estate  ;  but,  as  the  woman  says,  she 
and  her  brothers  and  sisters  knew  the  sharp  pangs  of  constant 
hunger,  though  their  father  was  never  out  of  work,  and  their 
mother  added  to  the  family  treasury  by  taking  in  washing. 
This  family  are  rather  above  the  average  in  size  and  breadth, 
and  so,  evidently,  unpleasant  though  the  semi-starvation 
was  in  their  youth,  it  has  not  certainly  tended  to  dwarf  them 
in  after  life.  This  may  be  because  as  soon  as  a  master  or 
mistress  could  be  found  the  children  were  sent  off  to  some 
farm-house  where  there  was  at  least  rough  plenty,  and 
fresh  air  in  abundance. 
We  do  not  like  to  think  of  the  children  of  hard-working 
parents  as  under-fed,  but  now,  wxcn  best  flour  at  Is.  3d.  per 
stone,  that,  at  least,  can  never  occur.  Flour  at  Is.  3d.  per 
stone,  as  against  7s.  per  stone  early  in  the  nineteenth  cen¬ 
tury  ! — 3  stones  for  £l  Is.  !  How  did  the  poor  live  ?  Of  course, 
white  bread  was  an  unknown  luxury,  and  now  bread  and 
cakes  and  pies  of  “  superfine  ”  find  their  way  to  every  table 
in  the  countrj'.  Foreign  commodities  are  in  every  village 
shop,  and  find  a  ready  sale.  We  mean  here  not  the  simple 
tea.  sugar,  and  spices,  but  meats,  fish,  choice  fruits  of  every 
variety  ;  so  that  the  workman’s  food  is  not  only  good,  but 
also  varies. 
There  is  in  some  neighbourhoods  an  outcry  for  more 
milk-;  yet  in  villages  where  every  encouragement  for  cow¬ 
keeping  is  given,  the  men  are  very  apathetic  on  the  matter. 
What  they  would  hke  is  that  the  master  should  keep  cows, 
and  supply  them  at  wholesale  prices.  But  the  master  is 
more  inclined  to  sell  by  the  gallon  than  by  the  pint,  and  get 
his  money  in  the  lump  sum  ;  or,  if  he  does  not  do  that,  he 
prefers  to  butter  or  cheese  what  he  can  spare  after  supplying 
his  own  wants.  He,  too,  is  quite  as  anxious  as  the  labourer 
to  lessen  work,  and  his  money  difficulties  are  far  more  acute. 
Work  on  the  Home  Farm. 
Grain  crops  are  ripening  rapidly  under  the  influence  of  sun¬ 
shine  and  wind,  and  a  gale  the  other  day  frightened  us  somewhat, 
for  the  Standwell  and  Goldthorpe  Barleys  were  almost  forward 
enough  to  be  in  danger  of  necking.  No  harm  was  done  except 
to  a  few  early  Oats,  and  that  only  slight. 
Wheat  is  very  well  developed  in  the  berry,  and  will  not  stand 
to  be  very  ripe  without  risk.  Nothing  is  gained  by  letting  it 
stand  so  long,  and  it  may  be  cut  when  convenient.  One  rule  we 
have  alwaj's  followed  in  deciding  as  to  the  fitness  of  Wheat  for 
reaping,  viz.,  to  wait  until  the  most  backward  ears  could  be 
rubbed  out  or  threshed  between  the  hands  without  bruising  any  of 
the  grains.  Another  plan  is  to  cut  when  no  milky  liquid  can  be 
squeezed  from  any  of  the  grains. 
Before  the  new  weak-necked  Barleys  were  introduced  it  was 
an  agricultural  axiom  that  Barley  must  not  be  cut  before  it  is 
fully  ripe.  These  Barleys  must  be  cut  much  greener  to  save 
them  from  necking  in  a  gale,  but  Chevalier  and  its  kindred  are 
still  better  left  to  be  quite  hard  in  the  grain.  We  often  see  Oats 
cut  too  green.  Farmers  see  a  grain  or  two  missing  from  the  top 
of  an  ear,  and  hurry  up  at  once  with  the  reaper.  The  loss  of  a 
few  grains  must  be  submitted  to  if  we  are  to  allow  the  much  more 
numerous  grains  lower  down  a  chance  to  fill  properly.  How 
many  samples  of  Oats  are  spoilt  by  containing  thin,  half-ripened 
grains.  The  corn  factor  reminds  us  when  we  have  not  given  our 
Oats  time  enough  to  mature,  but  the  seconds  bag  at  the  threshing 
machine  tail  would  tell  us  more  if  it  could  speak.  Well,  we  are 
ready  when  the  corn  is. 
Turnip  cleaning  is  just  finished,  and  the  horse  hoes  are  going 
over  them  once  more.  We  are  also  skerrying  the  Mangolds; 
there  is  not  much  room  between  the  rows,  but  there  are  a  few 
big  weeds.  They  should  have  been  killed  before,  as  an  old 
neighbour  of  ours  says  a  small  boy  is  more  ea,sily  knocked  down 
than  a  grown  man. 
Late  Potatoes  look  almost  too  well,  the  haulm  is  iinmense,  but 
very  little  prograss  ha,s  been  made  underground.  British  Queens 
are  a  fine  crop,  and  should  prove  remunerative. 
Sheep  are  doing  well ;  the  fine  weather  is  grand  for  the  lambs, 
which  have  quite  recovered  from  the  loss  of  their  mother’s  milk. 
We  saw  a  lot  unweaned  the  other  day — it  is  bad  for  the  ewes,  and 
no  advantage  to  the  lambs. 
A  good  deal  of  orcloard  fruit  is  grown  about  here.  The  crop 
is  an  utter  failure,  there  being  no  Plums  or  Pears,  and  very  few 
Apples.  It  will  be  a  very  bad  year  for  the  small  farmer  in 
consequence. 
