WALKS AND TALKS
OF AN
AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
BY
FREDERICK LAW OLMSTED,
NOW SUPERINTENDENT OF THE CENTRAL PARK, NEW YORK; AUTHOR OF A JOURNEY
IN THE SEA-BOARD SLAVE STATES, A JOURNEY IN TEXAS, ETC., ETC.
New Edition, Revised, with Additions by the Author.
COLUMBUS, OHIO:
JOS. H. RILEY AND COMPANY.
185 9.




Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1859, by
JOS. H. RILEY  & CO.,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, for the Southern
District of Ohio.
FOLLETT, FOSTER & CO.,
Printers, Stereotypers, Binders
and Publishers,
COLUMBUS, OHIO.




TO
GEORGE  GEDDES, EsQ.,
OF ONONDAGA COUNTY, NEW YORK,
THIS VOLUAE IS RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED.








PREFACE.
DO not deem it necessary to apologize for this memoir of a
farmer's visit to England. Every man in traveling will be
directed in peculiar paths of observation by his peculiar tastes,
habits, and personal interests, and there will always be a greater
or less class who will like to hear of just what he liked to see.
With a hearty country appetite for narrative, I have spent, previous to my own journey, a great many long winter evenings in
reading the books, so frequently written by our literary tourists,
upon England; and although I do not recollect one of them, the
author of which was a farmer, or whose habits of life, professional
interests, associations in society, and ordinary standards of comparison were not altogether different from my own, I remember
none from which I did not derive entertainment and instruction.
Notwithstanding, therefore, the triteness of the field, I may
presume to think, that there will be a great many who will yet
enjoy to follow me over it, and this although my gait and carriage
should not be very elegant, but so only as one farmer's leg and
(v)




vi                    PREFACE.
one sailor's leg, with the help of a short, crooked, half-grown
academic sapling for a walking stick, might be expected to
carry a man along with a head and a heart of his own.
And as it is especially for farmers and farmers' families that I
have written, I expect that all who try to read the book, will be
willing to come into a warm, good-natured, broad country kitchen
fireside relation with me, and permit me to speak my mind freely,
and in such language as I can readily command, on all sorts of
subjects that come in my way, forming their own views from the
facts that I give them, and taking my opinions for only just what
they shall seem to be worth.
Some explanation of a few of the intentions that gave direction
to my movements in traveling may be of service to the reader.
The wages, and the cost and manner of living of the laboring
men, and the customs with regard to labor of those countries and
districts, from which foreign writers on economical subjects are
in the habit of deriving their data, had been made a subject of
more than ordinary and other than merely philanthropical interest
to me, from an experience of the difficulty of applying their calculations to the different circumstances under which work must
be executed in the United States. My vocation as a farmer, too,
had led me for a long time to desire to know more of the prevailing, ordinary, and generally-accepted practices of agriculture than
I could learn from Mr. Coleman's book, or from the observations
of most of the European correspondents of our agricultural periodicals; the attention of these gentlemen having been usually




P R EFA CE.                     vii
directed to the exceptional, improved modes of cultivation which
prevail only among the amateur agriculturists and the bolder and
more enterprising farmers.
The tour was made in company with two friends, whose purposes somewhat influence the character of the narrative. One
of them-my brother-hoped by a course of invigorating exercise, simple diet, and restraint from books and other in-door and
sedentary luxuries, to reestablish his weakened health, and especially to strengthen his eyes, frequent failures of which often
seriously annoyed aud interrupted him in the study of his profe.ssion. The other, our intimate friend from boyhood, desired to
add somewhat to the qualifications usually inquired after in a
professed teacher and adviser of mankind, by such a term and
method of study as he could afford to make of the varying
developments of human nature, under different biases and institutions from those of his own land.
We all thought that it should be among those classes which
form the majority of the people of a country that the truest
exhibition of national character should be looked for, and that in
their condition should be found the best evidence of the wisdom
of national institutions.
In forming the details of a plan by which we could, within
certain limits of time and money, best accomplish such purposes
as I have indicated, we were much indebted to the information
and advice given by Bayard Taylor, in his "Views a-Foot."
This volume contains a narrative of the earlier, and to us most




viii                    PREFACE.
interesting, though not the most! practically valuable, part of our
journey. I was in the habit of writing my diary in the form of
a letter, to be sent as occasion offered to friends at home. It is
from this desultory letter-diary, with such revision and extension
and filling up of gaps as my memory and pocket-book notes
afford, that this book has been now made.
FRED. LAW OLMSTED.
TosoMOK FAARM, SOUTHSIDE)
Staten Island, 1859. 5




CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
Emigrant Passenger Agents-Second Cabin-Mutiny-Delay-Departure..........  1
CHAPTER II.
At Sea-Incidents-Sea Sociability —A Yarn-Sea Life-Characters-English Radicals  6
CHAPTER III.
Sailors-" Sogers "-Books-Anecdotes...................................... 23
CHAPTER IV.
On Soundings —English Small Craft-Harbor of Liverpool........................ 27
CHAPTER V.
The First of England-The Streets-A Railway Station-The Docks at Night-Prostitutes-Temperance-The Still Life of Liverpool-A Market.................... 35
CHAPTER VI.
The People at Liverpool-Poverty-Merchants-Shopkeepers-Women-SoldiersChildren-Donkeys and Dray-Horses.......................................... 44
CHAPTER VII.
Liverpool Continued-Irish Beggars-Condition of Laborers-Cost of Living-Prices
-Bath House-Quarantine-The Docks-Street Scene-" Coming Yankee" over
Nonsense-Artistic Begging...............................................  49
CHAPTER VIII.
Birkenhead — Ferry-Boats - Gruff Englishmen — The Abbey-Flour-MarketTh-T1e
Park-A Democratic Institution —qxbEm e Villas etc......................... 57
(ix)




x                           CONTENTS.
CHAPTER IX.
A Railway Ride-Second Class-Inconvenient Arrangements-First Walk in the
Country-England itself-A Rural Landscape-Hedges-Approach to a Hamlet-'TIrl Ale-House and the Old John Bull-A Talk with Country People-Notions
of America-Free Trade-The Yew Tree-The Old Rural Church and GraveyardA Park Gate-A Model Farmer-The Old Village Inn-A Model Kitchen-A Model
Landlady.................................................................... 68
CHAPTER X.
Talk with a Farmer; with a Tender-hearted Wheelwright —An Amusing StoryNotions of America-Supper-Speech of the English-Pleasant Tones-Quaint
Expressions-The Twenty-ninth of May-Zaccheus in the Oak Tree-EducationBedchamber-A Nightcap, and-a Nightcap.................................... 75
CHAPTER XI.
The Break of Day-A Full Heart-Familiar Things-The Village at Sunrise-Flowers
-Birds-Dog-Kennels-'" The Squire" and " The Hall "-Rooks-Visit to a Small
Farm-The Cows-The Milking-The Dairy-Maids-The Stables-Manure-Bones
-Pasture-White Clover-Implements-Carts-The English Plow and Harrow... 82
CHAPTER XII.
Breakfast at the Inn-A Tale of High Life-The Garden of the Inn-An Old FarmHouse-Timber Houses-Laborers' Cottages-Wattles and Noggin Walls-A
" Ferme Ornee "-A Lawn Pasture-Copper-leaved Beeches-Tame Black CattleApproach to Chester............................................... 86
CHAPTER XIII.
Chester without-A Walk on the Walls-Antiquities-Striking Contrasts.......... 92
CHAPTER XIV.
Chester within-Peculiarities of Building-The Rows-A Sea Captain-Romancing
-An Old Inn-Old English Town Houses-Timber Houses-Claiming an Inheritance-A Cook Shop-One of the Alleys-Breaking into the Cathedral-Expulsion
-T.he Curfew.......................................................... 100
CHAPTER XV.
Chester Market-The Town Common-Race-Course-The Yeomanry Cavalry, and
the Militia of England-Public Wash-House................................... 108
CHAPTER XVI.
Visit to Eaton Hall-The Largest Arch in the World-The Outer Park-Backwoods
Farming-The Deer Park-The Hall-The Parterre-The Lawn-The Fruit Garden
-Stables.......................................................................  112




CONTENTS.                                    xi
CHAPTER XVII.
Gamekeeper-Game Preserves-Eccleston, a Pretty Village-The School-HouseDraining-Children Playing-The River-side Walk-Pleasure Parties-A Contrasting Glimpse of a Sad Heart-Saturday Night-Ballad Singer-Mendicants-Row in
the Tap-Room-Woman's Feebleness-Chester Beer, and Beer-Drinking.......... 119
CHAPTER XVIII.
Character of the Welsh-The Cathedral; the Clergy, Service, Intoning, the Ludicrous and the Sublime-A Reverie-A Revelation-The Sermon-CommunionsOther Churches-Sunday Evening-Character of the Townspeople.............. 128
CHAPTER XIX.
Clandestine Architectural Studies-A Visit to the Marquis of Westminster's StudStable Matters................................................................ 139
CHAPTER XX.
The Cheshire Cheese District and English Husbandry upon Heavy Soils-Pastures;
their Permanence-The Use of Bones as a Manure in Cheshire-A Valuable Remark to Owners of Improved Neat Stock-Breeds of Dairy Stock-Horses........ 145
CHAPTER XXI.
Tillage-Size of Farms-Condition of Laborers-Fences-Hedges-Surface Drainage
-Under Drainage-Valuable Implements for Stiff Soils, not used in the United
States....................................................... 152
CHAPTER XXII.
The General Condition of Agriculture-Rotation of Crops-Productiveness-Seeding
down to Grass-Comparison of English and American Practice-Practical Remarks
-Rye-Grass, Clover-Biennial Grasses-Guano-Lime-The Condition of Laborers,
Wages, etc.-Dairy-Maids-Allowance of Beer.................................. 58
CHAPTER XXIII.
Remarks on the Cultivation of Beet and Mangel-Wurzel.......................... 166
CHAPTER XXIV.
Delightful Walk by the Dee Banks, and through Eaton Park-Wrexham-A FairMaids by a Fountain-The Church-Jackdaws-The Tap-Room and Tap-Room
Talk-Political Deadness of the Laboring Class-A Methodist Bagman........... 169
CHAPTER XXV.
Morning Walk through a Coal District-Ruabon-An Optimist with a Welsh WifeGraveyard Notes-A Stage-Wagon-Taxes-Wynstay Park-Thorough DrainingA Glimpse of Cottage Life —" Sir Watkins Williams Wyn "...................... 174




xii                          CO NT ENTS.
CHAPTER XXVI.
Stone Houses-Ivy —Virginia Creeper-A Visit to a Welsh Horse-Fair-English Vehicles - Agricultural Notes -HIorses - Breeds of Cattle; Herefords, Welsh, and
Smutty Pates-Character of the People-Dress-Powis Park.................... 180
CHAPTER XXVII.
English Vehicles-A Feudal Castle and Modern Aristocratic Mansion-Aristocracy in
1850-Primogeniture-Democratic Tendency of Political Sentiments-Disposition
towards the United States-Combativeness-Slavery............................ 186
CHAPTER XXVIII.
Paintings-Cromwell- Pastoral Ships-Family Portraits and Distant RelationsFamily Apartments-Personal Cleanliness-The Wrekin........................ 195
CHAPTER XXIX.
Visit to a Farm-Farm-House and Farmery-Fatting Cattle-Sheep-VetchesStack Yard-Steam Threshing-Turnip Sowing-Excellent Work-Tram RoadWages....................................................................... 199
CHAPTER XXX.
Visit to Two English Common Schools........................................... 203
CHAPTER XXXI.
Shrewsbury-Angling in Curricles-Sheep-walks-Effect of Thorough Draining on
Dry Soils-Gorse-Church Stretton-Churchyard Literature-Encounter with an
Enthusiastic Free-Trader....................................          206
CHAPTER XXXII.
Country Carrier's Cart-Independent Breakfast-Beauty-Old Inn-Jack up the
Chimney-Bacon and Bread; Beer and Rum-Ludlow-An Apostolic Church-The
Poor-House — Case of a Broken Heart-Refreshment............................ 212
CHAPTER XXXIII.
Physical Education-A Rustic Village-Farm-House Kitchen-An Orchard-Stables
-Leominster-A Trout Brook-Fruit Culture................................. 218
CHAPTER XXXIV.
English Orchard Districts-The most Favorable Soils and Climate-Lime-Practical
Deduction-Diseases-Prevention and Remedies-Suggestions................... 222
CHAPTER XXXV.
Decay of Varieties-Two Theories: Knight's, Downing's-English Theory and Practice-Practical Deductions-Causes of Decay-Remedies-Hints to OrchardistsSpecial Manures-Pruning-Thorough Drainage-A Satirical Sketch-Shooting
the Apple-Tree.............................................................. 228




CONTENTS.                                   xiii
CHAPTER XXXVI.
Roofs; Shingles; Tile; Thatch: the Advantages and Disadvantages of each-The
Use of Thatch in America-Hereford-Christian Hospitality-A Milk Farm-The
Herefords-A Dangerous Man-Primitive Christianity.......................... 239
CHAPTER XXXVII.
The County Jail-English Prison Discipline-The Perfection of the Present-Education and Taxation-What Next?-Captain Machonochie-The Mark System-The
Christian Idea of Punishment................................................. 246
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
A Hit-The Debtor's Prison-Utter Cleanliness-" City" and "Town" —"Down"
and " Up "-Hereford Cathedral-Church and State-The Public Promenade.... 255
CHAPTER XXXIX.
Shady Lanes-Rural Sketches-Herefordshire and Monmouthshire Scenery-Points
of Difference in English and American Landscapes-Visit to a Farm-House-The
Mistress-The Farm-House Garden-A Stout Old English Farmer-The Stables
and Stock-Turnip Culture-Sheep-Wheat-Hay-Rents-Prices-A PartingCider................................................. 260
CHAPTER XL.
Walk with a Rustic-Family Meeting-A Recollection of the Rhine-Ignorance and
Degraded Condition of the English Agricultural Laborer-How he is Regarded by
his Superiors-The Principles of Government-Duties of the Governing-Education
-Slavery-The Diet of Laborers-Drink-Bread-Bacon-Fresh Meat........... 271
CHAPTER XLI.
lintern Abbey and the Wye —English Screw Steamers-Tide Deluge-St. Vincent's
Rocks-Bristol-built Vessels-The Vale of Gloucester-Whitfield "' Example Farm"
-Hedge-row Timber-Drainage-Buildings-Stock - Soiling - Manure-WheatBeets and Turnips-Disgraceful Agriculture-The Landed Gentry-Wages of Laborers............................................................ 282
CHAPTER XLII.
Bath-Warminster-Surly Postmaster-A Doubtful Character-Polite Innkeeper
and Pretty Chambermaid-The Tap-Room Fireside-Rustic Civility-Rainy Morning in a Country Inn-Coming to Market-The Road in a Storm-Scudding...... 288
CHAPTER XLIII.
The South-Downs-Wiltshire Landscape-Chalk and Flint-Irrigation-The Cost
and Profit of Water-Meadows-Sewerage Water-Irrigation in Old Times........ 295




xiv                         CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XLIV.
Flocks, Dogs, and Shepherds of Salisbury Plain-Village Almshouses-Ostentation
in Alms-giving-A Forced March-At Home in Salisbury-The Street Brooks-The
Cathedral-Architectural Remarks and Advice-Village Churches............... 305
CHAPTER XLV.
Salisbury Plain-Strange Desert Character of the Scenery-The Agriculture-Sainfoin and Lucerne-Large Farms-Effect on Laborers-Paring and Burning-When
Expedient-Expense-Sheep-folding-Movable Railways and Sheds.............. 312
CHAPTER XLVI.
An Arcadian Hamlet-Out of the World, but not Beyond the Reach of the Yankee
Peddler-The Cottages of the Downs-Grout and Cobble-stones-Character of the
Laboring Class of the Downs-Want of Curiosity-Old Stockbridge, Winchester,
William of Wykeham-His Legacy to Wayfarers-The Cathedral-Some Remarks
on Architectural Situation-Search for Lodgings-Motherly Kindness-Railroad
Mismanagement-Waterloo Day at Portsmouth................................ 319
CHAPTER XLVII.
The Deceit of Descriptions of Scenery-The Soul of a Landscape-The Isle of Wight;
its Characteristics-Appropriate Domestic Architecture-Genial Climate-Tropical
Verdure-The Cliffs of Albion-Osborne-The Royal Villa-Country Life of the
Royal Family-Agricultural Inclination and Rural Tastes-The Royal Tenantry —- 326
CHAPTER XLVIII.
The Queen's Yacht-Yachts of the R. Y. Club; their Build and Rig-Comparison
with American Yachts and Pilot-Boats-Seamanship-Cut of Sails-The NavyYard at Portsmouth-Gun-Boats-Steamers - Evening at Portsea- CuriosityAbout Boasting and some English Characteristics-Conversation with a Shopkeeper on the " Glory of England"............................................ 330
CHAPTER XLIX.
Rural Police-The " Anchor " Inn-The Garden-" Old Coaching Times " —Heath
Land-A Dreary Landscape-Murder and a Highway Adventure-Human Vanity. 336
CHAPTER L.
London Lads-Railway Ride-Observations in Natural History.................... 340
CHAPTER LI.
Rural Laborers near London-Our Mother Tongue-Cockneys-Provincialists-On
the Naturalization of Foreign Words-Authorities-Suburban London-LondonThe Thames —" Saint Paul's from Blackfriar's Bridge "....8..................... 43




CO NTENTS.                                                             xv
CHAPTER LII.
A Pilgrimage................................................................ 349
APPENDIX.   [A]...........,,.....63....................................  353
[B]....................................3...........................   60








WALKS AND TALKS
oF A.N
AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER IL
Emigrant Passenger Agents - Second Cabin — Mutiny — Delay — Departure.
WE intended, if we could be suited, to take a second cabin
state-room for our party of three, and to accommodate me,
my friends had agreed to wait till after "planting."  While I
therefore hurried on the spring work upon my farm, they in the
city were examining ships and consulting passenger agents. The
confidence in imposition those acquire who are in the habit of
dealing with emigrant passengers, was amusingly shown in the
assurance with which they would attempt to lie down the most
obvious objections to what they had to offer; declaring that a
cabin disgusting with filth and the stench of bilge-water was
sweet and clean; that darkness in which they would be groping




2         AIN AMERICAN  FAR MER INV EXGCLAND.
was very light (a trick, certainly, not confined to their trade);
that a space in which one could not stand erect, or a berth like a
coffin, was very roomy, and so forth.
Finally we were taken in by the perfect impudence and utter
simplicity in falsehood of one of them, an underling of " a respectable house "-advertised passenger agents of the ship-which,
on the lie being represented to it, thought proper to express its
" regret" at the young man's error, but could not be made to see
that it was proper for it to do any thing more-the error not
having been discovered in time for us to conveniently make other
arrangements.
We had engaged a " family room" exclusively for ourselves,
in the large and neatly-fitted cabin of a new, clean, first-class
packet. We thought the price asked for it very low, and to secure it beyond a doubt, had paid half the money down at the
agent's desk, and taken a receipt, put some of our baggage in it,
locked the door, and taken the key. The ship was hauling out
from her pier when we went on board with our trunks, and found
that the spacious second cabin had been stowed half full of cotton, and the remaining space lumbered up with ship stores, spare
sails, etc. The adjoining rooms were evidently occupied by steerage passengers, and the steward was trying keys to let them into
ours. The mate cursed us for taking the key, and the captain
declared that no one had been authorized to make such arrangements as had been entered into with us, and that he should put
whom he pleased into the room.
We held on to the key, and appealed first to the agents and
then to the owners. Finally we agreed to take a single roommate, a young man whom they introduced to us, and whose appearance promised agreeably, and with this compromise were
allowed to retain possession. The distinction between second
cabin and steerage proved to be an imagination of the agents



PASSENGER AGENTS- MUTINY.                 3
those who had asked for a steerage passage were asked a little
less, and had berths given them in the second-cabin state-rooms,
the proper steerage being filled up with freight. The captain, however, directed the cook to serve us, allowed us a light at
night in our room, and some other special conveniences and privileges, and generally treated us, after we got to sea, as if he considered us rather more of the "gentleman" class than the rest;say about two dollars apiece more.
After the ship had hauled out in the stream, and while she lay
in charge of the first mate, the captain having gone ashore, there
was a bit of mutiny among the seamen. Nearly the whole crew
refused to do duty, and pledged each other never to take the ship
to sea. Seeing that the officers, though prepared with loaded
pistols, were not disposed to act rashly, we offered to assist them,
for the men had brought up their chests and were collecting handspikes and weapons, and threatened to take a boat from the davits
if they were not sent on shore. It was curious to see how the
steerage passengers, before they had any idea of the grounds of
the quarrel, but as if by instinct, almost to a man, took sides
against the lawful authority.
Having had some experience with the ways of seamen, I also
went forward to try to pacify them. (Like most Connecticut
boys, I knocked about the world a few years before I settled
down, and one of these I spent in a ship's forecastle.) The only
thing that the soberest of them could say was, that a man had
been killed on the ship, and they knew she was going to be unlucky; and that they had been shipped in her when too drunk
to know what they were about. Perceiving all that the most
of them wanted was to get ashore to have their spree out, and as
there was no reasoning with them, I advised the mate to send
them a fiddle and let them get to dancing. He liked the idea,
but had no fiddle, so as the next best pacifying expedient, ordered




4         AN AMERICAN FARMER IN  EN1GALAXD.
the cook to give them supper. They took to this kindly, and
after using it up fell to playing monkey-shines, and with singing,
dancing and shouting, kept themselves in good humor until late
in the evening, when they, one by one, dropped off, and turned
in. The next morning they were all drunk or sulky, and contented themselves with refusing to come on deck when ordered.
When the captain came on board and learned the state of
things, he took a hatchet, and with the officers and carpenter,
jumped into the forecastle, and with a general knocking down
and kicking out, got them all on deck. He then broke open their
chests and took from them six jugs of grog which they had concealed, and threw them  overboard. As they floated astern, a
Whitehall boatmen picked them up, and after securing the last,
took a drink and loudly wished us luck.
Two or three of the most violent were sent on shore, (not
punished, but so rewarded,) and their places supplied by others.
The rest looked a little sour, and contrived to meet with a good
many accidents as long as the shore-boats kept about us; but
when we were fairly getting clear of the land, and the wind
hauled a bit more aft, and the passengers began to wish she
would stop for just one moment, and there came a whirr-rushing
noise from under the bows-the hearty yo-ho-heave-o-hoii-with
which they roused out the stu'n-sails, was such as nobody the
least bit sulky could have begun to find voice for.
A handsome Napoleonic performance it was of the captain's:
the more need that I should say that in my mind he disgraced
himself by it; because, while we lay almost within hail of the
properly constituted officers of the law, and under the guns of a
United States fortress, such dashing violence was unnecessary
and lawless;-only at sea had he the right, or could he be justified in using it.
I suppose that some such difficulties occur at the sailing of




TEE START.                      5
half the ships that leave New York. I have been on board a
number as they were getting under way, and in every one of
them there has been more or less trouble arising from the intoxicated condition of the crew. Twice I have seen men fall overboard, when first ordered aloft, in going down the harbor.
The ship did not go to sea until three days after she was
advertised to sail, though she had her crew, stores, and steerage
passengers on board all that time. I do not know the cause of
her detention; it seemed unnecessary, as other large ships sailed
while we lay idle; and if unnecessary, it was not honest. The
loss of three days' board, and diminution by so much of the stores,
calculated to last out the passage, and all the other expenses and
inconveniences occasioned by it to the poor steerage passengers,
may seem hardly worthy of notice; and I should not mention it,
if such delays, often much more protracted, were not frequentsometimes adding materially to the suffering always attending a
long passage.
At noon on the 3d of Mlay we passed out by the light-ship of
the outer bar, and soon after eight o'clock that evening the last
gleam of Fire-Island light disappeared behind the dark line of
unbroken horizon.




6         AN AMERICAN FARMER IN EN~GLAND.
CHAPTER II.
At Sea - Incidents- Sea sociability-A Yarn - Sea Life —Characters -
English Radicals.
At Sea, May 23.
WE are reckoned to-day to be about one hundred and fifty
miles to the westward of Cape Clear; ship close-hauled,
heading north, with a very dim prospect of the termination of our
voyage. It has been thus far rather dull and uneventful. We
three have never been obliged to own ourselves actually sea-sick,
but at any time during the first week we could hardly have
declared that we felt perfectly well, and our appetites seemed
influenced at every meal as if by a gloomy apprehension of what
an hour might bring forth. Most of the other passengers have
been very miserable indeed. I notice they recover more rapidly
in the steerage than in the cabin. This I suppose to be owing to
their situation in the middle of the ship, where there is the least
motion, to their simple diet, and probably to their having less
temptation to eat freely, and greater necessity to "make an
effort," and move about in fresh air.
We have met one school of small whales. There might have
been fifty of them, tumbling ponderously over the waves, in sight
at once. Occasionally one would rise lazily up so near, that, as
he caught sight of us, we could seem to see an expression of




TIHE VOYA      GE.               7
surprise and alarm in his stolid, black face, and then he would
hastily throw himself under again, with an energetic slap of his
flukes.
One dark, foggy night, while we were "on the Banks," we
witnessed a rather remarkable exhibition of marine pyrotechny.
The whole water, as far as we could see, was lustrous white, while
near the eye it was full of spangles, and every disturbance, as
that caused by the movement of the ship, or the ripples from the
wind, or the surging of the sea, was marked by fire flashes. Very
singular spots, from the size of one's hand to minute sparks, frequently floated by, looking like stars in the milky-way. We
noticed also several schools, numbering hundreds, of what seemed
little fishes (perhaps an inch long), that darted here and there,
comet-like, with great velocity. I tried, without success, to catch
some of these. It was evident that, besides the ordinary phosphorescent animalculse, there were various and distinct varieties
of animated nature around us, such as are not often to be
observed.
Some kind of sea-bird we have seen, I think, every day, and
when at the greatest distance from land. Where is their home?
is an oft-repeated question, and, WVhat do they eat? They are
mysteries, these feathered Bedouins. To-day, land and longlegged shore birds are coming on board of us. They fly tremulously about the ship, sometimes going off out of sight and back
again, then lighting for a few moments on a spar or line of rigging. Some have fallen asleep so; or suffered themselves,
though panting with apprehension, to be taken. One of these is
a swallow, and another a wheat-ear. Some kind of a lark, but
not recognizable by the English on board, was taken several days
since. It had probably been lost from the Western Islands.
We have seen but very few vessels; but the meeting with one
of them was quite an event in sea life. She was coming from




8         AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
the eastward, wind north, and running free, when we first saw
her, but soon after took in her studding-sails and hauled up so as
to come near us. When abeam, and about three miles distant,
she showed Bremen colors, laid aback her mainsail and lowered
a quarter-boat, which we immediately squared away to meet, and
ran up our bunting: every body on deck, and great excitement.
With a glass we could see her decks loaded with emigrants; and
as her masts and sails appeared entirely uninjured, it could only
be conjectured that she was distressed for provisions or water.
The carpenter was sent to sound the water tanks, and the mate
to make an estimate of what stores might be safely spared, while
we hastened to our room, to scribble notes to send home. We
finished them soon enough to see a neat boat, rowed by four men,
come alongside, and a gentlemanly young officer mount nimbly
up the side-ladder. He was received on deck by our second
mate, and conducted aft by him to the cabin companion, where
the captain, having put on his best dress-coat and new Broadway
stove-pipe hat, stood, like a small king, dignifiedly waiting. After
the ceremony of presentation, the captain inquired, "Well, sir,
what can I have the pleasure of doing for you?" The young
man replied that he came from the ship so-and-so, Captain -
who sent his compliments, and desired " Vaat is te news?" This
cool motive for stopping two ships in mid-ocean, with a fresh and
favorable wind blowing for each, took the captain plainly aback;
but he directly recovered, and taking him into the cabin, gave
him a glass of wine and a few minutes' conversation with a most
creditable politeness; a chunk of ice and a piece of fresh meat
were passed into the boat, and the steerage passengers threw
some tobacco to the men in her. The young officer took our
letters, with some cigars and newspapers, and went over the side
again, without probably having perceived that we were any less
gregarious beings than himself. The curbed energy and sup



A "BOARDIAr G" ANECDOTE.                9
pressed vexation of our officers, however, showed itself before he
was well seated in his boat, by the violent language of command,
and the rapidity with which the yards were sharpened and the
ship again brought to her course.
This occurrence brought to the mind of our "second dickey"
that night, a boarding affair of his own, of which he told us in
the drollest manner possible. I wish you could hear his drawl,
and see his immovably sober face, but twinkling eye, that made
it all seem natural and just like him, as he spun us the yarn.
He was once, he said, round in the Pacific, in a Sag-Harbor
whaler, "rayther smart, we accounted her," when they tried to
speak an English frigate, and did not get quite near enough.
So, as they had nothing else to do, they "up't and chased her,"
and kept after her without ever getting any nearer for nearly
three days. Finally, the wind hauled round ahead and began
to blow a little fresh, and they overhauled her very rapidly, so
that along about sunset they found themselves coming well to
windward of her, as they ran upon opposite tacks. They then
hove-to, and he was sent in a boat to board her, and she promptly
came-to also, and waited for him.
Dressed in a dungaree jumper, yellow oil-skin hat, and canvass
trowsers, he climbed on board the frigate and was addressed by
the officer of the deck.
"Now then, sir, what is it?"
"Are you the cap'en of this ere frigate, sir?"
"What's your business, sir?"
"Why, our cap'en sent his compliments to yourn, sir, and-if
you are a going home-he wished you'd report the bark Lucreetshy Ann, of Sag-Harbor, Cap'en J. Coffin Starbuck, thirtyseven days from [Wahoo] Oahu, seven hundred and fifty barrels
of sperm, and two hundred and fifty o' right; guess we shall go
in to Tuckeywarner [Talcahuano]."




10        AN AMERICGAN FARMiLER IN E~NGLAND.
"Is that all, sir?"
"Well, no; the old man said, if you was a mind to, he'd like
to have me see if I could make a trade with yer for some'backy.
We hain't had none now a going on two week, and he's a most
sick. How is't-yer mind to?"
"Is that all your business, sir?"
"Well-yes; guess'tis-about all."
"I think you had better go into your boat, sir."
He thought so too, when he saw the main-yard immediately
afterwards begin to swing round. As the officer stepped below,
he went over the side. When he called out to have the painter
let go though, he was told to wait a bit, and directly a small
parcel of tobacco was handed down, and the same officer, looking
over the rail, asked,
"Did you say the Lucretia Ann?"
"Ay, ay, sir; Lucreetshy Ann, of Sag-Harbor."
"Mr. Starrboard, I believe."
"'Buck' sir,'buck.' How about this'backey?"
The lieutenant, raising his head, his cap, striking the mainsheet as it was being hauled down, was knocked off and fell into
the water, when one of the whalers immediately lanced it and
held it up dripping.
"Hallo, mister; I say, what shall we do with this cap? Did
you mean ter throw it in."
The officer once more looked over the side, with half a dozen
grinning middies, and imperturbably dignified, replied,
"You will do me the favor to present it to captain Buck, and
say to him, if you please, that when he wishes to communicate
with one of Her Majesty's ships again, it will be proper for him
to do so in person."
"Oh, certainly —oh, yes; good night to yer. Here, let's have
that cap. Give way, now, boys," so saying he clapped it on the




A GALE.                       11
top of his old souwester, and as the frigate forged ahead, the boat
dropped astern, and was pulled back to the Lucretia Ann.
We had only three days of bad "weather," and those we enjoyed, I think, quite as much as any. The storm was preceded
by some twenty-four hours of a clear, fresh north-wester, driving
us along on our course with foaming, sparkling and most exhilarating speed. It gives a fine sensation to be so borne along, like
that of riding a great, powerful and spirited horse, or of dashing
yourself through the crashing surf, and in your own body breasting away the billows as they sweep down upon you. Gradually
it grew more and more ahead, and blew harder and harder.
When we came on deck early in the morning, the horizon seemed
within a stone's throw, and there was a grand sight of dark
marbled swelling waves, rushing on tumultuously, crowding away
and trampling under each other, as if panic-struck by the grey,
lowering, misty clouds that were sweeping down with an appearance of intense mysterious purpose over them. The expression
was of vehement energy blindly directed. The ship, lying-to
under the smallest storm-stay-sail, seemed to have composed herself for a trial, and, neither advancing nor shrinking, rose and
fell with more than habitual ease and dignity. Having been
previously accustomed only to the fidgety movements of a smaller
class of vessels, I was greatly surprised and impressed by her
deliberate movements; the quietness and simplicity with which
she answered the threats of the turbulent elements.
"If only that north-wester had continued"-every body is
saying —"we might have been in Liverpool by this."  It's not
unfashionable yet at sea to talk about the weather. I am to
write about what is most interesting us? Well, the wind and
weather. Bad time when it comes to that?  Well, now, here
I am, sitting on a trunk, bracing myself between two berths,




12        AN A MERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
with my portfolio on my knees —imagine the motion of the
vessel, the flickering, inconstant half-light that comes through a
narrow piece of inch-thick glass, which the people on deck are
constantly crossing; exclamations from them, dash of waves and
creaking of timber, and various noises both distracting and stupefying, and if you can't understand the difficulty of thinking connectedly, you may begin to that of writing.
John's eyes have been bad, and we have read aloud with him
a good deal; but it is hard work even to read on board ship.
We have listened to a good deal of music, and to a bad deal, and
had a few staggering hops with the ladies on the quarter deck.
We contrived a set of chess-men, cutting them out of card-board,
fitting them with cork pedestals, and a pin-point to attach them
to the board so they would not slip off or blow away. Charley
has had some capital games, and I believe found his match with
Dr. MA., one of the cabin passengers returning home from the
East Indies by way of California, who proposes to introduce him
at the London chess club.
I told you in my letter by the pilot-boat, how we had been
humbugged about the second cabin. While this has reduced the
cost of our passage to a very small sum, we have had almost
every comfort that we should have asked. Our room is considerably more spacious, having been intended for a family
apartment, and has the advantage of much less motion than those
of the first cabin. For a ship's accommodations it has, too, a
quite luxurious degree of ventilation and light. There is a large
port in it that we can open at pleasure, having only been obliged
to close it during two nights of the gale. Our stores have held
out well, and the cook has served us excellently.
We have hardly tasted our cured meat, and with this and our
hard bread we are now helping out some of our more unfortunate




THIIE VOYAGE.                     13
neighbors.  Split peas and portable soup (bouillon), with fresh
and dried fruit, have been valuable stores.
As the captain desired us to use the quarter-deck privileges,
we have associated as we pleased with the first-cabin passengers,
and found several valuable acquaintances among them.
Our room-mate, a young Irish surgeon, is a very good fellow,
apparently of high professional attainments, and possessed of a
power of so concentrating his attention on a book or whatever he
is engaged with, as not to be easily disturbed, and a general
politeness in yielding to the tastes of the majority that we are
greatly beholden to. He is a devoted admirer of Smith O'Brien,
and thinks the Irish rising of'48 would have been successful, if
he [O'B.] had not been too strictly honest and honorable a man
to lead a popular revolt.
Of his last winter's passage, in an emigrant ship, across the
Atlantic, he gives us a thrilling account.
He had been appointed surgeon of a vessel about to sail from
a small port in Ireland. She was nearly ready for sea, the passengers Collecting and stores taken on board, when some discovery was made that involved the necessity of withdrawing her.
Another ship was procured from Liverpool, and the stores, passengers, doctor and all, hastily transferred to her in the night,
as soon as she arrived. They got to sea, and he found there was
hardly a particle of anything in the medicine chest. He begged
the captain to put back, but the captain was a stubborn, reckless,
devil-may-care fellow, and only laughed at him. That very night
the cholera broke out. He went again to the captain, he beseeched him, he threatened him; he told him that on his head
must be the consequences; the captain didn't care a    rope
yarn for the consequences, he would do anything else to oblige
the doctor, but go back? not he! The doctor turned the pigs
out of the long-boat, and made a temporary hospital of it. It




14        AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
was a cold place, but anything was better than that horrible
steerage. Nevertheless, down into the steerage the doctor would
himself go every morning, nor leave it till every soul had gone
or been carried on deck before him. He searched the ship for
something he could make medicine of. The carpenter's chalk
was the only thing that turned up. This he calcined and saved,
to be used sparingly. He forced those who were the least seasick to become nurses; convalescents, and those with less dangerous illness, he placed beds for on the galley and the hen-coops,
and made the captain give up his fowls and other delicacies to
them. Fortunately fair weather continued, and with sleepless
vigilance and strength, as it seemed to him almost miraculously
sustained, he continued to examine and send on deck for some
hours each day, every one of the three hundred passengers. On
the first cholera symptoms appearing, he gave the patient chalk,
and continued administering it in small but frequent doses until
the spasmodic crisis commenced; thence he troubled him only
with hot fomentations. The third day out a man died and was
buried. The captain read the funeral service, and after the
body had disappeared beneath the blue water, the doctor took
advantage of the solemn moment again to appeal to him.
"Captain, there are three hundred souls in this ship —"
"Belay that, doctor; I'll see every soul of'em in Davy's
locker, sir, before I'll put my ship back."
The doctor said no more, but turned away with a heavy heart
to do his duty as best he could.
I cannot describe the horrors of that passage as he would.
Nevertheless, as far as simple numbers can give it, you shall
have the result.
Out of those three hundred souls, before the ship reached
New York, there died -one; and he, the doctor declared most
soberly, was a very old man, and half dead with a chronic




EilIGRANT PASSENGERS.                  15
[something] when he came on board.  So much for burnt chalk
and-fresh air!
But seriously, this story, (which, as I have repeated it, I
believe is essentially true,) though not in itself a painful one, not
the less strikingly shows with what villainous barbarity, by disregard or evasion of the laws of England, and the neglect or
connivance of the port officers, the emigrant traffic is carried on.
Some of the accounts of the three other medical men on board,
who are also returning from passages in emigrant ships, would
disgust a slave-trader. They say that many of the passengers
will never go on deck unless they are driven or carried, and frequently the number of these is so great, that it is impossible to
force them out of their berths, and they sometimes lie in them in
the most filthy manner possible, without ever stepping out from
the first heave of the sickening sea till the American pilot is
received on board. Then their wives, husbands, children, as the
case may be, who have served them with food during their prostration, get them up, and, if they can afford it, change their
garments, throwing the old ones, with the bed and its accumulations, overboard. So, as any one may see, from a dozen ships a
day often in New York, they come ashore with no disease but
want of energy, but emaciated, enfeebled, infected, and covered
with vermin. When we observe the listlessness, even cheerfulness, with which they accept the precarious and dog-like subsistence which, while in this condition, the already crowded city
affords them, we see the misery and degradation to which they
must have been habituated in their native land. When in a year
afterwards we find that the same poor fellows are plainly growing
active, hopeful, enterprising, prudent, and, if they have been
favorably situated, cleanly, tidy, and actually changing to their
very bones as it seems-tight, elastic, well-knit muscles taking
the place of flabby flesh, as ambition and blessed discontent take




16        AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ELVGLAND.
the place of stupid indifference-we can infer with some confidence what was at the bottom of their previous debasement.
Dr. M. gives much happier accounts of the English governmental emigrant ships to Australia, in which he has made two
voyages. Some few of their arrangements are so entirely commendable, and so obviously demanded by every consideration of
decency, humanity, and virtue, that I can only wonder that the
law does not require all emigrant vessels to adopt them. Among
these, that which is most plainly required, is the division of the
steerage into three compartments: married parties with their
children in the central one, and unmarried men and women
having separate sleeping accommodations in the other two.
The others of our midship passengers are mostly English
artisans, or manufacturing workmen. There are two or three
farmers, a number of Irish servants, male and female, and several
nondescript adventurers; two Scotchmen only, brothers, both
returning from Cuba sugar plantations, where they have been
employed as engineers. They tell us the people there are all
for annexation to the United States; but as they cannot speak
Spanish, their information on this point cannot be very extensive.
Besides ourselves, there is but one American-born person among
them. She is a young woman of quite superior mind, fair and
engaging, rather ill in health, going to England in hopes to improve it, and to visit some family friends there. The young men
are all hoping the ship will be wrecked, so they can have the
pleasure of saving her, or dying in the attempt. One goes into
the main-chains and sits there for several hours, all alone, every
fine day, for no other reason that we can conceive, but to drop
himself easily into the water after her, in case she should fall
overboard. There are three or four other women, and as many
babies and little boys and girls. They do not cry very often, but




A 3nOTABLE CTIARAlCTER.               17
are generally in high spirits, always in the way, frolicking or
eating, much fondled and scolded, and very dirty.
The most notable character in our part of the ship, is one Dr.
T., another returning emigrant physician. IHe appears to have
been well educated, and is of a wealthy Irish family. His
diploma is signed by Sir Astley Cooper, whose autograph we
have thus seen. Though a young man, he is all broken down in
spirit and body from hard drinking. He makes himself a buffoon
for the amusement of tile passengers; and some of the young
men of the first cabin are wicked enough to reward him sometimes with liquor, which makes him downright crazy. Even the
pale-faced student, who kept his neighbors awake with his midnight prayers while he was sea-sick, has participated in this cruel
fun. Dr. T. has been " smutten," as the second mate says, by a
young lady of the first cabin, who does not altogether discourage
his gallant attentions. He keeps up the habits of a gentleman in
the reduction of his circumstances, eating his dinner at four
o'clock, (being thus enabled to cook it while the first-cabin people
are below eating theirs, which is served at half-past three). He
declares it was only to oblige the owners that he took a berth in
the second cabin, and he certainly should not have done so, if he
had suspected the promiscuous character of the company he
should be associated with there. The forenoon he spends in
combing his hair and whiskers, cleaning his threadbare coat,
smoothing his crushed hat, and polishing his shoes. Now, indeed,
since he has become conscious of the tender passion, and can feed
on love, he has traded off a part of his stock of bread for a pair
of boots, which enables him to dispense with stockings and straps,
much to his relief in dances and fencing bouts. Towards noon
he comes on deck with his coat buttoned to the neck; he wears
a stock and no collar;  his hat is set on rakishly; he has a yellow
kid glove for his right hand, the thumb only is missing —his
2




18        AN AMERICAN PARMER IN ENGLAND.
thumb, therefore, is stuck under the breast of his coat, allowing
the rest to be advantageously displayed; his other hand is carried
habitually in the mode of Mr. Pickwick, under the skirt of his
coat. He has in his mouth the stump of a cigar that he found
last night upon the deck, and has saved for the occasion. After
walking until it is smoked out with the gentlemen-to whom he
manages to give the impression that he has just finished his
breakfast-he approaches, with a really elegant air, to the ladies,
and, gracefully bowing, inquires after their health. Then, after
gazing upwards at the sun a moment, he takes the attitude,
"' Napoleon at St. Helena," his left hand hidden under his right
arm, and, in a deep, tremulous voice, says, " Ourre nooble barruck still cleaves the breeny ailiment, and bears us on with
velucitay'twarrd th' expectant shoorres of Albeeon's eel. Ah!
what a grrand expanse it is of weeld-washing waterrers! Deleeghtful waytherr,'pon my worrud." He is a good fencer,
boxer, card player, and trickster; a safe waltzer, even in a
rolling ship; and when half-seas over, dances a jig, hornpipe, or
pas seul, and turns a pirouette on the top of the capstan; plays a
cracked clarionet, and can get something out of every sort of musical instrument; he spouts theatrically, gives imitations of living
actors, sings every thing, improvises, and on Sunday chants from
the prayer-book, so that even then the religiously inclined may
conscientiously enjoy his entertainment. A most rare treasure
for a long passage! Some of our passengers declare they would
have died of dullness if it had not been for him.
There is another Irishman (from the North), who has written
a poem as long as Paradise Lost, the manuscript of which he
keeps under lock and key, in a small trunk, at the head of his
bed, and, as they say, fastened to a life-preserver. It is never
out of his head, however, and he manages to find something to
quote from it appropriate to every occasion. You might suppose




A POET- A CHARACTER.                  19
he would be made use of as a butt, but somehow he is only regarded as a bore. I incline to think him a true poet, for he is a
strange fellow, often blundering, stupidly as it seems, upon "good
hits," and, however inconsistently, always speaking with the confidence of true inspiration. We have a godless set around us,
and he is very impatient of their card-playing and profanityparticularly if the weather is at all bad-declaring that he is not
superstitious, but that he thinks, if a man is ever to stand by his
faith, it should be when he is in the midst of the awful ocean,
and in an unlucky ship. "Nay," he asserts again, " he is not superstitious, and no one must accuse him of it, but if he were not
principled against it, he would lay a large wager that this ship
never does arrive at her destined port."  His poem runs somewhat upon socialism, whether approvingly or condemnatory, I
have not yet been able quite to understand. I rather think he
has a scheme of his own for remodeling society. He uses a good
deal of religious phraseology; he is liberal on doctrinal points,
does not enlist under any particular church banner, and says
himself, that he can bear " any sort of religion [or irreligion] in
a man, so he is not a papist." Towards all persons of the Roman
church, he entertains the most orthodox contempt and undisguised
hatred, as becomes, in his opinion, an Irish Protestant-born man.
There is a good-natured fellow, who has been a flat-boatman
on the Mississippi, and more lately a squatter somewhere in the
wilds of the West. His "painter" and cat-fish stories, with all
his reckless airs and cant river phrases, have much entertained
us; of course he has no baggage, but a " heap of plunder." He
has a rough, rowdy, blustering, half barbarous way with him, and
you would judge from his talk sometimes, that he was a perfectly
lawless, heartless savage; yet, again, there is often evident in his
behavior to individuals a singularly delicate sense of propriety
and fitness, and there is not a man in the ship with whom I would




20        AN AMERICAN FARMER INr ENGLAD.
sooner trust the safety of a woman or child in a time of peril.
The great fault of the man is his terrific and uncontrollable indignation at any thing which seems to him mean or unjust, and his
judgment or insight of narrow-mindedness is not trustworthy.
I-Ie has formed a strong friendship, or cronyship, for an Englishman on board, who is a man of about the same native intelligence, but a strange contrast to him in manner, appearance, and
opinions, being short, thick-set, slow of speech, and husky-voiced.
HIe is a stone-cutter by trade, and returns to England because, as
he says, there is no demand for so fine work as he is able to do,
in America, and he will be better paid in London. These two
men are always together, and always quarreling. Indeed, the
Englishman has, with his slowness and obstinate deafness to
reason on any matter that he has once stated his views of, an
endless battery of logic and banterings to reply to, for he is the
only defender of an aristocratic form of government amongst us;
every other man, Irish, Scotch, or English, being a thoroughgoing, violent, radical democrat. Most of them, indeed, claim
the name of red republican, and carry their ideas of "liberty"
far beyond any native American I have known. What is more
remarkable and painful, nearly all of them, except the Irish, are
professedly Deists or Atheists, or something of the sort, for all
their ideas are evidently most crude and confused upon the subject, and amount to nothing but pity, hatred, or contempt for all
religious people, as either fools or hypocrites, impostors or imposed
upon. There is only one of them who seems to have ever thought
upon the matter at all carefully, or to be able to argue upon it,
and he is so self-satisfied (precisely what he says, by the way, of
every one who argues against him), that he never stops arguing,
while a hearer remains.
A remark of one of the farmers, an Englishman, and a very
sensible fellow, upon these sentiments so generally held among




CHIRIST4ANITY.                    21
our company, seemed to me true and well expressed. I think
my observation of the lower class of Englishmen in the United
States generally confirms it. " I have often noticed of my countrymen," said he, " that when they cease to honor the king, they
no longer fear God." That is, as I understand it, when they are
led to change the political theory in which they have been instructed, they must lose confidencetin a religious creed which
they owe about equally to the circumstances of their birth, neither having been adopted from a rational process in their own
minds. Seeing the childish absurdity of many forms which they
have been trained to consider necessary, natural, and ordered of
God, they lose confidence in all their previous ideas that have
resulted from a merely receptive education, and religion and royalty are classed together as old-fashioned notions, nursery bugbears, and romances. It is partly the result of the abominable
masquerade of words which is still constantly played off in England on all public occasions, clothing government with antiquated
false forms of sacredness. The simple majesty and holy authority
that depends on the exercise of justice, love, and good judgment,
so far from being made more imposing by this mummery, is lost
sight of; while all the folly, indiscretion, and injustice of the
administration of the law by fallible and unsanctified agents, is
inevitably associated in the minds of the ignorant with all that is
holy and true.
The only idea now, these, our shipmates, entertain of Christianity, seems to be, that it is the particular humbug by which
the clergy make the people think that they must support them in
purple and fine linen, just as royalty is the humbug on which the
Queen is borne, and government the humbug by which the aristocracy are carried on their shoulders: all, of course, in combination. And nothing would convince them of the sincerity of the
clergy short of their martyrdom —even that, I fear, should th,




22        AN AMERICAN FARMIER IN E.NGLAN'D.
time come for them to act as judges, they would rather attribute
to pride, or, at best, to an exceptional deluded mind. With these
ideas, nothing but thorough contempt for him, or fear of punishment, would prevent them from putting a bishop to the test of
the stake, if he should fall into their hands.




OUR SHIP'S CREW.                   23
CHAPTER III.
Sailors-" Sogers " —Books - Anecdotes.
IF the purport of my title would permit it, I should like to
write a long chapter on our ship's crew, and the general subject of American officers and seamen. I will, however, but give,
in this one word, my testimony, as one having had some experience, to the tyranny, barbarity, and lawlessness with which in most
of our merchant ships the common seamen are treated; and the
vice, misery, and hopelessness to which, as a body, they are left
on our shores, by the neglect or ill-judged and parsimonious
assistance of those who compass sea and land to make proselytes
of the foreign heathen.
Our ship's crew, as is usual in a Liverpool packet, are nearly
all foreigners - English, Scotch, Irish, Danes, French, and Portuguese. One boasts of being " half-Welsh and half-Heelander."
Judging from this specimen, I have not a very high opinion of
the cross. The mate is a Dane, the second and third mates Connecticut men. The captain, also, is from somewhere " down east."
He is a good and careful seaman, courteous in his manners, and
a religious man; much more consistently so than pious captains
whom I have known before proved to be, after getting on blue
water. He never speaks to the seamen, or directly has any thing




24        AN AinERICAN FARIMER IN ENGLAND.
to do with them. In fact, except when he is taking observations,
or in bad weather, or an emergency, you would never see in him
any thing but a floating-hotel keeper. It is plain, nevertheless,
that his eye is everywhere, and a single incident will show that
the savage custom of the sea has not been without the usual
influence upon him. He went to the kitchen the other day and
told the cook he must burn less wood. The cook, who is a peculiarly mild, polite, peaceable little Frenchman, replied that he
had been careful not to use more than was necessary. The captain immediately knocked him down, and then quietly remarking,
" You'll take care how you answer me the next time," walked
back to join the ladies. The cook fell on the stove, and was
badly burned and bruised.
The men complain that their food is stinted and poor, and they
are worked hard, at least they are kept constantly at work; men
never exert themselves much when that is the case. It has been
evident to me that they all soger systematically.  (Sogering is
pretending to work, and accomplishing as little as possible.) It
is usually considered an insult to accuse one of it, but one day I
saw a man so evidently trying to be as long as he could at, some
work he had to do in the rigging, that I said to him:
"Do you think you'll make eight bells of that job?"
He looked up with a twirl of his tongue, but said nothing.
"Have you been at it all the watch?"
"Ay, sir, I have."
"A smart man would have done it in an hour, I should think."
"Perhaps he might."
"Do you call yourself a soger?"
"Why, sir, we all soger, reg'lar, in this here craft. D'ye see,
sir, the capten's a mean man, and'ould like to get two days work
in one out on us. If he'd give us watch-and-watch, sir, there'd
be more work done, you mote be sure, sir."




SAILORS' ETtIICS.                 25
Sunday is observed by sparing the crew from all labor not necessary to the sailing of the ship, but as it is the only day in which
they have watch-and-watch, or time enough to attend to such
matters, they are mostly engaged in washing and mending their
clothes. We had selected a number of books at the Tract-house,
which we gave away among them. They were received with
gratitude, and the pictures at least read with interest. The
printed matter was read somewhat also; I noticed three men sitting close together, all spelling out the words from three different
books, and speaking them aloud, in a low, monotonous tone. If
they had come to a paragraph in Latin, I doubt if they would
have understood what they read any less. The truth is, as I
have often noticed with most sailors, a book is a book, and they
read it for the sake of reading, not for the ideas the words are
intended to convey, just as some people like to work out mathematical problems for the enjoyment of the work, not because they
wish to make use of the result. I saw a sailor once bargaining
with a shipmate for his allowance of grog, offering him for it a
little book, which he said was "first-rate reading."  After the
bargain was closed, I looked at the book. It was a volume of
Temperance tales. The man had no idea of making a practical
joke, and assured me, with a grave face, that he had read it all
through. One Sunday, in the latter part of a passage from the
East Indies, one of my watchmates, an old sea-dog, closed a little
carefully preserved Testament, and slapping it on his knee, said,
with a triumphant air, as if henceforth there was laid up for him
a crown of glory and no mistake: " There! I've read that book
through, every word on't, this v'yage; and, damn me, if I han't
got more good out on't than I should'a got going aft long with
the rest on ye, to hear that old Pharisee (the captain) make his
long prayers." Then after gazing at it a few moments, he added,
musingly, as if reflecting on the mutability of human affairs, "I




26        AN AMERICAN FARMER  IN ENGLAND.
hook't that book from a feller named Abe Williams, to the Home,
down to Providence,'bout five year ago. His name was in't, but
I tore it out. I wonder what's become on him now; dead-as
like as not," (puts it up and takes out his pipe;) "well, God'll
have mercy on his soul, I hope."




CAPE CLE4R- GALE.                   27
CHAPTER IV.
On Soundings- English Small Craft- Harbor of Liverpool.
Sunday, May 25th.
AT sunset yesterday the mate went to the royal yard to look
for land, but could not see it. By our reckoning, we were
off Mizzen Head, a point to the westward of Cape Clear, steering east by south, fresh wind and rising, going nine knots, thick
weather and rain. Several gannets (a kind of goose with white
body and black wings) were about us. Some one said they would
probably go to land to spend the night, and there was pleasure
in being so made to realize our vicinity to it. Several vessels.
were in sight, all running inside us, and steering northeast. WVe
thought our captain over anxious to give Cape Clear a wide berth,
and were sorry not to make the land before dark. After sunset
it grew thicker, and the wind, which had been increasing all day,
by midnight was a gale. We got in all sail but the reefed topsails; then hove-to, and found bottom in fifty-five fathoms. I
was quite satisfied now with the captain's prudence; the sea was
running high, and the crags of Ireland could not be many miles
distant. As it was, I felt perfectly safe, and turned in, sleeping
soundly till nine o'clock this morning. About an hour later, they
made the light on the old Head of Kinsale, where the Albion




28        AiV A-MERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
was lost some thirty years since. The captain says we passed
within ten miles of Cape Clear light without seeing it. He was
just right in his reckoning, and the vessels that went inside of us
were all wrong, and he thinks must have got into trouble. We
are now nearly up to Waterford, and off a harbor where, many
years ago, a frigate was lost, with fifteen hundred men. It is
foggy yet, and we can only see the loom of the land.
]Monday, May 27th.
The Channel yesterday was thick with vessels, and I was
much interested in watching them. A collier brig, beating down
Channel, passed close under our stern. We were going along so
steadily before it that I had not before thought of the violence
of the wind. It was surprising to see how she was tossed about.
Plunging from the height of the sea, her white figure-head would
divide the water and entirely disappear, and for a moment it
would seem as if some monster below had seized her bowsprit,
and was taking her down head foremost; then her stern would
drop, and a white sheet of spray dash up, wetting her foresail
almost to the foretop; then she would swing up again, and on the
crest of the billow seem to stop and shake herself, as a dog does
on comingr out of the surf; then, as the wind acted on her, she
would fall suddenly over to the leeward, and a long curtain of
white foam from the scuppers would be dropped over her glistening black sides. It was very beautiful, and from our quiet though
rapid progress, showed the superior comfort of a large ship very
strikingly. We have not rolled or pitched enough during all the
passage to make it necessary to lash the furniture in our room.
Afterwards, we saw a Welsh schooner, then a French lugger,
with three masts, then a cutter with one, all quite different in rig
and cut of sail from any thing we ever see on our coast.
About four o'clock, we sighted Tuscar light, and could see beyond it, through the fog, a dark, broken streak, on which we im



EYGLIST 1cANL' WEL.                29
agined (as the dull-eyed said) darker spots of wood and lighter
spots of houses, and which we called Ireland. We saw also, at
some distance, the steamer which left Liverpool the day before,
for Cork. She was very long and low, and more clipper-like in
her appearance than our sea-going steamers of the same class.
At sunset we were out of sight of land again and driving on at
a glorious rate, passing rapidly by several large British ships
going the same course.
I was up two or three times during the night, and found the
captain all the while on deck in his India-rubber clothes, the mate
on the forecastle, look-outs aloft, every. thing drawing finely, and
nothing to be seen around us but fog, foam and fire-flashing surges.
At three o'clock this morning, John called me, and I again came
on deck. It was still misty, but there was LAND-dark and distinct against the eastern glow-no more "imagination." It was
only a dark ledge of rocks, with a white light-house, and a streak
of white foam between it and the dark blue of the sea; but it
seemed thrillingly beautiful. In a few minutes the fog opened
on our quarter, and disclosed, a few miles off, a great, sublime
mountain, its base in the water, its head in the clouds. The rock
was the Skerrys; the mountain, Holyhead. Very soon, high,
dark hills, piled together confusedly, dimly appeared on our right
-dimly and confused, but real, substantial, unmistakable, solid
ground-none of your fog-banks. These were on the island of
Anglesea. Then, as the ship moved slowly on, for the wind was
lulling, past the Skerrys, the fog closed down and hid it all again,
and we went below. When again we came up it was much
lighter, and the brown hills of Anglesea were backed up by the
blue mountains of Wales distinct against the gray cloud behind
them. Soon a white dot or two came out, and the brown hillsides became green, with only patches of dark brown —ploughed
ground-real old mother earth.  As' it grew still lighter, the




30        AN AMERICAN FARMER INV ENVGLAND.
white spots took dark roofs, and coming to Point Linos, a telegraph station was pointed out; our signal was hoisted, and in
five minutes we had spoken our name to a man in Liverpool.
We had just begun to distinguish the hedge-rows, when there was
a sudden flash of light, disclosing the cottage windows, and
Charley, looking east, exclaimed, " THE SUN OF THE OLD
WORLD."
A long, narrow, awkward, ugly thing, some thought-a cross
of a canal boat with a Mystic fishing-smack-with a single short
mast, a high-peaked mainsail, a narrow staysail, coming to the
stem-head, and without any bowsprit; so, out from the last fogbank, like an apparition, comes the pilot-boat. Directly she
makes more sail, and runs rapidly towards us. Our yatchmanpassenger, coming on deck, calls her by name, and says that she
is considered a model, and that a portrait of her has been published. To say the right thing of her, she does look staunch and
weatherly now, the sort of craft altogether, if he were confined to
her tonnage, and more mindful of comfort than of time, that one
might choose to make a winter's cruise in off Hatteras, or to bang
through the ice after Sir John Franklin. The pilot she has this
moment sent aboard of us, does not, in his appearance, contrast
unfavorably with our own pilots. He is an intelligent, burly,
harsh-voiced Englishman-a trustworthy looking sort of a man,
only rather too dressy for his work. He brings o news; pilots
never do. When we took on board the New York pilot, in my
passage from the East Indies, we had had no intelligence from
home for more than six months. The greatest news the pilot had
for us, turned out to be that another edition of Blunt's Coast
Pilot was out. I contrived to keep myself within earshot of him
and the captain, as they conversed for half an hour after he came
on our deck, and this was all I could learn, and except the late
arrivals and departures and losses of vessels; this was all we got




PILOT- STEAM-TUG.                   31
from him in two days. Our Liverpool pilot, however, brings us
a Price Current and Shipping List, in which we find allusion to
"the unfavorable news from France," as affecting the state of
trade, but whether it is of floods, famine, or revolution, who
knows? In the same way, we understand that the loyal English
nation are blessed with another prince, and are stopping their
mills to give God thanks for it. There is a slight fall in cotton,
too, reported, and since he read of it, our Louisianian has been
very busy figuring and writing letters.
After the pilot came the first English shower, (" It's a fine
day," says the boatman, just now coming on board-we have had
three showers since then,) and then it fell calm, and the ship
loitered as if fatigued with her long journey. It is now noon,
and while I am writing, a low, black, business-like steam-tug has
taken hold of the ship, and means to get her up to the docks
before night. On her paddle-boxes are the words in letters once
white, and the only thing pretending to be white about her, " The
Steam-Tug Company's Boat, No. 5, the LIVER of Liverpool."
Long life to her then, for she is as a friendly hand stretched out
from the shore to welcome us. A good-looking little scullion, too,
she is, much better fitted for her business than our New York
tow-boats.
MIay 28th.
We were several hours in getting up to town yesterday, after
I had written you. Long before anything else could be seen of
it but a thick black cloud-black as a thunder cloud, and waving
and darkening one way and the other, as if from a volcano-our
approach to a focus of commerce was evident in the number of
elegant, graceful, well-equipped and ship-shape looking steamers,
scores of ships —graceful, spider-rigged New York liners, and
sturdy quarter-galleried, carved and gilt, pot-sided, Bristol built,
stump-to'-gallant-masted old English East-Indiamen, (both alive




32        AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
with cheering emigrants, hopeful of Australian and AMichiganian
riches, and yet defiant of sea-sickness,) dropping down with the
tide, or jerked along by brave little steam-tugs, each belching
from her chimney, long, dense, swelling volumes of smoke; with
hosts of small craft lounging lazily along, under all sorts of sooty
canvass.
These small craft are all painted dead black, and you cannot
imagine how clumsy they are. The greater part of them are
single masted, as I described the pilot-boat to be. In addition to
the mainsail and fore-staysail (an in-board jib), they set a very
large gaff topsail, hoisting as a flying sail, with a gaff crossing the
topmast (like our men-of-war's boat sails): their bowsprit is a
spar rigging out, like a studding-sail boom, and with this they
stretch forth before them an enormous jib, nearly as long in the
foot as in the hoist, and of this, too, before the wind, some of them
make a beam-sail. If it blows fresh, they can shorten in their
bowsprit, and set a smaller jib; and about the time our sloops
would be knotting their second reef and taking their bonnets off,
they have their bowsprit all in board, their long topmast struck,
and make themselves comfortable under the staysail and a tworeefed mainsail. If it comes on to blow still harder, when ours
must trust to a scud, they will still be jumping through it with a
little storm staysail, and the mainsail reefed to a triangle.
These single-masted vessels are called cutters, not sloops, (a
proper sloop I did not see in England;) and our word cutter,
wrongly applied to the revenue schooners, is derived from the
English term revenue cutter, the armed vessels of the British
preventive service, being properly cutters. Cutters frequently
carry yards and square sails. We saw one to-day with square
sail, topsail, top-gallant and royal set. I have heard old men
say, that when they were boys, our coasting sloops used to have
these sails, and before the revolution, our small craft were, not




SAILING CRAFT OF THIE CHANNEL.             33
uncommonly, cutter-rigged. Instead of being of whitewashed
cotton, the sails of the coasters here are tanned hemp, having the
appearance, at a little distance, of old brown velvet. In sailing
qualities, the advantage is every way with us; in the build, the
rig, and in the cut, as well as the material of the sails; for our
cotton duck will hold the wind much the best. Ninety-nine in a
hundred of our single-masted market-boats, in a light wind, would
run around the fastest coaster in the Mersey with the greatest
ease. They are not calculated for working to windward rapidly,
but are stiff and weatherly, and do very well for boxing through
the Channel, I suppose; but for such business we should rig
schooner fashion, and save the expense of an extra hand, which
must be wanted to handle their heavy mainsail and boom. Further up, we saw, on the beach, several cutter-rigged yachts.
They were wide of beam, broad sterned, sharp built, and deep,
like our sea-going clippers.
The immediate shores grew low as we entered the Mersey.
It was nearly calm; but though the surface of the water was
glassy smooth, it was still heaving with the long muscular swell
of the sea until we reached the town. We approached nearer
the land, where, on the right hand, there was a bluff point, bare
of trees, with large rocks cropping out at its base; beneath the
rocks, a broad, hard, sand beach, and low on the water's edge, a
castle of dark brown stone, the only artificial defense, that I noticed, of the harbor. The high ground was occupied by villas
belonging to merchants of Liverpool, and the place is called New
Brighton, and bears a resemblance to our New Brighton. There
is the same barrenness of foliage, and some similarity in the style
of the houses, though there are none so out of taste as some of
those that obtrude upon the scenery of Staten Island, and none
so pretty as some of the less prominent there.
As we entered the cloud that had hitherto interrupted our view
3




34        AN AMERICAN  AR11ER IN ENGLAND.
in front, we could see, on the left, many tall chimneys and steeples, and soon discerned forests of masts. On the right, the bank
continued rural and charming, with all the fresh, light verdure
of spring. Below it we could distinctly see-and quite amusing
it was-many people, mostly women and children, riding donkeys
and driving pony-carriages on the beach. It seemed strange, in
our pleasure at seeing them, that they did not stop to look atus.
There were bathing-wagons, too, drawn by a horse out into three
or four feet water, and women floundering into it out of them,
and getting back again very hastily, as if they found it colder
than they had expected. We approached incomplete structures
of stone work along the water's edge, in which men and horses
were clustering like bees. Soon we passed them, and were looking up at immense walls, each with its city of enclosed shipping
securely afloat fifteen or twenty feet higher than the water on
which we were, it being now low ebb. At five, in the rumble
and roar of the town, our anchor dropped. The ship could not
haul into the docks until midnight tide, and the steam-tug took
us, who wished it, to the shore, landing us across the Dublin
steamer at the Prince's Dock quay.




TIlE FIRST OF ENGLAAD.                 35
CHAPTER V.
The First of England - The Streets - A Railway Station — The Docks at
Night — Prostitutes — Temperance - The Still Life of Liverpool - A
Market.
AT the head of the gang-plank stood a policeman, easily recognized and familiar, thanks to Punch, who politely helped
us tc land, thus giving us immediate occasion to thank the government for its hospitality, and its regard for our safety and convenience. It was a real pleasure to stamp upon the neat, firm,
solid mason-work of the dock, and we could not but be mindful
of the shabby log wharves we had stumbled over as we left New
York. We were immediately beset by porters, not rudely, but
with serious, anxious deference and care to keep a way open before us. I was assisting a lady, and carried her bag; a man followed me pertinaciously. "I have no baggage," said I. "But,
sir, this bag?"  "Oh, I can carry that."  "Excuse me, sir; you
must not, indeed; gentlemen never does so in this country."
After handing the lady into a hackney-coach, we walked on.
The landing-place was spacious, not encumbered with shanties or
piles of freight, and though there was a little rain falling, there
was a smooth, clean stone pavement, free from mud, to walk upon.
There was a slight smell of bituminous smoke in the air, not dis



36       ANI AMERICAN- FARMER IN ENGLIAND.
agreeable, but, to me, highly pleasant. I snuffed it as if passing
a field of new mown hay-snuffed and pondered, and at last was
brought to my mind the happy fireside of my friend, in the indistinct memory of which this peculiar odor of English coal had
been gratefully associated.
Coming on shore with no luggage or any particular business
to engage our attention, we plunged adventurously into the confused tide of life with which the busy streets were thronged,'
carii'cfess whither it floated us. Emerging from the crowd of porters, hackmen, policemen, and ragged Irish men and women, on
the dock, we entered the first street that opened before us. On
the corner stood a church-not un-American in its appearanceand we passed, without stopping, to the next corner, where we
paused to look at the dray-horses, exceedingly heavy and in elegant condition, fat and glossy, and docile, but animated in their
expression. They were harnessed, generally, in couples, one
before another, to great, strong, low-hung carts, heavy enough
alone to be a load for one of our cartmen's light horses. Catching the bustling spirit of the crowd, we walked on at a quick
pace, looking at the faces of the men we met more than anything
else, until we came to a wall of hewn drab stone, some fifteen
feet high, with a handsomely cut balustrade at the top. There
was a large gateway in it, from which a policeman was driving
away some children. People were going in and out, and we followed in to see what it was. Up stairs, we found ourselves on a
broad terrace, with a handsome building fronting upon it. Another policeman here informed us that it was a railway station.
The door was opened as we approached it by a man in a simple
uniform, who asked us where we were going. We answered that
we merely wished to look at the building. " Walk in gentlemen;
you will best take the right-hand platform, and return by the
other." A train was backing in; a man in the same uniform




PROSTITUTES.                    37
stood on the rear car, and moved his hand round as if turning an
imaginary driving-wheel, the engine at the other end being governed by his motions-forward-slowwer-slower-faster-slower
-stop-back. The train stopped, the doors were unlocked by
men in uniform, and there was a rush of passengers to secure
good seats. Women with bundles and band-boxes were shoved
this way and that, as they struggled to hoist themselves into the
doors; their parcels were knocked out of their hands, porters
picked them up and threw them in, reckless where.
Going into the street again, we wandered on till it was quite
dark, with no other object but to get a general impression of the
character of the town. We looked into a few houses where we
saw a sign of " Clean and well-aired beds," and found that we
should have no difficulty in getting comfortable lodgings at a very
moderate price. From nine until twelve we were waiting at the
dock for the ship to haul in, or trying in vain to get a boat to go
on board of her. There were many vessels lying near the great
gates, all standing by, when they should be opened at high-water,
to be hauled in.
The broad promenade outside the dock walls was occupied by
the police, stevedores, watermen, boarding-house keepers, and a
crowd of women, waiting to help in the ships or to receive their
crews when the tide should have risen enough to admit them. I
was surprised at the quietness and decency of these "sailors'
wives," as they called themselves; they were plainly and generally neatly dressed, and talked quietly and in kind tones to each
other, and I heard no loud profanity or ribaldry at all. Whether
this was owing to the presence of the police, I cannot say, but I
am sure it would be impossible to find, in America, vice, shame.
and misery, so entirely unassociated with drunkenness or excitement and riot. They were not as young as girls of the same sort
in the streets of New York, and in the strong gas light their




38        AN AMERICAN F4ARMER iN ElNGLAIND.
faces seemed expressive of a quite different character; generally
they were sad, but not ill-natured or stupid. It occurred to me
that their degradation must have been reached in a different way,
and had not brought with it such banishment from all good as they
would suffer with us. As they stood, companioned together with
each other, but friendless, some with not even hats to protect
them from the rain, others, with their gowns drawn up over their
head, and others, two together, under a scanty shawl, it would
have been difficult, I thought, for any one not to have been softened towards those abandoned thus to seek support of life that
night. We could not but think the cheerful words with which
the sailors recognized and greeted them, as the ships hauled near,
were as much dictated by pity and sympathy as by any worse
impulses. They said, " If nobody else is waiting to welcome us,
we know that you will be glad that we are coming to the land
once more; so cheer up, and we will help each other again to
enjoy a short space of jollity, excitement, and forgetfulness."
Tired of waiting for the ship, and a good deal fatigued with
our tramp on the pavements, about half-past twelve we went back
into the town, and by the very obliging assistance of the policemen found lodgings in a " Temperance Hotel," still open at that
late hour. We were a little surprised to find a number of men
in the coffee-room drinking beer and smoking. The subject of
their conversation was some project of an association of working-men to combine their savings, and make more profitable investment of them than could be made of the small amounts of
each separately. There were late newspapers on the table, and
we sat up some time longer to read them, but they were still at
it, puffing and drinking, and earnestly discussing how they could
best use their money, when we went up to bed. We had good
beds, in pleasant rooms, for which we paid but twenty-five cents
each.




COST OF LIVING - BUILDING MA4TERIALS.         39
The next morning we got our trunks from the ship, the custom
house officers searching them  before they left the dockyard.
Books, letters, and daguerreotypes were examined minutely, but
the officers were very civil and accommodating; so also were the
cartmen that took them to the inn for us. The expense of getting our luggage through the searching office, and carting it a
mile, was only twenty-five cents for each trunk, and " tuppence
for beer."
We went to a small lodging-house that we had examined last
night, and found it neat and comfortable, and kept by an agreeable
woman. We have a large front room, comfortably furnished, and
down stairs is a quiet parlor and dining-room. We breakfast in
the house, and dine and sup at an eating-house. The whole cost
of living so, with care, need be but about seventy-five cents each
a day. As good entertainment would cost more in New York.
We have made a few purchases of clothing, and find every thing
we want cheaper than in New York.
Liverpool Tuesday, May 28th.
The common building material is a light, greyish-red brick.
Stone of different colors is used in about the same proportion
that it is in New York. The warehouses are generally higher
than the same class of buildings there, but the dwelling houses
lower, seldom over three stories. The old houses, in narrow
streets, are generally small, and often picturesque from the incongruous additions and improvements that'ave been made to them
at intervals. At the railway station, we noticed such differences
in the windows of a two story house near us, as these: There
were two below, one of these, being a shop front, was entirely
modern, with large panes of glass in light wooden sashes. The
other was of small panes, set in heavy wood work, such as you
see in our oldest houses. One of the upper windows had small




40         A i A.MER ICAX FIA R IMER ISN ENG LAND.
square panes set in lead; those of the other were lozenge-shaped,
and in neither were they more than three inches wide. The
frames were much wider than they were high, and they opened
sideways. Jn the newer part of the city, the fashionable quarter,
there are a good many brick-walled houses faced with stucco.
Others are of Bath stone, and these are not unfrequently painted
over of the original color of the stone. Bath stone, which is the
most common material of mason work, is a fine-grained freestone,
very easy to the chisel. It is furnished much cheaper than our
brown stone, so much so that there would be a chance of exporting it to America with profit. There is a finer sort, called by the
masons Caen stone, which is brought from Normandy. The color
of both is at first buff, but rapidly changes to a dark brown.*
There are some buildings of red sandstone, of a little lighter
color than that now so much used in New York. In buildings
mainly of brick, stone is used more than with us; and there are
none of those equivocating, sanded-wood parapets, porticos, steps,
etc.; all is the real grit. The bricks are mottled, half red and,half greyish yellow; the effect,:-at a little distance, being, as I
said, a yellow or greyish-red, much pleasanter than the bright
red color of our Eastern brick.  Every thing out of doors here
soon gets toned down, as the artists say, by the smoke.  Perhaps
it is partly on this account that pure white paint is never used;
but the prevailing taste is evidently for darker colors than with
us.  The common hues of the furniture and fitting up of shops,
for instance, is nearly is dark as old mahogany.  This gives
even the dram-shops such a rich, substantial look, that we can
hardly recognize them as of the same species as our tawdry
" saloons," painted, gilded, and bedizened to catch flies with their
* Caen stone does not darken much unless from soot. It is now frequently imported,
and several fine buildings have been made of it in New York.




LIVERPOOL.                       41
flare. There are no " oyster cellars," but oysters " in the shell,"
are exposed in stands about the street, like those of our " hot
corn," and apple women. Liquor shops, always with the ominous
sign of" Vaults," are very frequent, and often splendid. The
tea and coffee shops are among the richest in the streets. The
bakers' fronts are also generally showy, and there are a great
many of them. It seems to be the general custom, for poor families at least, to make their own bread, and send it in to them to
be baked. The first night we were ashore, we got some bread
and butter, and American cheese, at a baker's, and saw in ten
minutes a dozen loaves called for. They had sheet-iron checks,
with numbers ow them, which were given up on the presentation
of a corresponding check, and, for a loaf of ten or twelve pounds,
a penny for baking-in the same way that passengers' baggage
is checked on our railroads.
WVood is used in the interior of houses more than I had imagined it would be. Its cost is high. I inquired the price of what
looked like a common "Albany board," such as I buy in New
York for sixteen cents; it was of the value of about thirty-five
cents. The kitchens, as far as we have observed, are on the
street floor, level with the living apartments. Coarse pottery and
wicker-work utensils are more common than with us. Few of
the houses in the town have trees about them. Occasionally an
old mansion is set a little back, and has a little scrubby foliage
in front of it-most commonly of elms dwarfed [by smoke] to
the size and natural shape of a green-gage plum tree. There
are, though, inr the better part of the town, some charming public grounds. I have seen nothing in America so fine.
The surface of the ground on which the town is built is irregular, and the streets crooked and running at every angle with
each other. Generally they are short, and, if long, at every few
blocks the fames are changed. The names are often singular;




42        A N  AMIERIC'AN FARM ER IN ENGLAAND.
many, far apart, have the same with different prefixes, as Great
and Little, North and South, etc. We are in' "Great Cross Hall
street;" after a slight turn it is called " Tythe Barn street;" and
further on Chapel street.  Tythe Barn, I understand, is derived
from the name of the building in which the tithes were deposited
when they were taken in kind-a tenth of the hay, wheat, poultry, etc. There is a steep ascent near us called " Shaw's Brow;"
it is fitted with smooth stone tracks for cart-wheels, with narrow
stones between them set on end for the horses' feet-double teams
here generally going tandem. The best streets are paved only
one-quarter the distance across them, the intermediate space
being macadamized2". This makes a very pleasant road. There
is generally a'_vide side-walk, which is flagged as in our cities;
but in the commercial streets it is oftener paved like the carriage
way, and in the narrowest, there is none at all. The streets are
very clean, and all the side-walks, gutters, and untraveled spaces,
appear to be swept every day.
I have been through two markets. One of them is an immensely large building, covering about two acres, right in the
center of the town; it is clean, light, and well ventilated.  XYbha
a wonder it is that hie people of New York will put up with
such miserable, filthy, crowded hovels as their markets are! In
this building there are over five hundred stalls and tables. It
has its own superintendent of weights and measures, and a thorough and constant police. There are twelve men whose employment is to keep it clean. The garbage is passed readily through
traps into vaults below, from which it is removed at night. The
rules for those who use it, are excellent to secure healthy condition of food, neatness, order, and fair play, and they are strictly
enforced. To my mind, this structure and the arrangements
connected with it are an honor to Liverpool, not second to her
docks. And she has three other large public markets, besides




MARKETS - ECONOMIES — 0 URS.              43
small ones for particular purposes. The meat stalls are frequently owned by women, and, except a better supply of'birds and
rabbits, did not offer any thing different from those of our butchers. A part of the market seemed to be occupied by country
women for the sale of miscellaneous wares.
The fish market was in another building, which was entirely
occupied by women, nice and neat, though skinning eels and
cleaning fish. The milk market also seemed to be altogether in
the hands of women. MNilk is not peddled about as in New York,
but sold from cellar shops. If one wants a cup of tea, our landlady runs across the street for a penny-worth of milk. " From
hand to mouth " so, seems to be common with many things. The
material for our breakfast is mostly bought after we have ordered
it. As we did not mention what we would have till after the
shops were closed last night, we had to wait till nine o'clock for
it this morning. Business hours begin later than in America.
I think the market is not open till eight, which they speak of as
" early."




44        AN A MERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER VI.
The People at Liverpool- Poverty-Merchants- Shopkeepers —WomenSoldiers- Children- Donkeys and Dray Horses.
I HAVE mentioned the most general features of the town,
which, at first sight, on landing in Europe from New York,
strike me as peculiar. Having given you its still life, you will
wish me to people it.
After we had wandered for about an hour through the streets
the first afternoon we were ashore, I remarked that we had not
yet seen a single nicely dressed man, hardly one that in America
would have been described as " of respectable appearance." We
were astonished to observe with what an unmingled stream of
poverty the streets were swollen, and J. remarked that if what
we had seen was a fair indication of the general condition of the
masses here, he should hardly feel justified in dissuading them
from using violent and anarchical means to bring down to themselves a share of the opportunities and comforts of those " higher
classes " that seem to be so utterly separated from them. There
are a great many Irish in Liverpool, but the most that we had
thus far seen evidently were English, yet not English as we have
known them. Instead of the stout, full-faced John Bulls, we had
noticed but few who were not thin, meagre, and pale. There




LIVERPOOL PEOPLE.                    45
was somewhat rarely an appearance of actual misery, but a stupid, hopeless, state-prison-for-life sort of expression. There were
not unfrequently some exceptions to this, but these were mostly
men in some uniform or livery, as railroad hands, servants, and
soldiers.
The next morning, in the court-yard of the Exchange (the
regular'Change assemblage seemed to meet out of doors), we
saw a large collection of the merchants. There was nothing to
distinguish them from a company of a similar kind with us, beyond a general Englishness of feature and an entire absence of
all oddities-with astonishing beards and singularities of costume.
One young man only wore small clothes and leggins, which would
perhaps have disagreeably subjected him to be noticed with us.
They were stouter than our merchants, and more chubby-faced,
yet not looking in vigorous health. They were, on the whole,
judging by a glance at their outsides, to be more respected than
any lot of men of the same number that I ever saw together in
Wall street. Many of them, and most of the well-dressed men
that we have seen in the streets, have a green leaf and simple
posy in a button-hole of their coats.
The shopkeepers of the better class, or retail merchants, are
exactly the same men, to all appearance, who stand behind the
counters with us. Merchant, means only a wholesale dealer in
England; retailers are shopkeepers. The word store is never
applied to a building; but the building in which goods are stored
is a warehouse.
Women are more employed in trade than with us; I have no
doubt with advantage. The women in the streets are more
noticeably different from ours than the men. In general, they
seem cheaply and coarsely clad. Many of the lower class have
their outer garments ordinarily drawn up behind, in the scrubbing-floor fashion. Caps are universally worn, and being gener



46        AN AME'RICAN FAR MER INV ENGLAND.
ally nice and white, they have a pleasant effect upon the face.
The very poorest women look miserably. We see bruised eyes
not unfrequently, and there is evidently a good deal of hard
drinking among them. They are larger and stouter, and have
coarser features than any women we are accustomed to see.
There are neither as many pretty nor as many ugly faces as with
us; indeed, there are very few remarkably ill-favored in that
respect, and almost none strikingly handsome. The best faces
we have seen were among the fish-stalls in market. With
scarcely an exception, the fish-women were very large and tall,
and though many of them were in the neighborhood of fifty, they
had full, bright, unwrinkled faces, very ruddy cheeks, and a
cheerful expression. English women, generally,,appear more
bold and self-reliant than ours; their action is more energetic,
and their carriage less graceful and drooping. Those well dressed, whom we have seen, are no exceptions. Those we have met
to converse with are as modest and complaisant as could be desired, yet speak with a marked promptness, straightforwardness
and confidence which is animating and attractive. We met a
small company last night at the residence of a gentleman to whom
we had a letter, and spent the evening precisely as we should at
a small tea-party at home; we might easily have imagined ourselves in New England. The gentlemen were no way different,
that we noticed, from cultivated men with us, and the ladies only
seemed rather more frank, hearty and sincere, than we should
expect ours to be to strangers.*  There was nothing in their
dresses, that I can think of, as peculiar, yet a general air, not
American —a heavier look and more crinkles, and darker and
* These ladies were Irish. The remark hardly applies to English ladies, certainly not
unless you meet them domestically. The English in their homes, and the English " in
company," are singularly opposite characters.




CILILDREN'S DRESS-DONKEYS.              47
more mixed-up colors. We see many rather nice looking women
probably coming in from the country, driving themselves about
town as if they understood it, in jaunty-looking chaises and
spring-carts.
There are a good many soldiers moving about in fine undress
uniforms: one regiment is in blue, which I did not suppose the
British used. The men look well-more intelligent than you
would suppose. Many are quite old, grey-headed, and all are
very neat and orderly in the streets.
The children look Punchy. It strikes me the young ones are
dressed much older, while the young men are clothed much more
boyishly than in America.
There are lots of the queerest little donkeys in the streets;
some of them would not weigh more than Nep [my Newfoundland], and most of them are not as large as our two-year-old
steers. They are made to draw enormous loads. I saw one
tugging a load of coal, on the top of which two stout Irishmen
sat, and stopped them to ask the weight. It was 1200 [besides
themselvesl, and the top of the donkey's back was just even with
my waist. The driver said he bought her five years ago for two
pounds [$10], and she was then called an old one. Here is one
now coming up the hill with a great load of furniture, a man on
behind it, and a boy on the shafts-a poor little rat of a thing,
with the meekest expression you can conceive of. It is just as
much as he can stagger along with, and the boy jumps off to
relieve-no! the young satan has gone to his head and is cudgeling him. The poor little donkey winces and turns his head,
and drops his ears, and nearly falls down. The boy stops [probably a policeman heaves in sight] and takes his seat on the shaft
again, and the donkey reels on. The man aft has continued his




48        AN AMJIERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAYND.
smoking all the while, without taking any notice of the delay.
As I write, there goes by another-a very handsome, large fat
one, drawing a market cart, with a pretty county girl among the
hampers driving.




BEGGARS-PLACARD.                        49
CHAPTER VII.
Liverpool Continued —Irish Beggars —Condition of Laborers —Cost of
Living - Prices — Bath House - Quarantine — The Docks-Street Scene
" Coming Yankee" Over Nonsense - Artistic Begging.
I HAVE learned nothing reliable about the price of labor here;
the Irish emigration keeps it lower in Liverpool than elsewhere. This reminds me of beggars, and of a placard posted
everywhere about the streets to-day. The beggars are not very
frequent, and are mostly poor, pitiable, sickly women, carrying
half-naked babies. The placard is as follows: "The SELECT
VESTRY inform their fellow-citizens, that in consequence of the
extremely low price of passage from Ireland —4d. (8 cts.)-great
numbers are coming here apparently with no other object than to
beg. They earnestly desire that nothing should be given them.
As a specimen, they mention the following: An Irish woman,
pretending to be a widow, was taken up, who had obtained 3s.
2d. (80 cts.) in an hour and a half after her arrival. Her husband was found already in custody."
The people all seem to be enjoying life more, or else to be
much more miserable, than in America.* The laborers seem
* I was surprised to find this remark in my first letter from Liverpool, for it is the precise counterpart of my impression on landing again in the United States, after six
4




50          AN AMERICAN FARM1iER INT ENAGLAND.
haggard and stupid, and all with whom I have talked, say a poor
man can hardly live here. There is a strong anti-free-trade
growling among them, and they complain much of the repeal of
the Navigation Laws, asserting that American ships are now getting business that was formerly in the hands of the English alone,
and so American sailors do the labor in the docks which was
formerly given to the stevedores and working men of the town.
Clothing, shoes, etc., and rents, are a good deal cheaper than
in New York, and common articles of food but little higher.  I
have obtained the following as specimens of prices for a few ordinary necessaries of life (1st of June):
Beef, mutton, and pork, fine, 121 cts. a pound; lamb, 16 cts.;
veal, 10 cts.
Salmon, 33 cts. a pound; fresh butter, 27 cts.; potatoes, 31 cts.
a peck.
Fowls, 75 cts. a pair; rabbits, 50 cts. a pair; pigeons, 37 cts.
each.
Best Ohio flour, ("superfine,") $6.25 a barrel.
Bread, 2- cts. a pound, or a loaf of twelve pounds, 30 cts.
Bread of best quality, 3 cts. per lb., or loaf of twelve pounds,
35 cts.
Sugar is higher, and tropical fruits, pine-apples, oranges, etc.,
are sold by the hucksters for more money than in New York.
Gas.-The town is well lighted by gas, and it is much used in
private houses-much more generally than in New York. Price
$1.12 per 1000 feet.
Water.-Water is conveyed through the town and to the shipmonths absence in Europe. I observe lately, that the Earl of Carlisle has said something
of similar import. I do believe the people of the United States have less of pleasure and
less of actual suffering than any other in the world. Hopefulness, but hope ever unsatisfied, is marked in every American's face. In contrast with Germany, it is particularly
evident that most of us know but little of the virtuous pleasure God has fitted us to enjoy in this world.




PRICES - BA THING - DOCK'S.              51
ping in tubes, through which I believe it is forced by steam-engines by several companies. The manner in which they are
remunerated I did not learn.
Bathing.-There is a very large and elegant bath-house (covering half an acre), built of stone, by the corporation, at an expense of $177,000. It is fitted with suitable accommodations for
a11 classes of bathers, at various prices. There is a public bath
(45 by 27 feet) for gentlemen, and another for ladies. The water is all filtered, and the cold baths have a constant fresh supply
and outflow.  A steam engine is employed for pumping, etc.
There are also floating baths in the river, as at New York; and
beach-bathing and sea-swimming can be enjoyed at a few minutes
distance, by ferry,. from the town.
Quarantine.-There are no buildings or ground employed for
quarantine, but a number of large hulks are moored in the bay
for this purpose. Quarantine vessels are anchored near them,
and keep a yellow flag flying. It is a great many years since a
vessel has been quarantined here, however, the medical men
being generally agreed that such precaution is useless, or effective
of more harm than good.
We have not made a business of sight seeing, and I want to
give you the general aspect of the first English town to us, rather
than show up the lions. The Liverpool docks, however, are so
extensive, and so different from any thing we have of the kind
in America, that you will wish me to give a few particulars of
them.
The Docks are immense basins, enclosed from the river, or
dug out from the bank, walled up on all sides by masonry, and
protected on the outside, from the sea, by solid stone piers or
quays. In these quays are gates or locks, through which, at high
water, vessels enter or leave. When the water has slightly fallen




52        AN AiERIC'AN FARMER IN ENGLANiD.
they are closed, and the water being retained, the ships are left
securely floating at a height convenient for removing their cargoes. The docks are all enclosed by high brick walls, but between these and the water there is room enough for passing of
carts, and for the temporary protection of goods under wooden
sheds, as they are hoisted out, and before they can be removed.
The streets about the docks are mostly lined with very large and
strong fire-proof warehouses. The quay outside the docks is
broad enough to afford a wide terrace upon the river, which is
called the Marine Parade, and is much resorted to as a promenade. Stone stairs at intervals descend to the bottom of the river,
and there are similar ones within the docks to give access to small
boats. There are buoys and life-preservers lashed to the rails
of the bridges, and small houses occasionally, furnished with instruments and remedies, for the resuscitation of drowning persons..
There are graving docks in which the depth of water can be
regulated at pleasure, for the inspection and repair of the bottoms
of vessels; and there are large basins for coasters, to which there
are no gates, and in which the tide rises and falls, leaving them
in the mud at the ebb. The large docks are connected with each
other, and with the graving docks; by canals, so a vessel can go
from one to another at any time of tide, and without going into
the river.
But you have yet no idea of the spaciousness and grandeur of
the docks. Some of them enclose within their walls ten or twelve
acres, half of which, or more, is occupied by vessels. The twelve
now completed (there are more building) extend along in front
of the town uninterrupted by buildings for more than two miles,
or further than from Whitehall Stairs to Corlear's Hook, in New
York. On the other side of the river, a considerably larger extent of docks is laid out and constructing. A basin for coasters,




LIFERPOOL - DOCKS.                     53
which covers over sixteen acres, and in which there is twelve
feet at low water, is just completed there.
Each dock has its own dock-master, custom-house superintendent, and police force. The police seems to us perfect. It is
composed of well-instructed young men, most courteous and
obliging, at the same time prompt and efficient. It quite surprised me to see our fierce ship masters submit like lambs to have
their orders countermanded by them.
There are thlree docks for the convenience of steamers alone.
The American steamers, I suppose, are too large to go into them,
for they are lying in the stream.
The docks were built by the town, and besides the wonderful
increase of its commerce which they have effected, the direct
revenue from them gives a large interest on their cost. The
charges are more moderate than at other British ports, and this
has, no doubt, greatly helped to draw their commerce here. This
is the principal ground, for instance, of the selection of Liverpool
in preference to Bristol as the port of departure for transatlantic
steamers.*  The foreign commerce of Liverpool is the most valuable of any town in the world.  Its immense business is probably owing to its being the best port in the vicinity of the densest
manufacturing district of England. It is not naturally a good
harbor, but a very exposed and inconvenient one. The amount
paid by vessels for dockage has in some years been $1,000,000,
and the whole is expended by the corporation in improvements
of the town and for public purposes.
The small steam-craft do not usually go into the docks, but
land passengers on the quays outside.  The ferry-boats, of which
there are half a dozen lines crossing the Mersey, all come to one
* The port charges at Bristol have been lately greatly reduced, and are now lower than
those of Liverpool, or any other port in the kingdom.




54            AN AMERIC'AN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
large floating wharf, from which the ascent to the quays is made
easy at all times of tide, by a sufficiently long, hinged bridge.
There is a Sailor's Home now building here, which will certainly be a noble record of the justice and liberality of the merchants of the port to their humble associates on the sea.  It is
situated in an open public place, not far from the Custom House
and City Hall.  It is built of stone, in the Elizabethan style,
and was considered a design worthy of giving Prince Albert
honor in the laying of its corner-stone. It is already a stately
edifice.
There are chapels for seamen in several (possibly in all) of the
docks.*
Later.  We have left Liverpool, and while breathing this delicious fragrance of hawthorn and clover, it is hard to think back
to the stirring dusty town, but I will try for a few minutes to do
so, and then bring you with me (I wish I could!) out into the
country.
A great deal that interested us at Liverpool I must omit to
tell you of. I should like to introduce you to some of the agreeable acquaintances we met there, but in what we saw of social
life there was hardly any thing to distinguish it from  America.
~We were much pleased with some of the public gardens and
pleasure grounds that we visited, and when we return here I may
give you some account of them. I meant to have said a little
* The laws of the port require: That for three hours at high water, there shall be an
efficient person on the deck of every vessel in the docks or basins; That the anchor shall
be in-board, jib-boom run in, etc.; That no article of freight shall be allowed to remain
on the dock-quays for more than forty-eight hours [penalty, $1.25 an hour]; That no
light or fire shall be allowed [without special permission] on any vessel in the docks or
basins at any time. This last regulation prevents cooking on board, and makes it
necessary for the crews to live on shore. The consequent customs are very inconvenient,
expensive, and demoralizing to the seaman.




COMPARATIVE STREET-PO VERTY.              55
more about the style of building in the newer and extending parts
of the city; it did not differ much, however, fiom what you might
see at home, in some of the suburbs of Boston for instance.
It would be more strange to you to see long, narrow streets,
full from one end to the other, of the poorest-looking people you
ever saw, women and children only, the men being off at work, I
suppose, sitting, lounging, leaning on the door-steps and sidewalks, smoking, knitting, and chatting; the boys playing ball in
the street, or marbles on the flagging; no break in the line of
tall, dreary houses, but strings of clothes hung across from opposite second-story windows, to dry; all dwellings, except a few
beer, or junk shops, in the cellars. You can see nothing like
such a dead mass of pure poverty in the worst quarter of our
worst city. In New York, such a street would be ten times as
filthy and stinking, and ten times as lively; in the middle of it
there would be a large fair building, set a little back (would that
I could say with a few roods of green turf and shrubbery between it and the gutter, in which the children are playing), with
the inscription upon it, "Public Free School;" across from the
windows would be a banner with the " Democratic Republican
Nominations;" hand organs would be playing, hogs squealing,
perhaps a stampede of firemen; boys would be crying newspapers, and the walls would be posted with placards, appealing,
with whatever motive, to patriotism and duty, showing that statesmen and demagogues could calculate on the people's reading and
thinking a little there. There would be gay grog-shops, too,
with liberty poles before them, and churches and Sunday school
rooms (with lying faces of granite-painted pine) by their side.
The countenances of the people here exhibited much less either
of virtuous or vicious character, than you would discern among
an equally poor multitude in America, yet among the most miserable of them (they were Irish) I was struck with some singu



56        AN AME'RICGAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
larly intelligent, and even beautiful faces, so strangely out of
place, that if they had been cleaned and put in frames, so the
surroundings would not appear, you would have taken them for
those of delicate, refined, and intellectual ladies.
Thursday Mlorning,, May 30th.
We packed all our traveling matter, except a few necessaries,
in two trunks and a carpet-bag, and I took them in a hackney
carriage to the freight station, to be sent to London. The trunks
were received, but the bag the clerks refused, and said it must be
sent from the passenger station. I had engaged to meet my
friends in a few minutes at the opposite side of the town from
the passenger station, and the delay of going there would vexatiously disarrange our plans. I therefore urged them to take it,
offering to pay extra freight, etc. They would be happy to accommodate me, but their rules did not admit of it. A carpet-bag
could not be sent from that station at any price. I jumped on to
the box, and drove quickly to the nearest street of shops, where,
at a grocers, I bought for a twopence a coffee-sack, and enclosing
the bag, brought it in a few minutes back to the station. There
was a good laugh, and they gave me a receipt at once for a sack
-to be kept in London until called for.
On the quay, I noticed a bareheaded man drawing with colored crayons on a broad, smooth flagstone. He had represented,
in a very skillful and beautiful manner, a salmon laid on a china
platter, opposite a broken plate of coarse crockery; between
these were some lines about a "rich man's dish" and a "poor
man's dinner." He was making an ornamental border about it,
and over all was written, "Friends! Ican get NO WORK; I must
do this or starve."
His hat, with a few pence in it, stood by the side of this.




FERRY-BOATS.                      57
CHAPTER VIII.
Birkenhead -Ferry Boats- Gruff Englishmen - The Abbey - Flour —
Market- The Park- A Democratic Institution- Suburban Villas, etc.
THE ferry-boat by which we crossed to Birkenhead was very
small and dingy. There was no protection from the weather
on board of her, except a narrow, dark cabin under deck. There
were uncushioned seats all around the outside, against the rail,
and the rest of the deck was mostly filled up with freight, spars,
etc. She had a bowsprit, and a beautiful light, rakish mast and
topmast fitted to carry a gaff sail. She was steered with a wheel
in the stern. The pilot or master (a gentleman with a gold band
on his hat and naval buttons) stood on the paddle-boxes to direct,
and a boy stood over the engine to pass orders below. The
engine was under deck, the tops of the cylinders only appearing
above it. It was, however, entirely exposed to observation, and
showed excellent workmanship, and was kept perfectly clean and
highly polished. It was of entirely different construction from
any American engine, having three oscillating cylinders. The
"hands" looked like regular tars, wearing tarpaulins, with the
name of the boat in gilt letters on the ribbon, blue baize shirts,
and broad-bottomed trowsers hung tight on the hips. The boat
came alongside the wharf, ran out her hawsers, and took in her




58        AN AMERICAN FARMER iV EVGLATD.
passengers by a narrow gang-plank; and yet she makes her trip
once in ten minutes. There would not be room enough on her
decks for one of our Rockaways to stand, and she seemed to have
no idea of ferrying any thing but foot-passengers. What would
the good people of Birkenhead think of a Fulton ferry-boat, with
its long, light, and airy rooms, their floors level with the street,
and broad carriage-roads from stem  to stern, crossing and recrossing without turning round, or ever a word of command, or a
rope lifted from morning till evening and from evening till morning?  The length of the ferry is about the same as the South
Ferry of Brooklyn, and the fare one penny.
Birkenhead is the most important suburb of Liverpool, having
the same relation to it that Charlestown has to Boston, or Brooklyn to New York. When the first line of Liverpool packets was
established, there were not half a dozen houses here; it now has
a population of many thousands, and is increasing with a rapidity
hardly paralleled in the New World. This is greatly owing to
the very liberal and enterprising policy of the land-owners, which
affords an example that might be profitably followed in the vicinity of many of our own large towns. There are several public
squares, and the streets and places are broad, and well paved and
lighted. A considerable part of the town has been built with
reference to general effect, from the plans and under the direction
of a talented architect, GILESPIE GRAHAM.
We received this information while crossing in the ferry-boat,
from a fellow-passenger, who, though a stranger, entered into
conversation, and answered our inquiries with a frankness and
courtesy that we have thus far received from every one in England. By his direction, we found near the landing a square of
eight or ten acres, about half of it enclosed by an iron fence, and
laid out with tasteful masses of shrubbery (not trees) and gravel
walks. The houses about it stood detached, and though of the




RUINS OP AN A BBEY.                 59
same general style, were sufficiently varied in details not to
appear monotonous. These were all of stone.
We left this, and were walking up a long, broad street, when
the gentleman who had crossed at the ferry with us joined us
again, and said that as we were strangers we might like to look
at the ruins of anAbbLU Which were in the vicinity, and he had
come after us that if we pleased he might conduct us to it.
Right in the midst of the town, at the corner of a new brick
house, we came upon an old pile of stone work. Old, indeed!under the broken arch of a Gothic window, the rain-water had
been so long trickling as to wear deep channels; cracking,
crumbling, bending over with age, it seemed in many places as
if the threatening mass had only been till now withheld from
falling prostrate by the faithful ivy that clung to it, and clasped
it tight with every fibre.
You cannot imagine the contrast to the hot, hurrying, noisy
world without, that we found on entering the little enclosure of
th~ old churchyard and abbey walls. It was all overshadowed
with dense foliage, and only here and there through the leaves,
or a shattered arch round which the  ivy curled with enchanting
grace, would there be a glimpse of the blue sky above.': By listening, we could still hear the roar of wheers, rumbling of rail-cars,
clanging of steamboat bells, and the shouts of jovial sea-captains,
drinking gin and water in a neighboring tea-garden, over which
the American flag was flying. But within the walls there was
no sound but the chirps of a wren, looking for her nest in a dark
cranny; the hum of bees about an old hawthorn bush; the piping
of a cricket under a gravestone, and our own footsteps echoed
from mysterious crypts.
Our guide having pointed out to us the form of the ancient
structure, and been requited for his trouble by seeing the pleasure




60         AN AJMERICANl FARMER IN ENGLAND.
he had given us, took his leave.  We remained a long time, and
enjoyed it, as you may think.
Did you ever hear of Birkenhead Abbey? I never had
before. It has no celebrity; but coming upon it so fresh from
the land of youth, as we did, so unexpectant of any thing of the
kind-though I have seen far older _ruin& and more renowned,
I have found none so impressive.
A ruined end of the old prior's house had been repaired and
roofed over many years ago, and was used an a school-housemany years ago, for the ivy on it was very strong and gnarled,
and bushes and grass were growing all over the roof.  I send
you a hasty sketch of it;-wouldn't you like the memory of
such a school?
At the market-place we went into a baker's shop, and, while
eating buns, learned that the poorest flour in market was American and the best French. Upon examination of his stock, we
thought he had hardly a fair sample of American flour; but his
French flour was certainly remarkably fine, and would be so
considered at Rochester. He said it made much whiter bread
than either American or English, and he used but little of it
unmixed, except for the most delicate pastry. French and
English flour is sold in sacks, American in barrels. He thought
American flour was not generally kiln-dried, as it should be for
exportation,* and was much injured in consequence. When we
left he obligingly directed us to several objects of interest in the
vicinity;,and showed us through the market. It is but little less
* The great bulk of the flour we are now (1851) exporting to England is of inferior
quality, worth about $3.50, when common superfine is $4.50. It is used extensively by
the mnillers in England to mix with a superior quality of their own grinding, of English
wheat. By the way, the custom of taking a toll in kind, as a compensation for grinding
at grist-mills, which our fathers brought from England, and which we retain, is now
obsolete there. The millers make their charges in money, and are paid as in any other
business.




NrEW PARK.                        61
in size, and really appears finer and more convenient, than the
one I described in Liverpool. The roof, which is mostly of glass,
is high and airy, and is supported by two rows of slender iron
columns, giving to the interior the appearance of three light and
elegant arcades.  The contrivances to effect ventilation and
cleanliness are very conmplete. It was built by the town, upon
iad' given to it for the purpose, and cost $175,000.
The baker had begged of us not to leave Birkenhead without
seeing their New Park, and at his suggestion we left our knapsacks with him, and proceeded to it. As we approached the
entrance, we were met by women and girls, who, holding out a
cup of milk, asked us-" Will you take a cup of milk, sirs? -
good, cool, sweet cow's milk, gentlemen, or right warm from  the
ass! " And at the gate was a herd of donkeys, some with cans
of milk strapped to them, others saddled and bridled, to be let for
lad1es and children to ride.
The gateway, which is about a mile and a half from the ferry,
anrci quite back of the town, is a great, massive block of handsome
Ionic architecture, standing alone, and unsupported by any thing'el'gs'e- i'"the vicinity, and looking, as I think, heavy and awkward.
There is a sort of grandeur about it that the English are fond of,,
but which, when it is entirely separate from all other architectural constructions, always strikes me unpleasantly. It seems
intended as an impressive preface to a great display of art within;
but here, as well as at Eaton Park, and other places I have since
seen, it is not followed up with great things, the grounds immediate!y within th'e grand entrance being simple, and apparently
rather overlooked by the gardener. There is a large archway
for carriages, and two smaller ones for people on foot, and, on
either side, and over these, are rooms which probably serve as
inconvenient lodges for the laborers. No porter appears, and the
gates are freely opened to the public.




62        AN AMERICAN FARMER I~N ENGLAND.
Walking a short distance up an avenue, we passed through
another light iron gate into a thick, luxuriant, and diversified
garden. Five minutes of admiration, and a few more spent in
studying the manner in which art had been employed to obtain
from nature so much beauty, and I was ready to admit that inll
democratic America there was nothing to be thought of as comparable with this People's Garden. Indeed, gardening had here
reached a perfection that I had never before dreamed of. I cannot undertake to describe the effect of so much taste and skill as
had evidently been employed; I will only tell you, that we passed by winding paths, over acres and acres, with a comnstt varying, surface, where on all sides were growing every variety of
shrubs and flowers, with more than natural grace, all set in borders of greenest, closest turf, and all kept with most consummate neatness. At a distance of a quarter of a mile from the
gate, we came to an open field of clean, bright, green-sward,
closely mown, on which a large tent was pitched, and a party of
boys in on one part, and a party of gentlemen in another, were
playing cricket. Beyond this was a large meadow with groups
of' young trees, under which a flock of sheep were reposing,
and girls and women with children, were playing.  While
watching the cricketers, we were threatened with a shower,
and hastened to look for shelter, which we found in a pagoda,
on an island approached by a Chinese bridge. It was soon
filled, as were the other ornamental buildings, by a crowd of
those who, like ourselves, had been overtaken in the grounds
by the rain; and I was glad to observe that the privileges of
the garden were enjoyed about equally by all classes. There
were some who were attended by servants, and sent at once
for their carriages, but a large proportion were of the common
ranks, and a few women with children, or suffering from ill
health, were evidently the wives of very humble laborers.




NEW PARK.                          63
There were a number of strangers, and some we observed with
note-books and portfolios, who seemed to have come from a distance to study in the garden. i The summer-houses, lodges,
bridges, etc., were all well constructed, and of undeca ing materials.: One of the bridges which we crossed was of our countryman kEMINGTON'S  patent, an extremely light and  graceful
erection.
I obtained most of the following information from  the head
working-gardener.
The site of the park and garden was, ten years ago, a flat,
clay farm. It was placed in the hands of Mr. PAXTON, in June,
1844, by whom it was roughly laid out in its present form by
June of the following year.* Carriage roads, thirty-four feet
wide, with borders of ten feet, ritd walks varying in width,, were
first drawn and made.  The excavation for a pond was also immediately undertaken, and the earth obtained fiom these sources
used for making mounds and to vary the surface, which has been
done with much naturalness. The whole ground was thoroughly
under-drained, the minor drains of stone, the main of tile. By
these sufficient water is obtained to fully supply the pond, or
lake, as they call it, which is from twenty to forty feet wide, and
about three feet deep, and meanders for a long distance through
the garden.  It is stocked>'wi~i" aquatic plants, gold fish, and
swans.
The roads are macadamized. On each side of the carriage
way, and of all the walks, pipes for drainage are laid, which communicate with deep main drains that run under the edge of all
the mounds or flower beds. The walks are laid first with six
inches of fine broken stone, then three inches cinders, and the
surface with six inches of fine rolled gravel. All the stones on
* Mr. Kemp has the credit of the design with the public. I suppose that he was employed by Paxton to perfect his plan and superintend the construction




64        AN AMERICAN FARMER IIN EXGLANVD.
the ground which were not used for these purposes, were laid in
masses of rock-work, and mosses and rock-plants attached to
them. The mounds were finally planted with shrubs, and heaths
and ferns, and the beds with flowering plants. Between these
and the walks and drives, is everywhere a belt of turf (which
by the way, is kept close cut with short, broad scythes, and
shears, and swept with hair-brooms, as we saw). Then the
-rural lodges, temples, pavillion, bridges, orchestra for a band of
instrumental music, etc., were built. And so, in one year, the
skeleton of this delightful garden was complete.
But this is but a small part. Besides the cricket and an
archery ground, large valleys were made verdant, extensive
drives arranged- plantations, clumps, and avenues of trees
formed, and a large park laid out. - And all this magnificent
pleasure ground is entirely, unreservedly, and for ever, the
people's own. The poorest British peasant is as free to enjoy it
in all its parts as the British queen. More than that, the baker
of Birkenhead has the pride of an OWNER in it.
Is it not a grand, good thing? But you are inquiring who
paid for it. The honest owners - the most wise and worthy
townspeople of Birkenhead —in the same way that the New
Yorkers pay for " the Tombs," and the Hospital, and the cleaning
(as they say) of their streets.
Of the farm which was purchased, one hundred and twenty
acres have been disposed of in the way I have described. The
remaining sixty acres, encircling the park and garden, were
reserved to be sold or rented, after being well graded, streeted,
and planted, for private building lots. Several fine mansions are
already built on these (having private entrances to the park),
and the rest now sell at $1.25 a square yard. The whole concern
cost the town between five and six hundred thousand dollars.




BIRKENHEAD.                          65
It gives employment at present to ten gardeners and laborers in
summer, and to five in winter.
The generous spirit and fearless enterprise that has accomplished this, has not been otherwise forgetful of the health and
comfort of the poor.* Among other things, I remember, a public
washing and bathing house for the town is provided.  I should
have mentioned also, in connection with the market, that in the
outskirts of the town there is a range of stone slaughter-houses,
with stables, yards, pens, supplies of hot and cold water, and
other arrangements and conveniences, that enlightened regard for
health and decency would suggest.
The consequence of all these sorts of things is, that all about
the town, lands, which a few years ago were almost worthless
wastes, have become of priceless value; where no sound was
heard but the bleating of goats and braying of asses complaining
of their pasturage, there is now the hasty click and clatter of
many hundred busy trowels and hammers. You may drive
through wide and thronged streets of stately edifices, where were
only a few scattered huts, surrounded by quagmires.  Docks of
unequaled size and grandeur are building, and a forest of masts
grows along the shore; and there is no doubt that this young
town is to be not only remarkable as a most agreeable and
healthy place of residence, but that it will soon be distinguished
for extensive and profitable commerce. It seems to me to be the
only town I ever saw that has been really built at all in accordance with the advanced science, taste, and enterprising spirit that
are supposed to distinguish the nineteenth century. I do not
doubt it might be found to have plenty of exceptions to its gen* "Few towns, in modern times, have been built with such regard to sanitary regulationsg Birkenhead; and in no instance has so much been done for the healthii C6fbirt;~.
and enjoyment of a people, as by those energetic individuals with whose names the rise
and progress of Birkenhead are so intimately connected.:"-Dr. J. H. Robertson.
5




66        AN AMERICAN FARMER IN EN1GLANVD.
eral character, but I did not inquire for these, nor did I happen
to observe them. Certainly, in what I have noticed, it is a model
town, and may be held up as an example, not only to philanthropists and men of taste, but to speculators and men of business.
After leaving the park, we ascended a hill, from the top of
which we had a fine view of Liverpool and Birkenhead. Its
sides were covered with villas, with little gardens about them.
The architecture was generally less fantastic, and the style and
materials of building more substantial, than is usually employed
in the same class of residences with us. Yet there was a good
deal of the same stuck-up and uneasy pretentious air about them
that the suburban houses of our own city people so commonly
have. Possibly this is the effect of association, in my mind, of
steady, reliable worth and friendship with plain or old-fashioned
dwellings, for I often find it difficult to discover in the buildings
themselves the elements of such expression.:I am inclined to
think it is more generally owing to some disunity in the designoften, perhaps, to a want of keeping between the mansion and its
grounds, or its situation. The architect and the gardener do not
understand each other, and commonly the owner or resident is
totally at variance in his tastes and intentions from both; or the
man whose ideas the plan is made to serve, or who pays for it,
has no true, independent taste, but had fancies to be accommodated, which only follow confusedly after custom or fashion. I
think, with Ruskin, it is a pity that every man's house cannot be
really his own, and that he cannot make all that is true, beautiful,
and good in his own character, tastes, pursuits, and history, manifest in it.
But however fanciful and uncomfortable many of the villa
houses about Liverpool and Birkenhead appear at first sight, the
substantial and thorough manner in which most of them are built
will atone for many faults. The friendship of nature has been




TItE VILLAS.                    67
secured for such. Dampness, heat, cold, will be welcome to do
their best; every day they will improve. In fifty or a hundred
years fashions may change, and they will appear, perhaps, quaint,
possibly grotesque; but still strong, home-like, and hospitable.
They have no shingles to rot, no glued and puttied and painted
-gimcrackery, to warp and crack and moulder; and can never
look so shabby, and desolate, and dreary, as will nine-tenths of
the buildings of the same denomination now erecting about New
York, almost as soon as they lose the raw, cheerless, impostorlike airs which seem inseparable from their newness.




68         AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER IX.
A Railway Ride-Second Class —Inconvenient Arrangements — First
Walk in the Country —England itself —A Rural Landscape - Hedges
-Approach to a Hamlet - The Old Ale-house and the Old John Bull -
A Talk with Country People - Notions of America — Free Trade - The
Yew Tree - The Old Rural Church and Graveyard - A Park Gate -A
Model Farmer - The Old Village Inn —A Model Kitchen- A Model
Landlady.
W E were very tired when we again reached the baker's. After
passenger-life at sea, a man's legs need to be brought into
active service somewhat gradually. As we had spent more time
than we had meant to at Birkenhead, we determined to rest ourselves for a few minutes, and get a start of a few miles into the
country by the railroad. A seat, however, on the hard board
benches of an English second-class rail-carriage, crowded, and
your feet cramped under you, does not remove fatigue very
rapidly.
A heavy cloud darkened the landscape, and as we emerged in
a few moments from the dark tunnel, whirling out of town, big
drops of rain came slanting in upon us. A lady coughed, and
we closed the window. Soon the road ran through a deep cutting, with only occasionally such depressions of its green-sodded
bank, that we could, through the dusty glass, get glimpses of the
country. In successive gleams:




A RAIL WA Y RIDE.                  69
A market-garden, with rows of early cabbages, and lettuce,
and peas;Over a hedge, a nice, new stone villa, with the gardener shoving up the sashes of the conservatory, and the maids tearing
clothes from the drying-lines; —
A bridge, with children shouting and waving hats; —
A field of wheat, in drills as precisely straight, and in earth as
clean and finely tilled, as if it were a garden-plant; —
A bit of broad pasture, with colts and cows turning tail to the
squall; long hills in the back, with some trees and a steeple
rising beyond them; —
Another few minutes of green bank; —
A jerk-a stop. A gruff shout:
" BRO.IBRO!"
A great fuss to get the window on the other side from us open;
calling the conductor; having the door unlocked; squeezing
through the ladies' knees, and dragging our packs over their laps
-all borne with a composure that shows them to be used to it,
and that they take it as a necessary evil of railroad traveling.
The preparations for rain are just completed as we emerge upon
a platform, and now-down it comes in a torrent. We rush, with
a quantity of floating muslin, white ankles, and thin shoes, under
an arch. With a sharp whistle and hoarse puffing the train
rumbles onward; grooms pick up the lap-dog and baskets; flaunting white skirts are moved again across the track; another rush,
in which a diminutive French sun-shade is assisted by a New
York umbrella to protect a new English bonnet; a graceful bolw
in return, with lifting eyebrows, as if in inquiry; and we are
altogether crowded in the station-house.
In a few minutes they go off in carriages, and room is left us
in the little waiting-room to strap on our knapsacks. The rain
slackens- ceases, and we mount, by stone steps up a bank of




70        AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
roses and closely-shaven turf, to the top of the bridge over the
cutting.
There we were right in the midst of it! The country - and
such a country!- green, dripping, glistening, gorgeous! We
stood dumb-stricken by its loveliness, as, from the bleak April
and bare boughs we had left at home, broke upon us that English
May -sunny, leafy, blooming May - in an English lane; with
hedges, English hedges, hawthorn hedges, all in blossom; homely
old farm-houses, quaint stables, and haystacks; the old church
spire over the distant trees; the mild sun beaming through the
watery atmosphere, and all so quiet -the only sounds the hum
of bees, and the crisp grass-tearing of a silken-skinned, real (unimported) Hereford cow, over the hedge.
No longer excited by daring to think we should see it, as we
discussed the scheme round the old home-fire; no longer cheering
ourselves with it in the stupid, tedious ship; no more forgetful
of it in the bewilderment of the busy town - but there we were,
right in the midst of it; long time silent, and then speaking softly,
as if it were enchantment indeed, we gazed upon it and breathed
it — never to be forgotten. Ah, me!
At length we walked on - rapidly - but frequently stopping,
one side and the other, like children in a garden; hedges still,
with delicious fragrance, on each side of us, and on, as far as we
can see, true farm-fencing hedges; nothing trim, stiff, nice, and
amateur-like but the verdure broken, tufty, low, and natural.
They are set on a ridge of earth, thrown out from a ditch beside
them, which raises and strengthens them as a fence. They are
nearly all hawthorn, which is now covered in patches, as if
after a slight fall of snow, with clusters of white or pink blossoms
over its light green foliage. Here and there a holly bush, with
bunches of scarlet berries, and a few other shrubs, mingle with it.
A cart meets us - a real heavy, big-wheeled English cart; and




VILLAGE ALF-IO USE.                 71
English horses - real big, shaggy-hoofed, sleek, heavy English
cart-horses; and a carter —a real apple-faced, smock-frocked,
red-headed, wool-hatted carter —breeches, stockings, hob-nailed
shoes, and "Gee-up Dobbin" English carter.
Little birds hop along in the road before us, and we guess at
their names, first of all electing one to be Robin-Redbreast. We
study the flowers under the hedge, and determine them nothing
else than primroses and buttercups. Through the gates we admire the great, fat, clean-licked, contented-faced cows, and large,
white, long-wooled sheep.
What else was there?  I cannot remember; but there was
that altogether that made us forget our fatigue, disregard the rain,
thoughtless of the way we were going- serious, happy, and
grateful. And this excitement continued for maWn ydays.
At length, as it becomes drenching again, we approach a stonespire. A stone house interrupts our view in front; the road
winds round it, between it and another; turns again, and there
on our left is the church - the old ivy-covered, brown stone village church, with the yew-tree -we knew it at once, and the
heaped-up, green, old English churchyard. We turn to the
right; there is the old ale-house, long, low, thatched-roofed. We
run in at the open door; there he sits, the bluff and hearty old
fellow, with the long-stemmed pipe and the foaming pewter mug
on the little table before him. At the same moment with us
comes in another man. He drops in a seat-raps with his whip.
Enter a young woman, neat and trim, with exactly the white cap,
smooth hair, shiny face, bright eyes and red cheeks we are looking for.
" Muggoyail, lass!"
Mlug of ale- ay, that's it! ]Mug of ale! -Fill up! fill up!
and the toast shall be -" MERRIE ENGLAND! HURRAH!"
We sit with them for some time, and between puffs of smoke,




72        AN ANMERICAN FARMER IN ENlGLANVD.
the talk is of "the weather and the crops."  The maid leaves
the door open, so we can look into the kitchen, where a smart old
woman is ironing by a bright coal fire. Two little children
venture before us. I have just succeeded in coaxing the girl on
to my knee, as C. mentions that we are Americans. The old
woman lays down her iron and puts on her spectacles to look at
us. The stout man who had risen to take an observation of the
weather, seats himself again and calls for another mug and twist.
The landlord (a tall thin man, unfortunately) looks in and asks
how times go where we come from. Plenty of questions follow,
that show alike the interest and the ignorance of our companions
about America, it being confused apparently in their minds with
Ireland, Guinea, and the poetical Indies. After a little straightening out, and explanation of the distance to it, its climate and
civilized condition, they ask about the present crops, the price of
wheat, about rents, tithes, and taxes. In return, we get only
grumbling. "The country is ruined;" "things weren't so when
they were young as they be now;" and so on, just as a company
of our tavern-lounging farmers would talk, except that every
complaint ends with blaming Free Trade. "Vree-trade-hoye,
sirs-Vree-trade be killing the varmers."
We left them as soon as the shower slackened, but stopped
again immediately to look at the yew through the churchyard
gate. It was a very old and decrepit tree-with dark and funereal foliage -the stiff trunk and branches of our red-cedar, with
the leaf of the hemlock, but more dark and glossy than either.
The walls of the church are low, but higher in one part than
another. The roof, which is slated, is high and steep. The
tower is square, with buttresses on the corners, on the tops of
which are quaint lions rampant. It is surmounted by a tall,
symmetrical spire-solid stone to the ball, over which, as I am
the son of a Puritan, is a weather-cock, and not a cross. There




A MODEL KITCHEN.                     73
are little, narrow windows in the steeple, and swallows are flying
in and out of them. Old weather-beaten stone and mortar, glass,
lead, iron, and matted ivy, but not a splinter of wood or a daub
of paint. Old England for ever — Amen.
A mile or two more of such walking as before the shower, and
we came to a park gate. It was, with the lodges by its side, neat,
simple, and substantial. The park was a handsome piece of old
woods, but, as seen from the road, not remarkable. We were
told, however, that there was a grand old hall and fine grounds a
long way within. Near the park there were signs of an improving farmer: fields of mangel-wurzel in drills; large fields, partly
divided by wire fences, within which were flocks of sheep; marks
of recent under-draining; hedges trimmed squarely, and every
thing neat, straight, and business-like.
As it grows dark we approach another village. The first
house on the left is an inn-a low, two-story house of light drabcolored stone. A bunch of grapes (cast in iron) and a lantern
are hung out from it over the foot-path, and over the front door
is a square sign -"THE RED LION - licensed to sell foreign
spirits and beer, to be drunk on the premises."  We turn into a
dark hall, and opening a door to the left, enter — the kitchen?
Such a kitchen! You would not believe me if I could describe
how bright every thing is. You would think the fireplace a
show-model, for the very bars of the grate are glistening. It is
all a-glow with red-hot coals; a bright brass tea-kettle swings
and sings from a polished steel crane — hook, jack, and all like
silver; the brass coal-scuttle, tongs, shovel, and warming-pan are
blazingly radiant, and the walls and mantel-piece are covered
with bright plate-covers, and I know not what other metallic furniture, all burnished to the highest degree.
The landlady rises and begs to take our wet hats - a model
landlady, too. What a fine eye! —a kind and welcoming black




74        AN AIIERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
eye. Fair and stout; elderly - a little silver in her hair, just
showing its otherwise thick blackness to be no lie; a broad-frilled,
clean, white cap and collar, and a black dress. Ah ha! one of
the widows that we have read of. We hesitate to cross the cleanscoured, buff, tile floor with our muddy shoes; but she draws
arm-chairs about the grate, and lays slippers before them, stirs
up the fire, though it is far from needing it, and turns to take our
knapsacks. "We must be fatigued-it's not easy walking in the
fain; she hopes we can make ourselves comfortable."
There is every prospect of it.




TA4LK WITH A FARMER.                  75
CHAPTER X.
Talk with a Farmer; with a tender-hearted Wheelright-An Amusing
Story - Notions of America - Supper - Speech of the English - Pleasant Tones - Quaint Expressions - The Twenty-ninth of May - Zaccheus
in the Oak Tree — Education - Bed-chamber — A Nightcap, and....a
Nightcap.
O(N one side near the fire there was a recess in the wall, in
J  which was a settle, (a long, high-backed, wooden seat.) Two
men with pipes and beer sat in it, with whom we fell to talking.
One of them proved to be a farmer, the other a jack-of-all-trades,
but more distinctly of the wheelright's, and a worshiper of and
searcher after ideal women, as he more than once intimated to us.
WTe were again told by the farmer that free trade was ruining the
country-no farmer could live long in it. He spoke with a bitter
jocoseness of the regularity of his taxes, and said that though
they played the devil with every thing else, he always knew how
tithes would be. He paid, I think he said, about a dollar an acre
every year to the church, though he never went to it in his life;
always went to chapel, as his father did before him. He was an
Independent; but there were so few of them thereabouts that
they could not afford to keep a minister, and only occasionally
had preaching. When he learned that we were from America,
he was anxious to know how church matters were there. Though




76      AN AMIIERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
a rather intelligent man, he was utterly ignorant that we had no
State Church; and though a dissenter, the idea of a government
giving free trade to all sorts of religious doctrine seemed to be
startling and fearful to him. But when I told him what the
rent (or the interest on the value) of my farm was, and what
were its taxes, he wished that he was young that he might go to
America himself; he really did not see how he should be able to
live here much longer. He rented a farm of about fifty acres,
and was a man of about the same degree of intelligence and information that you would expect of the majority of those owning
a similar farm with us. Except that he was somewhat stouter
than most Yankees, he did not differ much in appearance or dress
from many of our rather old-fashioned farmers.
The tender-hearted wheelwright could hardly believe that we
were really born and brought up in America. He never thought
any foreigners could learn to speak the language so well. He too
was rather favorably struck with the idea of going to America,
when we answered his inquiries with regard to mechanics' wages.
He was very cautious, however, and cross-questioned us a long
time about the cost of every thing there-the passage, the great
heat of the climate, the price of beer; and at length, touching
his particular weakness, he desired to be told candidly how it
would be if he should marry before he went. If he should get
a wife, a real handsome one, would it be safe for him to take her
there? He had heard a story-perhaps we knew whether it was
true or not-of a man who took a handsome wife out with him,
and a black man, who was a great rich lord in our country, took
a great liking to her, and offered the man ten thousand pounds
for her, which he refused; and so the great black lord went away
very wroth and vexed. When he was gone, the woman upbraided her husband: " Thou fool, why didst thee not take it and
let me go with him? I would have returned to thee to-morrow."




S UPPER - BED- CIIA ABERS.             77
Then the man followed after the black lord, and sold his wife to
him for ten thousand pounds. But the next day she did not
return, nor the next, neither the next; and so the man went to
look for her; and lo! he found her all dressed up in silk and
satin,'lighting from a coach, and footmen waiting upon her. So
he says to her, "Why didst thee not return the next day?"
"_ Dost take me for a fool, goodman?" quoth she, and stepped
back into her fine coach and drove off; and so he lost his handsome wife.
Besides the kitchen, there were, on the lower floor of the inn,
two or three small dining or tea rooms, a little office or accounting closet for the mistress, and a tap-room, which is a small
apartment for smoking and drinking. These are all plainly but
neatly furnished. There is a large parlor above stairs, somewhat
elegantly furnished. The kitchen, tap-room, and office are low
rooms, and over these is the parlor. The dining-rooms are
higher, and over them are the bed-chambers. Thus the parlor
is allowed a high ceiling, level with the eaves of the roof, and
you enter it from a landing some steps lower than the bed-chambers. The latter are carried up under the roof, with dormer
windows, and are very pleasant rooms. It will be seen that all
the traveler's apartments are thus made spacious at the expense
of height in the others, and that yet there is a convenient arrangement and connection of the whole.
We had supper in a little back room, as neat as care and
scouring could make and keep it. The table was much such a
one as Mrs. Marcombe, in Hanover, would have set for a couple
of tired White Mountain pedestrians, except the absence of any
kind of cakes or pies. The ham had a peculiar taste, and was
very good-C. says the least unpleasant of any he was ever
tempted to eat. It had been dried by hanging from the ceiling
of the kitchen, instead of being regularly smoked, as is our prac



78        AN AMERICAN FAR MER IN ENGLAND.
tice. The milk and butter (which was not in the least salted)
were very sweet and high-flavored.
In the evening we had a long talk with the old woman and her
daughter. The latter was a handsome person, with much such a
good, beaming face as her mother, but with youth, and more refinement from education and intelligence. She also was a widow,
with two sweet, shy little girls.
There are peculiarities in the speech of these women that would
distinguish them anywhere from native Americans. Perhaps the
novelty of them is pleasing, but it has seemed to us that the
speech of most of the people, above the lowest class of laborers
whom we have met, is more agreeable and better than we often
hear at home. Perhaps the climate may have effect in making
the people more steadily animated-the utterance more distinct
and varied. Sentences are more generally finished with a rising
inflection, syllables are more forcibly accented, and quite often, as
with our landlady, there is a rich musical tone in the conversational voice, to which we are not yet so much accustomed but that
it compels us to listen deferentially. I wonder that beauty of
speech is not more thought of as an accomplishment. It is surely
capable of great cultivation, and should not be forgotten in education.
Except in the lower class, the choice of words seems often
elegant, and we hear few idiomatic phrases or provincialisms.
Where we do notice them, in the class I am now speaking of, it
would not seem an affectation of singular language in an educated person with us, but rather a fortunate command of vigorous
Saxon words. We have never any difficulty in understanding
them, while we do sometimes have to reconstruct our sentences,
and find substitutes for some of our words, before we are plainly
understood. The "H" difficulty is an exception to all this, with
nearly all the people, except the most polished, that we have met.




TIlE TWENTY-NINTIH OF  4A Y.                79
Is it not singular? Among the lowest classes, however, there
are many words used that puzzle us; others are pronounced curiously, and many of our common words are used in new combinations. There is an old-fashioned, quaint set of words in common
use that we only understand from having met with them in old
books-in the Bible, for instance. The words Master and J1i'stress
(instead of Mister and Misses, as we have got to pronounce
them), and lad and lass, are usual.  "Here, lad!"  "WJull,.Maister?" I first heard in the Liverpool market.  I passed a
man, there, too, leading a dray-horse, with a heavy load, up one
of the steep streets. He was encouraging him in this way:
" Coom on, my lad! coom on, my good lad!"  When he had
reached the brow, he stopped and went before the noble beast,
who, with glistening eyes, and ears playing beautifully, bowed his
head to be patted: " Good lad! good lad!  Well, thee's done it!"*
We had noticed yesterday, in Liverpool, that the omnibuses
were decorated with branches of trees, ribbons, and flags; the
union-jack (British ensign) was hoisted in several places, the
children seemed to be enjoying a half-holiday in the afternoon,
and once we saw them going together in an irregular procession,
carrying a little one dressed with leaves and crowned with a gilt
paper cap, and singing together in shrill chorus some verses, of
which we only understood the frequent repetition of the words:
"The twenty-ninth of May! the twenty-ninth of May!"  It
occurred to C. to ask whether all this was intended to celebrate
any thing.  "Oh, surely," our hostess said, " it was the twentyninth of May - King Charles-and-the-Oak day." In her hus* A gentleman, riding towards Chowbet, and seeing a boy in the road, shouted out to
him, " My lad, am I half-way to Chowbet? " Young Lancashire looked up at the querist,
and said, " Hah con aw tell, tha' foo', when I doon't know wheear ta' coom fra? "Liverpool Paper.




80        AN AMERICUAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
band's time, they used always to keep it in good style, ornamenting their house all over with oak boughs; and all the stagecoaches and the horses used to be decked with oak boughs too.
"How beautifully," says C. aside, " do such pretty simple customs
keep alive the remembrance of old historic facts! " " But why
do they carry about the child?"  She did not recollect clearly,
but she had the impression that King Charles was a baby when
it occurred. She had forgotten exactly how it was, she said,
"but it told all about it in the Bible."  "In the Bible! mother;
you mean in the History of England, do you not?" said her
daughter, smiling. " Was it?" replied the old lady; "I never
had time to read much in the large History of England. Let
me see-why, no; now I am sure it was in the Bible. Don't
you remember-what's his name-Zack-Zack-Zacheriah? yes,
Zacheriah; how he climbed up into an oak tree to see King
Charles go by!"
A large and most powerful class, including many even of the
more conservative of the Dissenters in England, are terribly
afraid of a national system of education that shall be free from
Church influence. The people had better be left to grow up in
ignorance, rather than that they should not be instructed in theological dogmas. I have actually heard a refined and educated
gentleman, occupying an influential position, advocate the idea
that all the education the common people needed was so much as
would enable them to read their Bible, prayer-book, and catechism. Except for this he would never let them have a teacher,
but would leave them to the parson. He would break up every
Dissenter's school —have no school in the land that was not a
part of the Church. The godless system of education which was
now favored in high quarters (on the plan of our New England
common schools!) he verily believed, if adopted, would be a
national sin that God would arise in his anger to punish.




AC-COMMODATIONS.                  81
Our landlady had lived almost to old age under the shadow of
the Church, in which the story of Zaccheus is every year read
aloud, and in which a religious celebration of the Restoration of
King Charles is by law performed every 29th of May. But a
person of sound faculties, native-born, could not probably be found
in New England, whose godless education would not have made
impossible such a confusion of religious instruction as had been
given her.
I am writing now in my bed-room. Though the ceiling is low,
it is large and well furnished. There are large pitchers of water,
foot-bath, and half-a-dozen towels. The bed is very large, clean,
and deeply curtained. The landlady has sent me up a glass of
her home-brewed beer, with a nightcap, which I noticed she hung
by the fire when I left the kitchen. The chambermaid has drawn
down the bedclothes, and says, " The bed has been well aired,
sir." Good night.
6




82        AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XI.
The Break of Day —A Full Heart-Familiar Things-The Village at
Sunrise - Flowers - Birds - Dog Kennels -"' The Squire" and "The
Hall "- Rooks — Visit to a Small Farm - The Cows - The MilkingThe Dairy-Maids - The Stables - Manure - Bones - Pasture - White
Clover - Implements - Carts - The English Plow and Harrow.
81st May.
T  asvery early this morning when I became gradually aware
of the twittering of house-sparrows, and was soon after
brought to more distinct consciousness of time and place by the
long, clear note of some other stranger bird. I stepped from bed
and kneeled at a little, low, latticed window, curtained without by
a woodbine. Parting the foliage with my hands, I looked out
upon a cluster of low-thatched cottages, half overgrown with ivy;
a blooming hawthorn hedge, enclosing a field of heavy grass and
clover glistening with dew; a few haystacks; another field beyond, spotted with sheep; a group of trees; and then some low
hills, over which the dawn was kindling, with a faint blush, the
quiet, smoky clouds in a gray sky. It may seem an uninteresting
landscape, but I gazed upon it with great emotion, so great that
I wondered at it. Such a scene I had never looked upon before,
and yet it was in all its parts as familiar to me as my native
valley. Land of our poets! Home of our fathers! Dear old




TIrE  SQUIRE- ROOKS.                 83
mother England! It would be strange if I were not affected at
meeting thee at last face to face.
I dressed, and worked my way through the dark, crooked stairs
to the kitchen, where, on the bright steel fender, I found my
shoes dry and polished. I walked through the single short street
of the hamlet.' The houses were set closely together, with neat
little gardens about them. They were of every age; one I
noticed marked with the date 1630-about the time of the first
settlement in Connecticut. It was of stone, narrow, with a steep
roof covered with very small slates. The windows were much
wider than high, and filled with little panes of glass set in strips
of lead. Except in this and the materials of which it was built,
it was not unlike some of the oldest houses that we yet see in our
first Puritan villages, as Hadley and Wethersfield. At the other
end of the hamlet was another inn-" The Blue Lion," I believe,
and a tall hostler opening the stable doors was dressed just as I
wanted to see him-jockey-cap, long striped waistcoat, breeches,
and boots.
As I returned, I saw the farmer who had been at the inn the
night before, and asked him to let me see his cows. He said
they were coming down the lane, and if I went with him I should
meet them. Passing a group of well-built, neat, low buildings,
he said they were the Squire's kennels. They were intended for
greyhounds, but he had his pointers in them now.
"The Squire's! But where's the Squire's house?"
"Yon's the Hall," pointing to a distant group of trees, above
which a light smoke was rising straight up in the calm air, and a
number of large black birds were rapidly rising and falling.
" Yon's the Hall; ye see the rooks."
"The rooks! Then those are rooks, are they?"
"Ay, be they; rooks-do ye not know what rooks be?"
"Yes, but we don't have them in America."




84        ANX  MERICAN F4ARMER IN ENiGLA~ND.
"No! not have rooks? They be main good in a pie, sir."
We met the cows, of which there were about a dozen, driven
by a boy towards the farm-house. They were large and in good
order; with soft, sleek skin, and, like every cow I have seen in
England, look as if they had just been polished up for exhibition.
He could tell nothing of their breed except of one, a handsome
heifer, which he said came partly of Welsh stock. He took me
across a field or two to look at a few cows of the Squire's. They
were finer than any of his, and seemed to be grade short-horns.
The cows were driven- into hovels, which he called ship-pens,
and fastened at their mangers by a chain and ring, sliding on an
upright post (the latest fashion with us), eight of them in an
apartment, standing back to back. Three or four of his daughters
came out to milk-very good looking, modest young women,
dressed in long, loose, grey, homespun gowns. They had those
high wooden tubs to milk in that we see in the old pictures of
sentimental milk-maids. It seems constantly like dreaming to
see so many of these things that we have only known before in
poetry or painting.
The dairy-house and all the farm buildings were of brick, interworked with beams of wood and thatched. They were very
small, the farm being only of fifty acres, and the hay and grain
always kept in stacks. The arrangements for saving manure
were poor-much the same as on any tolerably good farm with
us —a hollowed yard with a pool of liquid on one side. He
bought some dung and bones in Liverpool, but not much. He
esteemed bones most highly, and said they did immense good
hereabout. They made a sweeter, stronger, and more permanent
pasture. Where he had applied them twelve years ago, at the
rate of a ton to an acre, he could see their effect yet. He took
me into an adjoining field which, he said, was one of the best
pastures in the village. It had been plowed in narrow lands, and




FARM IMPL EMEYTTS.                  85
the ridges left high, when it was laid down. The sward was
thicker, better bottomed, than any I ever saw in America. He
sowed about a bushel of grass seeds to the acre, seeding down
with oats. For cheese pasture, he valued white clover more than
any thing else, and had judged, from the taste of American
cheese, that we did not have it. For meadows to be mowed for
hay, he preferred sainfoin and ray-grass. He had lately underdrained some of his lowest land with good effect. His soil is
mostly a stiff clay, resting on a ledge of rocks.
The farm-carts were clumsy and heavy (for horses), with very
large wheels, with broad tires and huge hubs, as you have seen
the English carts pictured. The plow was a very long, sharp,
narrow one, calculated to plow about seven inches deep, and turn
a slice ten inches wide, with a single pair of horses. The stilts,
of iron, were long and low, and the beam, also of iron, very high,
with a goose-neck curve. It is a very beautiful instxument,
graceful and strong; but its appearance of lightness is deceptive,
the whole being of iron; and this, with its great length, though
adding to its efficiency for nice, accurate work, in perfectly smooth
and clear, long fields, would entirely unfit it for most of our purposes. On the rocky, irregular, hill-side farms of New England,
or the stump lands of the West, it would be perfectly useless;
but I should think it might be an admirable plow for our New
York wheat lands, or perhaps for the prairies, after they had
been once broken.
The harrow used on the farm was also of iron, frame and all,
in three oblong sections, hinged together. These were about all
the tools I saw, and they were left in a slovenly way, lying about
the farm-yard and in the road.




86        AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XII.
Breakfast at the Inn —A Tale of High Life- The Garden of the InnAn Old Farm-House - Timber Houses - Laborers' Cottages —Wattles
and Noggin Walls —A " Ferme Ornee " —A Lawn Pasture - Copperleaved Beeches - Tame Black Cattle - Approach to Chester.
I RETURNED to my room in the inn, and had written a page
or two of this before any one was stirring. Then I heard the
mistress waking the servants, and soon after "John the Boots"
came to my door to call me, as I had requested.
After prevailing with difficulty upon the landlady and her
daughter to breakfast with us, we had a very sociable time with
them over the tea and eggs which they had prepared for us.
They were interested to hear of the hard coal we burned (anthracite), that made no smoke, and of wood fires, and of our
peculiar breakfast dishes, griddle-cakes, and Indian bread. They
told of other members of their family-two or three in Australia
-and of the clergy and gentry of the neighborhood. They spoke
kindly and respectfully of the vicar-" a sporting man, sir, and
fond of good living," the old lady added, after mentioning his
charity and benevolence. In speaking of the gentry, it was difficult for her to believe that we did not know the general history of
all the families. We asked about a park we had passed. It was




A TALE OF HIGH LIFE.                87
Park, and had a remarkable story to be told of it; but so
constantly did she anticipate our knowledge, taking for granted
that we knew all that had occurred until within a short time, that
it was long before we could at all understand the news about it.
As you are probably equally ignorant, I will tell you the tale
connectedly, as we finally got it.
It had been the property of Sir T, who occupied the Hall
in it until his death, a year or two ago, and had been in his family
many hundred years. The estate included several villages-the
whole of them, every house and shop, even the churches-and
was valued at ~800,000 ($4,000,000). On the death of Sir T.,
Sir W., his son, inherited his title and estate. But Sir W. was
a sporting man, and had previously gambled himself in debt to
Jews in London ~600,000. He came to the Hall, however, and
remained there some time, keeping two packs of hounds. He
was a good landlord, and the family were beloved. Lady M.
had established and maintained a National (church) School; and
in the winter was in the habit of serving out a large quantity of
soup every day to the poor of the estate. But at length the
bailiffs came, and Sir W. went to France, and his family dispersed among their relatives all over the kingdom. Lady M. last
winter had been very ill, and nothing ailed her, the physicians
said, but sorrow.
And now they were going to sell it-they did not know how
they could —but they showed us a considerable volume, illustrated with maps and lithographs, of "plans and particulars" of the
estate, on the first page of which "Messrs. -  had the honor
to announce that they had been instructed by the honorable proprietor, to sell at auction, on a certain six days, upwards of fifteen
hundred acres of very fine rich land, let to an old and respectable
tenantry, including the whole of the town of, together with
several manors and manorial rights, which have been commuted




88        A N AME'RICAN' IF4ARMER IN ENGLAND.
at ~500 per annum." They showed us also another volume,
containing in one hundred and twelve quarto pages, descriptions
of the furniture, plate, library, paintings, wines, etc., with many
engravings-a curious exposure of noble housekeeping to our
republican eyes. Seeing that we were interested in the book,
the landlady offered it to us; it was of no use to her, she said,
and we were quite welcome to it. It was really of some value,
and we offered to pay for it, but she would not sell it.
Before we left, they showed us through the little garden of the
inn; it was beautifully kept, and every thing growing strongly.
Then, after buckling on our knapsacks, and bringing us another
mug of home-brewed, our kind entertainers took leave of us with
as much good feeling and cordiality as if we were old friends,
who had been making them a short visit, following us out into
the road, with parting advice about the roads and the inns, and
at last a warm shaking of hands.
The country we walked over for a few miles after leaving the
village, was similar to that we saw yesterday-fiattish, with long,
low undulations-the greater part in pasture, and that which was.-not, less highly cultivated than I had expected to find much land
in England, the stock upon it almost altogether cows, and these
always looking admirably well; the fields universally divided by
hedges, which, though they add much to the beauty of the landscape, when you are in a position to look over it, greatly interrupt
the view, and always are ill-trimmed, irregular, and apparently
insecure. We met no one on the road, sarvery few habitations,
and only two men at work, plowing, for several miles; then a
cluster of cottages, an inn, and a large old timber-house. As I
had been informed (very wrongly) that these were getting rare
in England, and it was very peculiar and striking, I stopped to
sketch it.
Imagine a very large, old-fashioned New England farm-house,




OLD FAR-li- IUSE — COTTAGES.             89
with the weather-boarding stripped off and all the timber exposed.
Fill up the intervals with brick, and plaster them over even with
the outer surface of the beams; then whitewash this plastered
surface and blacken the timber, and you have the walls of the
house. A New England house, however, would have three times
as many windows. The roof is mostly of very small old slates,
set with mortar, and capped (ridged) with thick quarried stones.
It is repaired with large new slates in several places, and an
addition that has been made since the main part was erected,
which is entirely of brick in the walls, with no timber, is heavily
thatched with straw, as are also all the out-buildings.
The rear of the firm-house probably contains the dairy, and is
covered with thatch to secure a more equable temperature.
All the other buildings in the hamlet were similarly builttimber and whitewashed walls, and thatch roofs. While I was
sketching, the farmer, a stout old man, and the first we have seen
in top-boots, came out and entered into conversation with us. He
was much amused that I should think his house worth sketching,
and told us it had been long [rented] in his family. He had no
idea bow old it was. He described the cottages, which were
certainly very pretty to look at, as exceedingly uncomfortable
and unhealthy-the floors, which were of clay, being generally
lower than the road and the surrounding land, and often wet, and
always damp, while the roofs and walls were old and leaky, and
full of vermin. The walls of these cottages are all made by interlacing twigs (called wattles) between the timbers, and then
plashing these with mud (noggin), inside and out, one layer over
another as they dried, until it is as thick as is desired; then the
surface is made smooth with a trowel, and whitewashed.
A few miles further on we came to a large, park-like pasture,
bounded by a neatly trimmed hedge, and entered by a simple
gate, from which a private road ran curving among a few clumps




90        AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
of trees to a mansion about a furlong distant. We entered, and
rested ourselves awhile at the foot of some large oaks. The house
was nearly hidden among trees, and these, seen across the clear
grass land, formed, we thought, the finest mass of foliage we had
ever seen. A peculiar character was given it by one or two
purple-leaved beeches-tall trees, thickly branched from the very
ground. The cattle in this pasture-lawn were small and black,
brisk and wild-looking, but so tame in reality that, as we lay
under the tree, they came up and licked our hands like dogs.
The whole picture completely realized Willis's ideal-sketch, "The
Cottage Insoucieuse."
After this the country was more elevated and broken, and the
walk delightful. We saw many beautiful things, but have seen
so many, more interesting, since, that I hardly remember them.
The road was more traveled. W~e met a stage-coach, with no
inside passengers, but the top overloaded, and a stylish carriageand-four, the near wheeler and leader ridden by postillions in
bright livery, and within an old gentleman, wearing a velvet cap,
and a young lady under a blue hood. The fields, too, were more
tilled; and one of fifty acres, which was ridged for some root crop,
was the most thoroughly cultivated piece of merely farming
ground I ever saw.
About the middle of the forenoon, we came to the top of a
higher hill than we had before crossed, from which we looked
down upon a beautiful rich valley, bounded on the side opposite
us by blue billowy hills. In the midst of it was the smoke and
chimneys and steeples of a town. One square, heavy brown
tower was conspicuous over the rest, and we recognized our first
cathedral.
As we approached the town, the road became a crooked paved
street, lined with curious small houses, between which we passed,
stopping often to admire some singular gable, or porch, or gro



APPROACH TO CHIESTER.                 91
tesque carving, until it was spanned by a handsome brown stone
arch, not the viaduct of a railroad, as at first seemed likely, but
one of the four gateways of the city. Passing under it, we found
on the inner side a flight of broad stairs leading on to the city
wall, which we ascended. At the top, on the inside of the wall,
was a printer's shop, in which guide-books were offered for sale.
Entering this we were received by an obliging young man, who
left the press to give us chairs, and with whom we had an interesting conversation about the town and about his trade. Printers'
wages, if I recollect rightly, were about one quarter more in New
York than in Chester. After purchasing a guide-book and a few
prints of him, we accepted his invitation to leave our knapsacks
in his shop, and take a walk on the walls before entering the
town.




92        AN AMERICAN FARMER INV ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XIII.
Chester without —A Walk on the Walls - Antiquities - Striking Contrasts.
Chester, June 2d.
MY journal is behindhand several days. Meantime, I have
seen so much, that if I had a week of leisure I should
despair of giving you a good idea of this strange place. But that
you may understand a little how greatly we are interested, I will
mention some of the objects that we have seen, and are seeing.
Use your imagination well to fill up the hints, rather than descriptions, of these that I shall give you. You need not fear that,
when you come here, the reality will disappoint you.
We are on the top of the wall, a few feet from the archway
through which we entered the town. Look down now  on the
outside. The road, just before it enters the gate, crosses, by a
bridge, a deep ravine. In it, some seventy feet below us, you see
the dark water, perhaps of old the fosse, but now a modern commercial canal. A long, narrow boat, much narrower, than our
canal-boats, laden with coals, is coming from under the bridge; a
woman is steering it; and on the cabin, in large red letters, you
see her name, "Margaret Francis," and the name of the boat —
"Telegraph."  The arch was turned by a man now living, but




A WALK ABOUT CHESTER.                   93
that course of stones-the dark ones between the ivy and the
abutment-was laid by a Roman mason, when Rome was mistress
of the world.
Walk on. The wall is five feet wide on the top, with a parapet of stone on the outside, and an iron rail within. Don't fear,
though it is so far and deep to the canal, and the stone looks so
time-worn and crumbling; it is firm with true Roman cement, the
blood of brave men. Here it is strengthened by a heavy tower,
now somewhat dilapidated. Look up, and you see upon it the
rude carving of a Phoenix; under it, on an old tablet, these
words:
" ON THIS TOWER STOOD CHARLES THE FIRST, AND SAW HIS ARMY DEFEATED."
Within the tower is the stall of a newsman. Buy the Times,
which has come some hundred miles since morning, with the information that yesterday the president of a French Peace Society
was shot in a duel. (A fact.)
Pass on. On one side of us are tall chimneys, built last year,
through which, from fierce forge-fires, ascend black smoke and
incense of bitumen to the glory of mammon. Close on the other
side stands a venerable cathedral, built by pious labor of devout
men, centuries dead, to the laud and service of their God. We
look into the burying-ground, and on the old gravestones observe
many familiar New England names.
Again, narrow brick houses are built close up to the wall, and,
now, on both sides; the wall, which you can stride across, being
their only street or way of access. Here, again, it crosses another
broad road, and we are over another entrance to the city-the
" New Gate;" it is not quite a century old. We look from it into
a market-place. Narrow, steep-gabled houses, with their second
story threatening the sidewalks, surround it. But the marketbuilding is modern. See! the sparrow lighting on the iron roof




94        AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAIND.
burns her feet and flies hastily over to the heavy, old brown
thatch, where the little dormers stick out so clumsily cosy.
Odd-looking vehicles and oddly-dressed people are passing in
the street below us: a woman with a jacket, driving two stout
horses in one of those heavy farm-carts; an omnibus, with the
sign of " The Green Dragon," very broad, and carrying many
passengers on the top; the driver, smartly-dressed, tips his whip
with a knowing nod to a pretty Welsh girl, who is carrying a tub
upon her head. There are scores of such damsels, neat as possible, with dark eyes, and glossy hair half covered by white caps,
and fine, plump forms, in short striped petticoats and hob-nailed
shoes. There goes one, straight as a gun-barrel, with a great jar
of milk upon her head. And here is a little donkey, with cans of
milk slung on each side of him, and behind them, so you cannot
see why he does not slip off over his tail, is a great brute, with
two legs in knee-breeches and blue stockings, bent up so as to be
clear of the ground, striking him with a stout stick across his
long, expressive ears. A sooty-faced boy, with a Kilmarnock
bonnet on his head, carrying pewter pots, coming towards us,
jumps suddenly one side, and, ha! out from under us, at a rattling pace, comes a beautiful sorrel mare, with a handsome, tall,
slightly-made young man in undress military uniform; close
behind, and not badly mounted either, follow two others-one
also in uniform, with a scarlet cap and a bright bugle swinging
at his side; the other a groom in livery, neat as a pin; odd again,
to American eyes, those leather breeches and bright top-boots.
Lord Grosvenor, going to review the Yeomanry, says the printer.
His grandfather built this gate and presented it to the corporation; you may see his arms on the key-stone. But we must
go on.
On the left an old tower, and under it the ragged outline and
darker color of still older masonry. A swallow has just found a




A NTIQ UITIS.                   95
cranny big enough wherein to build her nest, that Father Time
has been chiseling at eight hundred years. Eight hundred?
Yes; for it was rebuilt then. You can see some of the real old
wall at the other end-no, not that round Saxon arch, but beyond
the trees-a low wall with a heavy clothing of ivy. The steamboat is just coming out from behind it now. In the year 973,
King Edgar landed at this church from a boat, in which he had
been rowed by eight conquered kings. A smoky old tub is that
steamboat, but doubtless a faster and more commodious craft than
Edgar's eight king-power packet.
We cross another gateway, and pass a big mill. The dam was
built-I don't know when. But they say it had a bad name with
the Puritans, who undertook to expunge it, but failed, because,
like a duck, it kept under a high flood of water until the Cavaliers, making a dash to save it, spiked their guns.
Our path turns suddenly, and runs along the face of a stone
wall, supported by brackets high above the water of the river,
but some distance below the parapets-parapets of a Castle.
Soon we pass a red-coated sentry, and now you see a tower
that looks older than the rest.  The battle-axes of William
the Conqueror once clanged where that fellow now lounges
with a cigar. Beyond, on the esplanade, were wont to assemble
the feudal armies of the Earls of Chester, whose title is now
borne by the German Prince's eldest son. Quite a different appearance they must have made from this regiment of Irishmen
in cloth jackets and leather helmets.
Stop one moment to look at the bridge; step back to the angle
-there you see it-half-a-dozen arches of different forms and
shades of color, not particularly handsome, but worth noticing.
The blackest of the arches was turned half a century before
Jamestown was founded-that is, it was then rebuilt. The original bridge, from which the stones for it were taken, was built by




96        AN AMERICAN  FARMER INr ENiGLAND.
Ethefleda. Who was she? She was " the queen" here a thousand years ago, I believe; you'll be shown her great-grandmother's
cradle somewhere about town probably.
Just above is another bridge. What a fine arch. Yes; the
widest in the world, it is said. That was not built by a queen;
but a little girl was the first to cross it, who afterwards " developed" into " her most gracious Majesty, Victoria, whom God long
preserve," as the loyal guide-book hath it.
"....  Poor fellow! he is very lame."
"Probably an impostor, sir; don't encourage him."
"l e asks a penny to keep him from starving; his son has not
been able to get work lately, or he would not let him beg."
" There's enough work for him if he really wants it; it's what
they all say. Give a ha'penny, then, and be rid of him. Now, look
over there, between the trees, and see the entrance to the Marquis
of Westminster's Park."-A great, fresh pile of bombastic towers
and battlements to flank a gate and protect the woman who opens
it from-rain and frost. It is but recently finished, and costs,
says the printer, ~10,000.
What says the beggar?  Free trade and the Irish have cut
down wages, since he used to work on the farms, from five shillings to eighteen pence.
IHe reasserts it. He has stood himself at Chester Cross on the
market day, and refused to work for four-and-sixpence, and all
the beer he could drink. It may be true-the printer tells us;
in the old Bonaparte years, in harvest time, it was not unlikely
to have been so. With wheat at a guinea a bushel, the farmers
did not have the worst of it. Soldiers can't reap, but they must
eat. The government borrowed money to give the farmers for
supporting the war, and now the farmers are paying the debt.




" TIIE ROODEE"  R RUINS.              97
Hark! horns and kettle-drums! It is the band of the Yeomanry; we shall see them directly..... There! Five squadrons of mounted men trotting over a broad green meadow below
us. Well mounted they seem to be, and well seated too. Fox
hunting makes good cavalry. Doubtless many of those fellows
have been after the hounds.
Possibly. But never one of them charged a buffalo herd, I'll
be bound.
This green plain-a sort of public lawn in front of the townis about twice as large as Boston Common, and is called " The
Roodee." It is free from trees, nothing but a handsome meadow,
and the Chester race-course runs round it. On this course, by
the way, the greatest number of horses ever engaged in a single
match have been run. In 1848, the entries were one hundred
and fifty-six, of which one hundred and six accepted.
Right below us, on the meadow, there is pitched a marque'e.
It belongs to a cricket club. I only want you to notice the beautiful green sward of their playing ground. It is shaven so clean
and close. You see men sweeping it with hair-brooms.
In this garden, on the other side of the wall, there was once a
nunnery. A subterranean passage exists, by which, if you could
keep a candle burning, you might pass from it under the city back
to the cathedral..... Are you tired of ruins?  Here is one more that may
rouse your Puritan blood: a heavy tower built into the wall,
connected with a larger one at some distance outside. How old
they look! No paintings and no descriptions had ever conveyed
to me the effect of age upon the stone itself of these very old
structures. How stern! how venerable! how silent-yet telling
what long stories! We will not ask for the oldest of them, but
7




98        AN AMERICANN FARMER iN _EGYCLAN1V'D.
-you see there, where the battlements are broken down in one
place-that breach was made by a ball thrown from the hill
yonder; and the cannon that sent it was aimed by OLIVER
CROMWELL himself.
How beautiful, how indescribably beautiful, are those glossy
tresses of ivy, falling over the blackened ramparts, like the curls
of a child asleep on its grandfather's shoulder. - WIhew  They
have pierced the wall right under us, and here goes an express
train fifty miles an hour, from Ireland to London, by way of
Holyhead. The Roman masonry, that resisted the Roundhead
batteries, has surrendered to the engines of peace.
But, as we move on, higher marks of civilization are pointed
out to us. Here, close to the wall, and in the shadow of the old
tower, is a public bath and wash-house. A little back is a hospital, and near it a house of refuge. Across the valley is a
gloomy looking workhouse, and in another direction a much more
cheering institution, beautifully placed on a hill, among fine, dark,
evergreen trees, through which you can see the bright sunshine
and smile of God falling upon it. It is the Training College-a
normal school, for preparing teachers for the church schools of
the diocese. And here, on the left, as we approach the north
gate again, is an old charity school-house, the Blue-coat Hospital.
The boys at play are all young George Washingtons, dressed in
long-skirted blue coats, and breeches, and stockings..... So here we are, back at the good-natured printer's
office, having been a circuit of three miles on the walls of the
city. Its population is twenty-five thousand, and as you have
observed that nearly all the houses are low, you cannot suppose
that much room is taken up by streets and unoccupied grounds,
where that number is accommodated in such limited space, you




OBSER VATIONS.                   99
will be ready to explore the interior with curiosity. If your taste
for the quaint and picturesque is at all like mine, you will be in
no danger of disappointment.




100       AN A MERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XIV.
Chester within — Peculiarities of Building —The Rows - A Sea Captain
-Romancing —An Old Inn —Old English Town Houses —Timber
Houses- Claiming an Inheritance - A Cook Shop - One of the Alleys
Breaking into the Cathedral - Expulsion - The Curfew.
THE four gates of the city are opposite, and about equally
distant from each other. Four streets run from them, meeting in the centre and dividing it it into four quarters. These
principal streets vary in width from one to three rods, and besides
them there are only a few narrow alleys, through which carts can
pass. But the whole city is honeycombed with by-ways, varying
from two to five feet in width; sometimes open above, and sometimes built over; crooked and intricate, and, if he cares where
they lead him to, most puzzling to a stranger..Besides these
courts, alleys, and foot-paths, there is another highway peculiarity
in Chester, which it will be difficult to describe; but --
Imagine you have entered the gate with us, after the walk on
the wall. The second story of most the old houses is thrown forward, as you have seen it in the " old settlers'" houses at home.
Sometimes it projects several feet, and is supported by posts in
the sidewalk. Soon this becomes a frequent, and then a continuous arrangement; the posts are generally of stone, forming an




PECULIARITIES OF B UILDINGS.             101
arcade, and you walk behind them in the shade. Sometimes,
instead of posts, a solid wall supports the upper house. You
observe, as would be likely in an old city, that the surface is
irregular; we are ascending a slight elevation. Notwithstanding
the old structure overhead, and the well-worn, thick, old flagging
under foot, we notice that the shop fronts are finished with plateglass, and all the brilliancy of the latest commercial taste and art.
Turning, to make the contrast more striking, by looking at the
little windows and rude carvings of the houses opposite, we see a
bannister or hand-rail separates the side-walk from the carriageway, and are surprised, on stepping out to it, to find that the street
is some ten feet below us. We are evidently in the second story
of the houses. Finding steps leading downwards, we descend
into the street and discover another tier of shops, on the roofs of
which we have been walking.
Going on, we shortly come to where the two streets meet in
the centre of the town. Passing over the ground where the
"cross" and the pillory, and other institutions of religion and
justice and merry-making formerly stood, we ascend steps, and
are again in one of those singular walks called by the inhabitants
"The Rows."  There are no more stylish shop fronts; but dark
doorways and old windows again, and on almost every door-post
little black and red checkers, which hieroglyphics, if you are not
sufficiently versed in Falstaffian lore to understand, you can find
rendered in plain black and white queen's English on the beam
overhead-" Licensed to sell beer," etc. Generally there will be
an additional sign, naming the inn or tavern, always in letters,
and almost never in portraiture. I remember "The Crown and
Castle," "The Crown and Anchor," "The Castle and Falcon,"
"The King's, Head," "The Black Bear," "The Blue Boar,"
"The Pied Bull," "The Green Dragon," "The White Lion,"




102    AN AMERICA4 N F4ARMER IN ENGLAND.
" The Sun and Apple Tree," "The Colliers' Arms," " The Arms
of Man," "The Mlalt Shovel," etc., etc.
Instead of columns and a hand-rail, or a dead wall on the street
side of the row, it is now and then contracted by a room, which
is sometimes occupied by a shop, and sometimes seems to be used
as a vestibule and staircase to apartments overhead, for we see a
brass plate with the resident's name, and a bell-pull, at the door.
On the inner side there are frequent entrances to the narrow
passages that I mentioned, which may be long substitutes for
streets, communicating, after a deal of turning and splitting into
branches, with some distant alley or churchyard, with the front
doors of wealthy citizens' houses opening upon them; or they may
be merely alleys between two tenements leading to a common yard
in the rear; or again, if you turn into one, it may turn out to be
a private hall, and after one or two short turns, end in a kitchen.
Never mind-don't retreat; put on a bold face, take a seat by
the fire as if you were at home, and call for a mug of beer. Ten
to one it will be all right. Almost every other housekeeper seems
to be a licensed taverner.
We had great sport while nominally engaged in finding lodgings to suit us. Many of the places at which we applied were
merely houses of refreshment, and had no spare bed-rooms. In
one of these, " The Boot Inn," we found an old sea-captain, who,
some twenty years ago, had traded to New York, and enjoyed
talking and making inquiries about persons he had met and
places he had visited. Fortunately we knew some of them, and
so were constrained to sit down to bread and cheese and beer,
and listen to some tough yarns of Yellow Jack and Barbary
pirates. At one end of the kitchen was a table with benches on
three sides of it, and a great arm-chair on the other. Over the
chair hung a union-jack, and before it on the table was a strongly
bound book, which proved to be "The Record of the Boot Inn




AN OLD INN.                     103
Birthday Club." The bond entered into by each member on
entering this association was, that he should treat the club to
plenty of good malt liquor on his every future birthday. There
was a constitution and many by-laws, the penalty for breaking
which was always to be paid in "beer for the club."
At other inns we would be shown, by delightfully steep, narrow, crooked, and every way possible inconvenient stairways, up
through low dark spaces of inclined plane, into long, steep-roofed,
pigeon-house like rooms, having an air as gloomy and mysterious
as it was hot and close. Then, upon our declining to avail ourselves of such romantic and typhous accommodations, instead of
being reconducted down by the tortuous path of our ascent, we
would be shown, through a back door in the third story, out upon
a passage that seemed to be also used as a public street (footway),
doors opening from it, which were evidently entrances to residences in the rear.
Finally we were suited; and now I am writing on an old oak
table, with spiral legs, sitting in an old oak chair, with an Elizabethan carved back, my feet on an old oak floor (rather wavy),
stout old oak beams over my head, and low walls of old oak wainscot all around me. Resting on an old oak bench by the window,
is a young man with a broad-brimmed felt hat, slouched half over
his face. Across the street, so near we might jump into it if we
were attacked from the rear, is a house with the most grotesquely-carved and acutely-pointed gable possible to be believed real,
and not a bit of scene painting, with the date, "1539," cut in
awkward figures over the cockloft window, high in the apex.
For fifteen minutes there has been a regular "clink, clink," deadening all other sounds but the clash of sabres against spurs, and
distant bugle-calls, as a body of horsemen are passing in compact
columns through the narrow street, from the castle, out by the
north gate, towards Rowton Moor.




104       AN AMERICAN FARME R  IN EzVGLAIVD.
To be sure, it is a California and not a Cavalier sombrero that
shades my friend, and the men of war outside are gentle yeomen,
carrying percussion-lock carbines indeed, but who have fought
for nothing so valiantly as for the corn laws. But when shall I
again get as near as this to Prince Charlie or the Ironsides?
At least, there will be no prompter's bell summoning carpenters
to slide off the picture. That 1539 over the way is TRUE; I
can see the sun shine into the figures. Away with 1850!
What, ho! a cup of sack!
The house is full of most unexplainable passages and unaccountable recesses, of great low rooms and little high rooms, with
ceilings in various angles to the walls, and the floor of every one
at a different elevation from every other, so that from the same
landing. you step up into one and down into another, and so on.
Back of a little kitchen and big pantry, down stairs, we have another parlor. In it is a grand old chimney, and opposite the
fireplace a window, the only one in the room. It is but three
feet high, but, except the room occupied by a glass buffet in one
corner and a turned-up round-table in the other, reaches from
wall to wall. To look out of it, you step on to a platform, about
four feet broad, in front of it, and on this is an old, long, highbacked settee.
As I lay in bed last night, I counted against the moon seventyfive panes of glass in the single window of our sleeping apartment. The largest of them was four by three, and the smallest
three by one inches. They are set in lead sashes, and the outer
frame is of iron, opening on hinges.
There are none but timber houses all about us; the walls
white or yellow, and the timbers black. The roofs are often as
steep as forty-five degrees with the horizon, and the gables always
front on the street. If the house is large there will be several
gables, and each successive story juts out, overhanging the face




OLD CAR VINGS - FATIIER-LAND.                    105
of that below.  There is no finical vergeboard, or flimsy "drapery" in the gable, but the outermost rafter (a stout beam that
you cannot fear will warp off or blow away) is boldly projected,
and your attention perhaps invited to it by carving. Porches,
bow-windows, dormers, galleries (in the rows), and all the prominent features of the building, are generally more or less rudely
carved. One house near us is completely covered with figures.
C. says they represent Bible scenes. There is one compartment
which he understands to be a tableau of the sacrifice of Isaac,
Abraham being represented, according to his exegesis, by a
bearded figure, dressed in a long flapped waistcoat and kneebreeches.
Another house has these words cut in the principal horizontal
beam: "God's Providence is mine Inheritance-1652."  It is
said the family residing in it was the only one in the city that
entirely escaped the great plague of that year.
We cannot keep still, but run about with boyish excitement.
We feel indeed like children that have come back to visit the
paternal house, and who are rummaging about in the garret
among their father's playthings, ever and anon shouting, " See
what I've found! see what I've found! " If we had been brought
here blindfolded from America, and were now, after two days'
visit, sent back again, we should feel well repaid for the long sea
passage. If we were to stay here a month, we should scarcely
enjoy less than we now do, rambling about among these relics of
our old England.*
* Some months later than this we were at a supper party, after some old English ballads
and songs had been sung, when one of the company apologized for it, saying, " We forget
out American friends. It is selfish in us to sing only these national songs, in which we
are peculiarly interested. Have you nothing American, now? " " Excuse me, sir," I
replied, "' those are our national songs as much as yours. You forget that we are also
countrymen of Shakspeare, and Robin Hood, and Richard the Lion-hearted. Our mothers dance-L wNith your fathers under that same' green-wood,' and around the' May-pole.'




106        AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
Going into an eating-house, the first afternoon we were in
Chester, we were shown through three apartments into a kitchen,
and from that into a long, narrow, irregularly-shaped room, with
one little window high above our heads, and twenty-seven old
wood engravings in frames about the walls. When we were
ready to leave, a back door was opened, and we were told that
the first opening to the left would bring us to the street.  We
found ourselves in one of the narrow covered ways, and instead
of turning off to the street as directed, kept on in it, to go where it
should happen to lead.  Sometimes wide, sometimes narrow,
running first, as it appeared, between a man's kitchen and his
dining-room; then into a dust-yard; then suddenly narrowed,
and turned one side by a stable; then opening into a yard, across
which a woman over a wash-tub was scolding her husband-sitting with a baby and smoking at a window; then through a
blacksmith's shop into a dark,. crooked passage, like the gallery
of a mine, at the other end of which we found ourselves on a
paved street not far from the cathedral.
We entered the burying-ground, and seeing that a small door,
that is cut in the large door of the cathedral, was ajar, pushed it
open and went in. It was dark, silent, and chill. We felt
strangely as we groped our way over the unobstructed stone floor,
and could make nothing of it until, our eyes becoming adapted to
the dimness, we discovered gilded organ-pipes, and were going
towards them, when a small door in front of us was opened, and
a man came out, saying impatiently, "WVho are you? what do
you want? Take off your hats."
Our fathers fought for their right in this land against Turk, Frenchman, Spaniard, and
Pretender. We have as much pride in Old England, gentlemen, as any of you. We
claim the right to make ourselves at home on that ground with you." " You'are right;
you are welcome. Give us your hand." And the whole table rose, shaking our hands
with an enthusiasm that only patriotic pride will excuse among Englishmen.




TIEE CURFEW BELL.                  107
"We are strangers, looking at the cathedral."
"Can't see it, now; can't see it, now. Service every day at
four and ten o'clock."
As we were going out, a great bell began to toll. "What is
that, sir?" said I.
"What? "
"That bell tolling-what is it for?"
"Why, that's the cuffew," and he closed and bolted the door,
while we stood still without; and as the long waving boom of the
bell pulsed through us, looked soberly at each other, as if America
and the nineteenth century were a fading dream, slowly repeating"The cuffew;-to be sure —yes-the curfew."




108        AN AMIERICAN FARMER IN E.NGLANTD.
CHAPTER XV.
Chester Market - The Town Common - Race-course - The Yeomanry Cavalry, and the Militia of England - Public Wash-house.
THE  day after we came to Chester was market-day, and the
streets were busy at an early hour with people coming in
from the country to sell produce, or purchase the supplies for their
families for the coming week. The quantity of butter exposed
for sale was very large, and the quality excellent. The fishmarket also was finely supplied.  The dealing in both these
articles was mostly done by women.*
After walking through the market, we went to the Roodee,
and there saw the Yeomanry reviewed. They wore a snug blue
uniform, were armed with sabres, carbines, and pistols, and were
rather better mounted and drilled than any of our mounted militia that I have seen. The active commander seemed to be a
regular martinet. If the lines got much out of dress while on the
trot, he would dash up, shaking his fist, and loudly cursing the
W* e noted the following as the common prices:
Butchers' meat, 10 to 14 cents per lb.
Best fresh butter in balls of 1 Y lbs, 35 cents.
Salmon, fresh from the Dee, 35 cents per lb.
Turbot; 35 cents per lb.
Soles and other fish, 16 cents per lb.




MfI~ITIA SYSTEM OF ENGLABND.             109
squadron at fault. I noticed, also, that when pleased, he sometimes addressed them  in the ranks as "gentlemen."  He was
probably some old army officer, engaged to drill them. The
colonel of the regiment, who was constantly on the ground every
day while we were at Chester, is Lord Grosvenor, heir to one of
the largest estates in England. A young man in the dress of an
officer, but dismounted, informed us that their number was 800, in
five companies. Most of them were farmers; every farmer of a
certain age in the county (as we understood him) being obliged to
serve three years, but allowed to send a substitute if he chooses.
They are out but once a year for training, and then continuously
for eight days, and while engaged receive 75 cents a day. They
cannot be ordered out of the country, and are seldom called into
active service, except to quell riots.
I frequently asked afterwards for more information about the
yeomanry, but never found a person who seemed to know much
about them. A man in the ranks of the Denbigshire yeomanry,
told us the service was optional. In some counties there is no
such body, and the organization, laws, and customs of it seem to
vary in the different regiments. There is a regular foot-militia
organization throughout England (the "train-bands"), but none
of them, I believe, have been paraded for many years.
According to a parliamentary return of 1838, there were then
of the mounted yeomanry 251 troops, numbering 13,594 privates;
the annual expense of maintaining them was $525,000. The enrolled militia of England in 1838 numbered 200,000 men. The
officers of these forces, when in service, rank with those of the
army of the same grade. A part of the uniform and mountings
of the yeomanry are paid for by the government, and some small
daily compensation is allowed the privates when in service. A
drill-sergeant and a trumpeter is also permanently attached to
each troop, with a salary from the state.




110       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
Napier mentions that the greater part of the 16,000 British
troops who gained the battle of Talavera, were men drafted from
the militia at home, and that they had but very recently joined
the army in Spain.
Coming up from the Roodee, we visited the Castle. It is of
no importance in a military way, except as a dep6t. There are
30,000 stand of arms and a large quantity of gunpowder stored
in it. It is garrisoned by an Irish regiment at present, which, as
well as the yeomanry, has a very good band of music, by which
the town benefits.
We afterwards visited the public baths and wash-house. In
its basement there are twenty square tubs, each with hot and cold
water cocks, wash-board, and pounder, a drying-closet heated by
steam to 2120 F., etc. In the first story are the usual private
baths, and a swimming tank or public bath, having a constant
influx of fresh water by a jet from below, and an overflow. It is
45 by 36 feet, 21 feet deep at one end, 6 at the other, contains
36,000 gallons, and is furnished with swings, diving-stage, lifebuoys, etc. It was built by a committee of the citizens, and
bought by the town very soon after it went into operation. The
whole cost was $10,000, most of which was raised by a stock
subscription. The water is supplied from the canal, and is all
filtered-the cost of the filtering machine being $200. The principal items of current expenses are fuel and salaries. The cost
of coal (very low here) is $5 a week. There are four persons
constantly employed in the establishment, viz: superintendent
and wife, who are paid $10 a week, and receive something besides as perquisites, (supplying bathing-dresses, for instance, at a
small charge;) the bath-attendant, and the fireman, who each
have $7.50 a week. Total salaries $25 a week. The charges
for the use of the clothes-washing conveniences is about one cent




P UBLIC BA TEI.                   111
an hour. For the baths, it varies from two to twenty-five cents,
certain hours being appointed for those who choose, by paying a
larger sum, to avoid a crowd. There are also commutations by
the year, at lower rates: boys, for instance, have a yearly ticket
for about a dollar. During the first year it has something more
than paid expenses. The number of bathers the last week (in
May) was over one thousand. I give these statistics, as this
establishment is rather smaller than most of the kind, and they
may serve the projectors of a similar one in some of our smaller
cities.




112       AN' AMERICAN FAR MER IN EVNGLAND.
CHAPTER XVI.
Visit to Eaton Hall - The Largest Arch in the World - The Outer ParkBackwoods Farming- The Deer Park - The Hall - The Parterre —
The Lawn - The Fruit Garden- Stables.
IN the afternoon we walked to Eaton Park.
1   Probably there is no object of art that Americans of cultivated-tigte more generally long to see in Europe, than an English
park. What artist, so noble, has often been my thought, as he
who, with far-reaching conception of beauty and designing power,
sketches the outline, writes the colors, and directs the shadoy,.of
a picture so great that Nature shall be employed upon it for generations, before the work he has arranged for her shall realize his
intentions.
Eaton Hall and Park is one of the seats of the Marquis of
Westminster, a very wealthy nobleman, who has lately been
named "Lord High Chamberlain to her Majesty," a kind of
state-housekeeper or steward, I take it —an office which Punch,
and a common report of a niggardly disposition in his private
affairs, deems him particularly well fitted for.
We left town by the new, or Grosvenor bridge-a simple,
grand, and every way excellent work, crossing the Dee by a
single arch, which we are told is the largest in the world. It is




THE OUTER PARK.                      113
entirely free from decoration, and the effect of it, as seen looking
from the river side, imposing. It was built by the Marquis, whose
family name is Grosvenor, at a cost of $180,000 (~36,000). The
designer was Thomas Harrison, an architect of note, who formerly lived in Chester.*
By the side of the road we found an oratory, or small chapel,
building, and gardeners laying out grounds for a rural cemetery.
Beyond this we came to the great castellated edifice that I have
before spoken of, as the gateway to the park. Such we were
told it was, and were therefore surprised to find within only a
long, straight road, with but tolerable mowing lots alternating by
the side of it with thick plantations of trees, differing little from
the twenty-year old natural wood of my own farm, except that
hollies, laurels, and our common dog-wood, were planted regularly along the edge. After awhile we pushed into this wood, to
see if we could not scare up the deer. We soon saw daylight on
the outside, and about twelve rods from the road, came to an
open field, separated from the wood only by a common Yankee
three-rail fence, which I had not expected to see in England;
very poor it was, too.
A stout boy, leaning heavily on the stilts, was plowing stubbleground. We jumped over and asked what crop the ground was
preparing for. The horses stopped of their own accord when we
spoke. The boy turned and sat upon the stilts-brace, and then
answered —" Erdnow."
The same answer, or some other sounds that we could not
guess the meaning of, followed several other questions. The
plow had a wooden beam, bound round with hoop iron. The
* The main arch spans two hundred feet, and its height is forty feet, and there are two
dry arches, each twenty feet wide and forty feet high. From the surface of the water to
the road is over sixty feet. The parapet walls are three hundred and fifty feet long, with
a carriage-way and foot-path between, of thirty feet.
8




114       AN AMERICAN FARMER iN ENlGLAND.
horses seemed to be worn-out hacks; the harness was mended
with bits of rope; the furrows were crooked and badly turned.
Altogether, a more unfarmer-like turn-out, and a worse piece of
work, I never saw in our own backwoods."{ When we last saw
the plowman, he had taken off his woollen cap and seemed about
lighting a pipe, and the horses were beginning to nibble at the
stubble, which stuck up in tufts all over the plowed ground. In
getting back to the road, we crossed a low spot, sinking ankle
deep in mire, and noticed several trees not eight inches thick,
which showed signs of decay.
We tramped on for several miles, I think, through this tame
scenery and most ungentlemanly farming, until it became really
tiresome. At length the wood fell back, and the road was lined
for some way with a double row of fine elms. Still no deer. i A
little further, and we came to a cottage beautifully draped with
ivy, and passed through another gate. Ah! here is the real park
at last.
A gently undulating surface of close-cropped pasture land,
reaching way off illimitably; very old, but not very large trees
scattered singlyf nd in groups-so far apart as to throw long unFbroken shadows across broad openings of light, and leave the
view in several directions unobstructed for a long distance.
Herds of fallow-deer, fawns, cattle, sheep, and lambs quietly
feeding near us, and moving slowly in masses at a distance; a
warm atmosphere, descending sun, and sublime s-hadows from'fleecy clouds transiently darkening in succession, sunny surface,
cool woodside, flocks and herds, and foliage.
The road ran on winding through this. We drew a long
breath, and walked slowly for a little way, then turned aside at
the nearest tree, and lay down to take it all in satisfactorily.
Then we arose and went among the deer. They were small and
lean, all with their heads down feeding. Among them was one




THE DEER- SHEEP.                    115
pure white fawn; none had antlers, or more than mere prongs.
They seemed to be quite as tame as the sheep; but suddenly, as
we came still nearer, all, as if one, raised high their heads, and
bounded off in a high springing gallop. After going a few rods,
one stopped short, and facing about, stood alone, with ears erect,
and gleaming eyes, intent upon us. A few rods further, the
whole herd halted in mass and stood in the same way, looking at
us. One by one the heads again dropped; a fawn stepped out
from among them; the one nearest us turned and trotted to it,
and then all fell quietly to feeding again.
The sheep were of a large, coarse-wooled variety, some of them
nearly as large, only not standing quite so high, as the deernot handsome at all (as sheep) even for a mutton breed; but in
groups at a distance, and against the shadows, far prettier than
the deer. The cattle were short-horned, large, dapple-skinned,
sleek, and handsome, but not remarkable.
We concluded that the sheep and cattle were of the most value
for their effect in the landscape; but it was a little exciting to us
to watch the deer, particularly as we would sometimes see them
in a large herd leisurely moving across an opening among the
trees, a long way off and barely distinguishable; or still more
when one, two, or three, which had been separated from a nearer
herd, suddenly started, and dashed wildly by us, within pistol shot.
"I don't think they are as large as our Maine fallow-deer."
I wonder if they'd taste as good as they did that night."
"Well, I reckon not-no hemlock to toast them over."
"Or to sleep on afterwards, eh!"
"And no wolves to keep you awake."
Following the carriage road, we came near a mass of shrubbery, over and beyond which the trees were closer and taller. It
was separated from the deer park by an iron fence. Passing this




116        AN AMERICAN FARMER IN EINGLAND.
by another light gate, and between thick underwood, we found
ourselves close to the entrance front of the Hall.
"It is considered the most splendid specimen of the pointed Gothic. It
consists of a centre and three stories, finished with octagonal turrets, connected with the main part by lofty intermediate towers, the whole enriched
by buttresses, niches, and pinnacles, and adorned with elaborately carved
heraldic designs, fretwork, and foliage, surmounted throughout by an enriched battlement."
So much from the Guide Book.  It is not my business to attempt a criticism of " the finest specimen of the pointed Gothic"
in England; but I may honestly say that it did not, as a whole,
produce the expected effect upon us, without trying to find reasons for the failure. Even when we came to look at it closely,
we found little to admire.  There was no great simple beauty in
it as a mass, nor yet vigorous original character enough in the
details to make them an interesting study. The edifice is long
and low, and covered with an immense amount of meaningless
decoration.
Sutch was our first impression, and we were greatly disappointed, you may be sure. We admired it more afterwards on the
other side, from the middle of a great garden, where it seems to
stand much higher, being set up on terraces, and gaining much,
I suspect, from the extension of architectural character to the
grounds in its front.'Here we acknowledged a good deal of
magnificence in its effect. Still it seemed as if it might have
been obtained in some other style, with less labor, and to be much
frittered away in a confusion of ornament.
This garden is a curiosity.  It is in the geometrical style, and
covers eight acres, it is said, though it does not seem nearly that
to the eye. It is merely a succession of small arabesque figures
of fine grass or flower beds, set in hard, rolled, dark-colored




EATON LALL GARDEN.                  117
gravel. The surface, dropping by long terraces from the steps
of the Hall to the river, is otherwise only varied by pyramidal
yews and box, and a few vases. On the whole, the effect of it,
in connection with the house, and looking towards it, is fine, more
so than I should have expected; and it falls so rapidly, that it
affects the landscape seen in this direction from the house but
little, and, as an enriched foreground, not disagreeably. This
landscape is exquisitely beautiful, looking across the Dee, oyer a
lovely valley towards some high, blue mountains. From other
parts of the Hall, vistas open through grand avenues of elms;
and there are some noble single trees about the lawn.
The English elm is a much finer tree than I had been aware
of-very tall, yet with drooping limbs and fine thick foliage; not
so fine as a single tree as our elm, but more effective in masses,
because thicker and better filled out in its general outline.
The Hall was undergoing extensive alterations and repairs;
and all the grounds immediately about it, except the terrace garden, were lumbered up with brick and stone, and masons' sheds,
and in complete confusion. Being Saturday, all the workmen
had left, and it was long before we could find any one about the
house. We had got very thirsty, and considering that such a
place would not be left without any tenants, determined that we
would get a drink. After hammering for some time at a door
under the principal entrance, a woman came and opened it a few
inches, and learning our wish, brought us a glass of water, which
she passed out through the narrow opening, never showing her
face. We were amused at this, which she perceiving, told us the
door was chained and padlocked, so she could not open it wider.
Soon after, while looking for an entrance to the fruit garden,
we met a gamekeeper, who was followed by a pet cub fox. He
very obligingly showed us through such parts of the establishment
as he was able to. There was nothing remarkable in the gardens




118       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
or glass-houses, except some large and well-trained fruit trees on
walls. Every thing was neglected now, however, and we did no
more than glance at them. There were some new stables nearly
finished, the plans of which I studied with interest. Each horse
is to have a private box. I do not recollect the exact size, but
it is at least twelve feet square on the floor, and more than that
high. In the ceiling is a ventilator, and in one corner an iron
rack for hay (much like a fire-grate); and there is probably intended to be a small manger for fine and wet feed. There is a
grating for drainage in the floor, and, besides these, no other fixtures whatever. The horse is to be left free within the walls.




POACRiLNTG.                    119
CHAPTER XVII.
Gamekeeper - Game Preserves - Eccleston, a pretty village - The School
House- Draining — Children Playing - The River-side Walk — Pleasure Parties - A Contrasting Glimpse of a Sad Heart - Saturday Night
- Ballad Singer - Mendicants - Row in the Tap-room - Woman's Feebleness - Chester Beer, and Beer-drinking.
THE gamekeeper advised us to return to Chester by another
road, and following his directions, we found a delightful path
by the river side. We had not gone far before we overtook another keeper, carrying a gun. It is hard for us to look upon wild
game as property, and it seemed as if the temptation to poach
upon it must be often irresistible to a poor man. It must have a
bad effect upon the moral character of a community for the law
to deal with any man as a criminal for an act which, in his own
conscience, is not deemed sinful. Even this keeper seemed to
look upon poaching as not at all wrong —merely a trial of adroitness between the poacher and himself, though it was plain that
detection would place the poacher among common swindlers and
thieves, exclude him from the society of the religious, and from
reputable employment, and make the future support of life by
unlawful means almost a necessity. He said, however, there
was very little poaching in the neighborhood. Most of the
farmers were allowed to shoot within certain limits, and the




120       A N A MERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
laboring class were generally wanting in either the means or the
pluck to attempt it.
Evidently a man has a right to foster and increase the natural
stock of wild game upon his own land, that is, in a degree to domesticate it; and the law should protect him in the enjoyment of
the results of the labor and pains he has taken for this purpose.
The undefinable character of such property, however, makes the
attempt to preserve it inexpedient, and often leads to injustice;
and when the preserve is sustained at the expense of very great
injury to more important means of sustaining human life in a
half-starved community, the poacher is more excusable than the
proprietor.
That this is often the case in England, I more than once saw
evidence. A picture, drawn by the agricultural correspondent
of the London Times of Nov. 11, 1851, represents a scene of this
kind, more remarkable however than any that came under my
notice:
"At Stamford we passed into Northamptonshire, obtaining a
glimpse of the Marquis of Exeter's finely wooded park and mansion of Burleigh. This magnificent place, founded by Queen
Elizabeth's Lord Treasurer Cecil, with its grand old trees and
noble park, is just the place to which a foreigner should be taken
to give him an idea of the wealth of our English nobility.
"The tenants on this estate are represented as being in the
most hopeless state of despondency on account of the present low
prices of agricultural produce, and as they were complaining vehemently, the Marquis offered to have the farms of any tenants
who desired it, revalued. Only one on this great estate accepted
the offer. There have been no farms of any consequence yet
given up, and for those which do come into the market there are
plenty of offerers, though men of capital are becoming chary, and
will only look at very desirable farms. The estate is said to be




GAME PRESER VES.                   121
low-rented. Small farmers, of whom there are many, are suffering most severely, as they have not saved any thing in good times
to fall back upon now. Some of them are, indeed, greatly reduced, and we heard of one who had applied to his parish for
relief. Others have sold every thing off their farms, and some,
we were told, had not even seed corn left with which to sow their
fields.
"In a fine country, with a gently undulating surface and a soil
dry and easy of culture, laid into large fields moderately rented,
one is surprised to hear that there is so much complaint and so
much real suffering among the poorer class of farmers. It is
only in part accounted for by the devastation of game, which on
this and some other noblemen's estates in North Northamptonshire, is still most strictly preserved. On the 24th of January
last, seven guns, as we were told, on the Marquis's estate, killed
430 head of game, a most immoderate quantity at such a late
period of the season. The fields are all stuck about with bushes
to prevent the poachers netting; and the farmers feel most
severely the losses they sustain, in order that their landlord and
his friends may not be deprived of their sport. The strict preservation of game on this and some other estates in the northern
parts of the county, was described to us in the bitterest terms, as'completely eating up the tenant farmer, and against which no
man can farm or live upon the farm.' It is'the last ounce that
breaks the camel's back,' and men who might have made a manful struggle against blighted crops and low prices, are overborne
by a burden which they feel to be needlessly inflicted, and of
which they dare not openly complain.
" In consequence of the distress among the small farmers, many
of the laborers would have been thrown out of employment had
work not been found for them by the Marquis in stubbing and
clearing woodland, which will thus be reclaimed for cultivation.




122       AN AMERICA N FAR.MER IN EYNGLAND.
The improvement is expected to be amply remunerative in the
end, and it is one of the unlooked-for results of free trade, which
are to be met with in every part of the country, that a landlord
is compelled by circumstances, various in kind, to improve the
neglected portions of his estate, and which, without such impelling cause, might have long lain unproductive. Every such improvement is not merely an addition to the arable land of the
kingdom, but it becomes also an increased source of employment
to the laborer."
I witnessed immense injury done to turnip crops by shooting
over them, in Scotland. I was once visiting a tenant-farmer
there, when for a whole half day a "gentleman," with three dogs,
was trampling down his Swedes, not once going out of the field.
He was a stranger, having the permission of the owner of the
property to shoot over it, probably, and the farmer said it would
do no good to remonstrate; he would only be laughed at and
insulted.
We passed near a rookery, and the keeper was good enough
to shoot one of the rooks for us to look at. It was a shorterwinged and rather heavier bird than our crow, with a larger head
and a peculiar thick bill. At a distance the difference would not
be readily distinguished. The caw was on a lower note, and
more of a parrot tone, much like the guttural croak of a fledgling
crow. The keeper did not confirm the farmer's statement of
their quality for the table. When they were fat they made a
tolerable pie only, he said, not as good as pigeons. The rookery
was, as we have often seen it described, a collection of crows'-like
nests among the tops of some large trees.
We turned off from the river a little way to look at Eccleston,
a village on the border of the park, and one of the prettiest we
saw in England.
The cottages were nearly all of the timber and noggin walls I




TIrE COTTAGES OF ECCLESTON.            123
have described as common at Chester, covered with thick thatched roofs, with frequent and different-sized dormers, often with
bow-windows, porches, well-houses, etc., of unpainted oak or of
rustic work (boughs of trees with the bark on), broad latticed
windows opening on hinges, a profusion of creeping vines on trellises, and often covering all the walls and hanging down over the
windows, little flower-gardens full of roses, and wallflowers, and
violets, and mignonette, enclosed in front by a closely trimmed
hedge of yew, holly, or hawthorn, sometimes of both the latter
together, and a nicely-sloped bank of turf between it and the
road. I made a sketch of one of them. An intelligent laboring
man talked with me while I was drawing it, and said it was the
residence of the schoolmaster, and the village school was kept
in it. The main part (which was covered with our Virginia
creeper) was over three hundred years old; a part of the wing
was modern.
This laborer had been digging drains in the vicinity. He said
the practice was to make them from 18 to 36 inches deep, and
from 5 to 7 yards apart, or "in the old buts "-" The buts?"
"Ay, the buts."  He meant what we sometimes call the "'bouts"
(turnabouts) or furrows between the lands in plowing, which here
are often kept unaltered for generations for surface drainage, and,
oddly enough, considering the many manifest inconveniences of
retaining them, as we were often told, on account of the convenience of measuring or dividing fields by them, (as our farmers
are often guided in their sowing by the lands, and estimate areas
by counting the panels of fence.) Tiles, such as are being now
introduced with us, an inch or an inch and a half in diameter
(without collars), were laid in the drains to conduct the water.
The usual crop of potatoes in the vicinity he thought about
three measures to a rood, or 225 bushels to an acre; of wheat,
30 bushels.




124       AN AMBIERICAN FAR MER IN ENGLAND.
We went into a stylish inn to get some refreshment, and while
waiting for it, watched some little girls playing in the street.
They stood, four holding hands, dancing and singing round one
(" Dobbin") lying on the ground:
Old Dobbin is dead,
Ay, ay;
Dobbin is dead,
He's laid in his bed,
Ay, ay.
There let him lie,
Ay, ay;
Keep watch for his eye.
For if he gets up
He'll eat us all uprand away they scampered and Dobbin after them. The one he
first catches lays down again for "Dobbin," when it is repeated.
The church was a little one side of the village on an elevation,
and so hidden by trees that we only saw a square tower and vane.
Near it a neat stone building, I thought likely to be the parsonage,
and pointing towards it soon after, asked a man who lived in it?
His reply was, "Why, there's none but poor peoples' houses
there, sir!" The vicarage he showed us in another directiona fine house in spacious grounds.
From Eccleston we had a delightful walk in the evening to
Chester. There is a good foot-path for miles along the river
bank, with gates or stiles at all the fences that run down to it,
and we met great numbers of persons, who generally seemed
walking for pleasure. There were pleasure boats, too, with parties of ladies under awnings, rowing up and down the river,
sometimes with music.
We were stopped by some laboring people going home, who
asked us to look after a poor woman we should see sitting by the




BALLAD SINGER.                    125
water side over the next stile, who, they feared, had been unfbrtunate, and was going to drown herself. She had been there for
an hour, and they had been for some time trying to prevail on her
to get up and go home, but she would not reply to them. We
found her as they had said-a tall, thin woman, without hat or
cap on her head, sitting under the bank behind some bushes, a
little bundle in a handkerchief on her knees, her head thrown
forward resting upon it, her hands clasped over her forehead, and
looking moodily into the dark stream. We drew back and sat
on the stile, where we could see if she stepped into the water.
In a few minutes she arose, and avoiding to turn her face towards
us, walked rapidly towards the town. We followed her until she
was lost in a crowd near the gate.
We found the streets within the walls all flaring with gas light,
and crowded with hawkers and hucksters with donkey carts,
soldiers, and policemen, and laboring men and women making
purchases with their week's earnings, which, until lately, it has
been a universal custom in England to pay on Saturday night.
We heard a ballad-monger singing with a drawling, nasal tone,
on a high key, and listened for awhile to see what he had. One
after another he would hold them up by a gas light, and sing
them. The greater number were protection songs, with "free
trade" and "ruin" oft repeated, and were the worst kind of doggerel. One (sung to " Oh, Susannah!") I recollect, as follows:
"Oh, poor farmers,
Don't wait and cry in vain,
But be off to Californy,
If you cannot drive the wain."
He read also choice scraps from confessions of murderers;
parts of the prayer-book travestied so as to tell against free trade;
and other such literature. In another place we found a crowd




126       AN A 1ERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
about a man with a flute, a woman with a hurdy-gurdy, and three
little children singing what we guessed must be Welsh songsregular wails. The youngest was a boy, not appearing to be over
five years old, and was all but naked.
In front of our inn a man held in his arms a fine, well-dressed
little boy, and cried in a high, loud, measured, monotonous drawl,
continuously over and over -" His mother died in Carlisle we
have traveled twenty-seven miles to-day I have no money she
left this boy yesterday he walked eighteen miles I have no supper
he is five years old I have walked two hundred miles this is no
deception I have seen better days friends his feet are lacerated I
am in search of work I am young and strong he cannot walk his
mother died in Carlisle help me in my lamentations I have but
sixpence for myself and boy friends I am compelled to beg I am
young and strong his mother died in Carlisle I am in search of
work his feet are lacerated"-and so on. We watched him from
the rows perhaps two minutes, and saw seven persons drop coppers into his hat: two little girls whom a man was leading, a boy,
a German lace-peddler, a woman with a basket of linen on her
head, another woman, and a well-dressed man.
The rest of the evening we sat round a bright coal fire, in what
had been the great fireplace of the long back parlor. We are the
only inmates of the inn except Mrs. Jones, the landlady, and her
maid. About eleven o'clock we were disturbed by some riotous
men in the tap-room, which is the other side of the big chimney.
Mrs. Jones seemed trying to prevail on them to leave the house,
which they refused to do, singing, " We won't go home till morning." Mrs. Jones is a little, quiet, meek, soft-spoken woman, and
we were apprehensive for her safety. I was about to go to her
assistance, when the maid entered and said, " If you please, sir,
my mistress would like to see you." I went hastily round into
the tap-room, and found two stout, dirty, drunken men, swinging




CHESTER BEER.                    127
pewter mugs, and trying to sing "There was a jolly collier."
Mrs. Jones stood between them. I pushed one of them aside,
and asked her what she wished-expecting that she would want
me to try to put him into the street. The men made such a noise
that I could not hear her mild voice in reply, which, she perceiving, turned again and said, in a tone that at once quelled them,
" Stop your noise, you brutes! "- and then to me, "will you
please step into the kitchen, sir?"  She only wished to know
what we would like to have for our breakfast and dinner, as the
shops would close soon, and, to-morrow being Sunday, they would
not be open before noon.
The next morning, when we were going out, she came to unlock the door of the passage or entry, and told us she was obliged
by law to keep it locked till two o'clock. At two o'clock we
found it open, and immediately after saw a man drinking beer in
the tap-room again.
There is a continual and universal beer-drinking in Chester.
Mirs. Jones tells us that the quality of the beer made here has
long been a matter of town pride, though now there is very little
brewed in families, every one almost being supplied, at a great
saving of trouble, from the large breweries. She says there used
to be a town law that whoever brewed poor beer should be publicly ducked. Sunday night, young men with their sweethearts
and sisters, of reputable appearance, and quiet, decent behavior,
came into our back parlor, and sitting by the round-table, ordered
and drank each their glass or two of beer, as in an American
town they would take ice-cream. Now and then a few remarks
would be made about the sermon and who had been at church, or
about those who had been, or were soon going to be, married, or
other town gossip; but for the most, they would sit and drink
their beer in silence.




128       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XVIII.
Character of the Welsh —The Cathedral: The Clergy, Service, Intoning,
the Ludicrous and the Sublime - A Reverie -A Revelation - The Sermon - Communions - Other Churches - Sunday Evening - Character
of the Townspeople.
Sunday, June 2d.
WE were awakened this morning by a sweet chiming of the
cathedral bells.
After breakfast, Mrs. Jones introduced us to a young Welsh
woman, wh6 had come to visit her. She was intelligent and
handsome, having a clear, though dark complexion, thick, dark
hair, and large eyes. This style of beauty seems common hereabouts, and is, I judge, the Welsh type.
She lived among the mountains near Snowdon, and told us the
country there was bleak and sterile, and agriculture confined
mostly to grazing. She spoke highly of the character of the
peasantry in many respects, but said they had strong prejudices,
usually despising the English and refusing to associate with them.
Many of them could not speak English, and those who could
would often affect not to understand, if they were addressed by
an Englishman. Among themselves they were neighborly, clannish, honest, and generous, but strangers they would impose upon
shamelessly. She had known very few to emigrate, and those




THE CATHEDRAL - OLD  ASONR Y.            129
that did usually went to Australia. In her neighborhood they
were mostly dissenters-Methodists and Baptists, and, with the
exception of deceit to strangers, were of much better character
than the English laborers. They had, however, many traditional
superstitions.
We attended service in the morning at 4the cathedral. The
comparative lowness and depth of its wals,:strengthened by
thick, rude buttresses, and its short, square massive tower, together with its general time-worn aspect, impressed me much as
an expression of enduring, self-sustaining age. Like the stalwart
trunk of a very old oak, stripped by the tempests of much of the
burden of its over-luxuriant youth, its settled, compact, ungarnished grandeur, was much more imposing than the feeble grace
and pliant luxuriance of many more celebrated structures, The
raggedness of outline, the wrinkles and furrows and scars upon
the face of all the old masonry, are very remarkable. The mortar has all fallen from the outside, and the edges of the stones
are worn off deeply, but irregularly, as they vary in texture or
are differently exposed. The effect of rain and snow and frost,
and mossy vegetation and coal smoke, for six hundred years upon
the surface, I know of no building in America that would give
you an idea of. The material of construction is a brown stone,
originally lighter than our Portland sandstone, but now darker
than I have ever seen that become. It has had various repairs
at long intervals of time, and is consequently in various stages of
approach to ruin-some small parts, not noticeable in a cursory
view, being in complete and irreparable demolishment, and others
but yesterday restored to their original lines and angles, with
clean-cut, bright-colored stone and mortar-bad blotches, but fortunately not prominent.
It was once connected with an abbey, and other religious
houses that stood near it, and by a long under-ground passage
9




130       ANr AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
with the nunnery at the other side of the town. Think of the
poor girls walking, with a wailing chant through that mile of
darkness, to morning service at the cathedral!
Our approach to it this morning was by a something less
gloomy and tedious way.fve were accidentally in an alley in
the vicinity, when we saw a gentleman in a white gown, and a
square or university cap on his head, with a lady on his arm,
enter an old, arched, and groined passage. We followed him
adventurously, not being sure that it was not the entrance to his
residence. After passing to the rear of the block of buildings
that fronted on the alley, we found ourselves in a kind of gallery
or covered promenade attached to the outside of the cathedral.
(The cloisters.) From this we passed into the nave (or long arm
of the cross). Its length, its broad, flat stone floor, entirely free
from obstruction, except by a row of thick clustered columns near
the sides, and the great height and darkness of its oak-ceiled roof,
produced a sensation entirely new to us. Its dignity was increased by a general dimness, and by the breadth of the softened,
colored light, that flowed in one sheet through a very large
stained-glass window at one en.7 In the end opposite this were
wide piers that support the tower, and between the two central
ones of these were the gilded organ-pipes that we had seen in our
nocturnal visit.
Under these was an arched door, on each side of which stood
about thirty boys, from ten to fifteen years old, dressed in white
robes-the "singing boys," or "choristers."  Walking leisurely
up and down the otherwise vacant floor of the nave, were "my
Lord Bishop of Bath and Wells" (I believe that is the title), the
dean and canons, etc.; a squad of ecclesiastical dignitaries, whose
very titles were strange to me, but altogether forming, what Mrs.
Jones said we should see, "a very pretty pack of priests."  The
bishop was a thin man, with an insignificant face, and crisp hair




A CLERICAL AND LAY PROCESSIONV.           131
brushed back from his forehead, dressed in a black gown with
white lawn sleeves, and a cap on his head. The dean, a burly
man, strikingly contrasting with the bishop, particularly when
they laughed, in white gown with a sort of bag of scarlet silk,
perhaps a degenerate cowl, tied around his neck, and dangling by
strings down his back. The others had something of the same
sort, of different colors. We were told afterwards, that these
were university badges, and that the color was a mark of rank,
not in university honors, but in the scale of society-as nobleman
or commoner-(a pretty thing to carry into the worship of the
Father, is it not?) The others were in black.
We walked about for a few minutes outside the columns, reading the inscriptions on the stones of the floor, which showed that
they covered vaults for the dead, and looking at the tablets and
monumental effigies that were attached to the walls and columns.
They were mostly of elaborate heraldic design, many with military insignia, and nearly all excessively ugly and inappropriate
to a place of religious meditation and worship.
After a while the great bell ceased tolling, and some men in
black serge loose gowns, two bearing maces of steel with silver
cups on the ends, the rest carrying black rods, entered and saluted the bishop. A procession then formed, headed by the boys,
in double file, followed by the bishop, dean, subdean, canons
major and minor, archdeacon, prebendaries, etc., and closed by
three Yankees in plain clothes; passed between the " vergers,"
who bowed reverently and presented arms, through the door
under the organ into the choir-a part of the edifice (in the
centre of the cross) which is fitted up inconveniently for public
worship.
It is a small, narrow apartment, having galleries, the occupants
of which are hidden behind a beautiful open-work carved wood
screen, and furnished below with three or four tiers of pews and




132         AN AMERICAN F~AR1ER IN ELNGLALND.
a few benches. Under the organ loft were elevated armed seats,
which were occupied indiscriminately by the unofficiating clergy
and military officers in uniform; the governor of the castle; Lord
Grosvenor (as "colonel of the militia"), Lord de Tapley, and
others.  Stationing soldiers among the canons, it struck us, was
well enough for a joke, but objectionable as part of a display of
worshiping the God of Peace.*
Half way between these elevated seats and the chancel was
the reading desk and pulpit, and on each side of this the choristers were seated. Several persons rose to offer us their seats as
we approached them, and when we were seated, placed prayerbooks before us.  The pews were all furnished with foot-stools,
or hassocks of straw rope, made up in the manner of a straw beehive.
Mfuch of the service, which in our churches is read, was sung,
or, as they say, intoned.  Intoning is what, in school-children, is
called "sing-song" reading, only the worst kind, or an exaggerated sing-song. I had never heard it before in religious service,
except in a mitigated way from some of the old-fashioned Quaker
and Methodist female exhorters, and I was surprised to hear it
among the higher class of English clergy, and for a moment perplexed to account for it. But I remembered that nearly all men,
in reading Scripture, or in oral prayer, or in almost any public
religious exercises, use a very different tone and mode of utterance from that which is usual or natural with them, either in
conversation or in ordinary reading. And this is more noticeable
in persons of uncultivated minds; so it is probably an impulse to
* I remember when I was a child, seeing on the Sunday preceding the first Monday in
May-the annual training day-in one of the most old-fashioned villages in Connecticut,
the officers of the militia come into the meeting-house in their uniforms. The leader of
the choir was a corporal, and the red stripes on his pantaloons, the red facings and bellbuttons of his coat, as he stood up alone and pitched the psalm tunes, was impressed
irretrievably on my mind.




INTONING A DEVOUT EXPRESSION.             133
distinguish and disassociate religious exercises from the common
duties of life, that induces it. The effect is, that the reading of
the Bible, for instance, instead of being a study of truth, or an
excitement to devotion and duty, as the individual may intend,
becomes an act of praise or prayer-the real, unconscious purpose of the reader finding expression in his tone and manner. So
we may often hear the most arrant nonsense in oral prayers; a
stringing together of scriptural phrases and devout words in confusing and contradicting sentences, while the tone and gesture
and the whole manner of the devotee show that he is most sincerely, feelingly, enthusiastically in earnest supplication. What
for? Not for that which his words express, for they may express
utter blasphemy, as in fact, it seems to me, they generally do. It
is simply an expression or manifestation by the act of uttering
words in a supplicating tone-of the sense of dependence on a
superior being-of love, of gratitude, and of reverence. David
did the same thing by dancing and playing upon the harp. It is
done now, as it seems to us, more solemnly in playing upon
church organs. It is done by monuments, and in the decorations
of churcihes. It is done by the Catholics, in listening and responding to prayers in a language which they don't pretend to understand, and in mechanically repeating others, the number of them
counted by beads, measuring the importance or intensity of their
purpose. It is done by abstaining from meat on Friday, and by
confession to one another, in the form prescribed by their church
government. It is done by the Japanese, in twirling a teetotum;
by the Chinese, in burning Joss-sticks; by the Fakirs, in standing on one leg; by the Methodists, in groans and inarticulate
cries; by the Shakers, in their dance; by the Baptists, in icewater immersions; by Churchmen, in kneeling; by Presbyterians, in standing; by New Englanders, in eating a cold dinner
and regularly going to meeting on Sunday; by the English, in




134       AN A-MERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
feasting; and the Germans, in social intercourse on that day, as
well as by more distinctly devout exercises.
It was plain to me that the tone of the reader was meant to
express-" Note ye that this reading is no common reading, but
is the word derived from God, not now repeated for your instruction, plainly and with its true emphasis, but markedly otherwise,
that we may show our faith in its sacred character, and through
it acknowledge our God; I by repeating its words, as men do not
those of another book-you by your presence and reverent silence
while I do so."
It was evident, too, by the occasional difficulties and consequent
embarrassment and confusion of our reader, causing blushing and
stammering, that it was not with him a natural expression of this
purpose, as was the nasal tone of the Puritan, but a studied form,
which had originated in some person more musically constituted.
Whether I was right with regard to the theory or not, there
was no room for doubt that, practically, such was the operation
of much of the service. The portion of the Old Testament read
was one of those tedious genealogical registers that nobody but
an antiquary or a blood nobleman would pretend to be interested
in. The psalm, one of the most fearful of David's songs of
vengeance and imprecation, alternately sung by the choristers
and intoned by the reader, one often running into the other with
most unpleasant discord. The same with the Litany. Even the
prayers could with difficulty be understood, owing partly to
echoes, in which all distinctness was lost.
Despairing of being assisted by the words of the service, I
endeavored to " work up" in myself the solemnity and awe which
seemed due to the place and the occasion, by appropriate reflections. Under this vaulted ceiling, what holy thoughts, what
heavenly aspirations, have been kindled-what true praise of
noble resolution has, like unconscious incense, grateful to God,




TI.E COMJUALITIES OF THE CATHEDRAL.         135
ascended from these seats! On these venerable walls, for hundreds of years, have the eyes of good men rested, as from their
firm and untottering consistency they gained new strength and
courage to fight the good fight,-and again I raised my eyes to
catch communion with them. They fell upon a most infamous
countenance, like to the representations of Falstaff's-a man with
one eye closed and his tongue tucked out the side of his mouthhis body tied up in a sack, his knees being brought upon each
side of his chin to make a snugger bundle. I turned away from
it immediately; but there was another face in doleful grimace, as
if a man who had been buried alive had suddenly thrust his head
out of his coffin, and was greatly perplexed and dismayed at his
situation. Again I turned my eyes-they fell upon the face of a
woman under the influence of an emetic; again, upon a woman
with the grin of drunkenness. Everywhere that any thing like
a boss would be appropriate to the architecture, were faces sculptured on the walls that would be capital in a comic almanac.
I closed my eyes again, and tried to bring my mind to a reverent mood, but the more I tried the more difficult I found it.
My imagination was taken possession of by the funny things, and
refused to search out the sublime. Not but that the sublime, the
grand, and the awful were not apparent also, all over and around
-ay, and consciously within me; but, like a stubborn child, my
mind would resist force. I gave it up, envying those who would
have been so naturally elevated by all these incitements and aids
to devotion.
I could not understand a sentence of the service, but sat, and
rose, and kneeled; thus only being able to join in the prayer, and
praise, and communion of the congregation.
Soon my thoughts, now wandering freely, fell to moving in
those directions of reverie that I have found they are apt to take
when I am hearing what those who listen with critical ear shall




136       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
call fine music: doubtless it is the best and truest that can effect
this. I had been wandering in a deep, sad day-dream, far away,
beyond the ocean-beyond the earth... dark-lost to remembrance-when I was of a sudden brought back and awakened
again, in the dim old cathedral, with such emotion, as if from
eternity and infinity, I was remanded to mysterious identity and
sense of time, that I choked and throbbed; and then, as the
richest, deepest melody I must ever have heard passed away,
softly swelling through the vaulted ceiling, caught up tenderly
by mild echoes in the nave, and again and again faintly returning
from its deepest distances, I kneeled and bowed my head with
the worshipers around me, acknowledging in all my heart the
beauty and sublimity of the place and the services.
The sermon was from an elderly man, with a voice slightly
broken, and an impressive manner, whom we were afterwards
told was Canon Slade, a somewhat distinguished divine. It was
one of the best, plain, practical, Christ-like discourses I ever
heard from a pulpit. It was delivered with emphasis and animation, in a natural, sometimes almost conversational tone, directly
to individuals, high and low, then and there present, and of
course was listened to with respectful attention. The main drift
of it was to enforce the idea, that a knowledge of the truth of
God was never to be arrived at by mere learning and dry study;
that these were sometimes rather encumbrances; that love was
of more value than learning. He had been describing the Pharisees of old, and concluded by saying, that the Pharisees, satisfied
with their own notions, and scorning new light, were not scarce
in our day. " There are some of them in our Church of England:
would that there were fewer; that there were less parade and
more reality of heavenly knowledge." He made but little use
of his notes, and pronounced an extemporaneous prayer at the
conclusion with extreme solemnity.




CO01TMUNlION SER VICE.               137
I remained in company with a large proportion of the women
present, and half a dozen men, at the communion service. The
Church of England service, which has always seemed to me more
effective than most others to the practical end of the ceremony,
never was so solemn, impressive, and affecting. It was administered by the bishop, unassisted, with great feeling and simplicity.
There was not the least unnecessary parade or affectation of
sanctity; but a low, earnest voice, and a quiet, unprofessional
manner, that betokened a sense of the common brotherhood of us
all " united by God in Christ."  The singing was " congregational," the choristers having left, and without assistance from the
organ.
A considerable proportion of the congregation were servants
in livery; and besides these and the soldiers and clergy, the men
present were generally plainly, and many shabbily, dressed. The
women, many of them, seemed of a higher class, but were also
simply dressed, generally in dark calicoes.
In the south transept (or short arm of the cross) of the cathedral another congregation were assembling as I came out. I
followed in a company of boys, marching like soldiers, dressed in
long-skirted blue coats, long waistcoats, breeches, and stockings,
and with the clerical bands from their cravats. Within were
several other such companies-boys and girls in uniform, from
charity schools, I suppose. The girls were dressed in the fashion
of Goody Two-Shoes, with high-backed white caps, and white
"pinafores" over blue check gowns.
This transept is a large place of worship in itself, though but a
small part of the cathedral, and is occupied by the parish of St.
Oswald-morning and evening service being held in it immediately after that of the cathedral church. On the doors were
notices, posted in placards, addressed to persons in certain circumstances-among others, to all who used hair-powder-to give




138       AN AMERIC'AN FARMER IN -ENGLAND.
notice to the appointed officers, that they might be rightfully
taxed.
In the afternoon we visited a Sunday-school of the Unitarians,
where we saw about sixty well-behaved children-the exercises
much the same as in ours. Afterwards we heard a sensible sermon in the Independent chapel. The clergyman, who has been
a missionary in the East, and has also traveled in America, was
good enough to call on us and invite us to his house the next day.
The congregation seemed to be of a higher grade than most of
that we had seen at the cathedral-more intelligent and animated, and more carefully dressed, yet very much plainer, more
modestly and becomingly, and far less expensively, than you
could often see any congregation with us.
We had a delightful walk, later in the afternoon, on the walls,
where we met a very large number of apparently very happy
people. I never saw so many neat, quiet, ungenteel, happy, and
healthy-looking women, all in plain clean dresses, and conversing
in mild, pleasant tones; hundreds of children, too, dressed ridiculously bright and clean and stiff, not a dirty one among them,
and as well behaved as dolls, comically sober and stately. The
walls form a good promenade, elevated and dry. The landscape
view across the river, in the sunset haze, seemed in communion
with the minds of the people, tranquil and loving. An hour
later, and we found the streets lighted up and almost as crowded
as on Saturday night, yet very quiet, and no impudence, blackguardism, or indecency. On the whole, spite of the universal
beer-drinking, we obtained a high opinion of the character of
Chester people, quite as high in respect to morality and courtesy
at least, as a stranger passing a Sunday in a New England town
of the same size would be likely to form of its inhabitants.




CLANDESTINE ARCHITECTURAL STUDIES.          139
CHAPTER XIX.
Clandestine Architectural Studies -A Visit to the Marquis of Westminster's
Stud- Stable Matters.
Monday, June 3d.
EARLY in the morning we visited the old church of St. John's,
and afterwards several curious places, relics of Romans,
Saxons, and Normans, in the suburbs-after all, nothing so interesting to me as the commonest relics of Englishmen but two
or three centuries old. As we returned through the town at
seven, the early risers seemed to be just getting up. Passing the
cathedral as the bell tolled for morning prayer, we turned in.
There are services every day at 7, 11, and 3 o'clock. The
service was performed in the Lady Chapel, which we did not
enter. The attendance must have been rather meagre, as we
saw no one going to it but two ladies with an old man-servant.
We remained some time hunting on tip-toe for traces of the
" Norman transition" in the architecture, and found we had had
already practice enough to readily detect it in various parts.
Stealing softly into the choir, from which the Lady Chapel opens,
we examined the bishop's throne. It is adorned with many
figures of saints and angels, kings and queens, and having been
once broken to pieces, in the repairs upon it the old heads were
generally put on young shoulders, and vice versa, producing in




140       AN AMERICAN F1ARMER IN ENGLAND.
some instances a very ludicrous effect, particularly where the
men's heads, beards and all, are set on female bodies. We then
got out into the cloisters, and fiom them into the chapter-house,
in which heavy-groined arches, simple, and without the slightest
ornament, have a fine effect. The date is about 1190. We saw
here some very strongly marked faces which, in stone, represent
certain Norman abbots whose graves were under us.
Without the cathedral yard, the ruins of the old abbey appear
frequently among the houses-the old black oak timber and brick
work of the time of Cromwell, mingling picturesquely with the
water-worn carvings of the older, old masonry. This morning
we saw a stout, round, old Saxon arch giving protection to a fireengine, which brought to mind the improbability of the present
race of New Yorkers sending down to posterity such memorials
of itself. Well, it will send better perhaps, and more lasting
than stones-or stocks.
On the town-hall is a large statue, said to be of Queen Anne,
but so battered and chipped, that it might stand for anybody else,
in a long dress. The hands and nose, and all the regalia, are
knocked off. And how, do you suppose? By the super-sovereign
people in election demonstrations. Thank God, we may yet boast
that, in our thoroughly democratic elections, where the whole
national policy is turning, and the most important private and
local interests are at issue, we leave no such memorials of our
time.  (I beg pardon of the " bloody Sixth.")
Going into a book-shop for a direction, we saw Emerson's
"Representative Men," and Irving's "Sketch Book," on the
counter, with newspapers and railway guides, and the proprietor
told us he had sold many of them.
We passed through a crockery shop to see a Roman bath,
which had been discovered in excavating a cellar in the rear of
it. Such things are every year turning up.




THE EATON STUD.                   141
After breakfast we once more took our knapsacks, and left
Chester by the foot-path on the bank of the Dee.
The Marquis of Westminster owns some of the finest horses
in the kingdom: in passing through Eccleston, we asked a man
if he could direct us where we could see some of them. IIe informed us that he was himself head groom of the stud, and would
take pleasure in showing it to us. He took us first to " the paddocks," which are fields of from two to five acres, enclosed by
stone walls, ten feet high, some of them with sheds and stables
attached, and some without. In these were thirty or forty of the
highest bred and most valuable mares and fillies in the world.
Unfortunately I am not a horse-man, and cannot attempt to describe them particularly. It needed but a glance, however, to
show us that they were almost any of them the most beautiful
animals we had ever seen. The groom, whose name is Nutting,
and whose acquaintance I recommend every traveler this way to
endeavor to make, was exceedingly obliging, not only taking us
into every paddock and stable, and giving us an account of the
pedigree, history, and performances of every horse, but calling
our attention to his " points," all the peculiarities of form which
distinguished each individual. It was evident his heart was in his
business, and that his regard was appreciated, for as soon as he
unlocked the gate and showed himself within the enclosure, some
of the older mares would trot up to be caressed with the most
animated, intelligent, and gratified expression. The most celebrated among them was Bee's-wing. She is seventeen years old,
and very large, but perfect in form; I should think better than
her daughter, Queen-Bee, who is lighter and more delicate. The
extraordinary beauty of " Ghuznee" and " Crucifix," both distinguished on the turf, was also obvious. These, I think, do not
belong to the Marquis. In one of the paddocks were a number
of foals, pretty, agile, fawn-like creatures. They came around




142       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
us dancing and, capering, catching our knapsacks with their teeth,
then springing off and coming back again, like dogs at play. The
mares, fillies, and colts were all of dark bay color but one, which
was dark iron-grey, nearly black.
Just as we left the colts, a great cart-horse, belonging to the
Marquis, was passing on the road. The contrast was striking.
He was seventeen hands and one inch high (within a trifle, six
feet), and putting both my thumbs to the smallest part of his leg,
I could not make my fingers meet around it.
From the paddocks we went to the stables to see the stallions.
They were all loose boxes (no stalls), thirteen feet by sixteen,
some with rack and manger across the side, some with the same
in a corner. Touchstone is a magnificent creature. It is impossible to imagine higher condition, indicated not less in the happy
and spirited expression and action, than in the bright, smooth,
supple, and elastic feel of his skin. I never saw any thing to
equal it; and it was nearly as remarkable in the mares. Five
thousand guineas (over $25,000) have been offered and refused
for Touchstone. Springy-Jack is a younger stallion; by Nutting
esteemed even higher than Touchstone. Nothing in the world
of animal life can be finer than the muscular development of his
neck. Touchstone is thought a little coarse in the withers. They
were intending to put him in pasture the next week, and in preparation for it, he had some fresh grass mixed with hay to eat.
He stood in a deep bed of straw, and was not curried-groomed
merely with a cloth-yet he was so clean that it would not have
soiled a white linen handkerchief to have rubbed it upon him.
In the granary we saw some very plump and bright Scotch
oats; they were bought for 42 lbs. to the bushel, but would overweigh that. The common feed was oat and bean meal, mixed
with cut hay. The hay was cut very fine (not more than 8 inch
lengths) by a hand machine. I believe, cut as it usually is by




D UICH BARNVS.                    143
our machines (i inch to 1 inch), it is more thoroughly digested.
I use Sinclair's, of Baltimore, which is intended for cornstalks,
driven by horse-power, and cuts hay and straw from one to three
inches, which I prefer to the finer.* The machine here cost ~6
($30), and was in no way superior, that I could see, to Ruggles's,
of Boston, which is sold at half that price.
The farm buildings were not fine or in good order; manure
wasting, old carts and broken implements thrown carelessly about,
and nothing neat. Nor were the cattle remarkable —-most of
them below the average that we have seen on the road-side. It
is evident that the Marquis is more of a horse-jockey than a
farmer.
The groom's house, which we entered, was very neat and
handsomely built of stone.  All the cottages hereabout are
floored with tiles, nine inches square.
Nutting showed us a cow of his own, which I took to be a
direct cross of Devon and Ayrshire, and which had as fine points
for a milker as I ever saw. She was very large, red and white,
and a good feeler.  He assured us that she was giving now on
pasture feed thirty-two quarts a day.
The hay was partly stored under slate roofs, supported by four
strong stone columns, the sides open. This plan differs from the
hay " barracks," common where the Dutch settled in America, in
which the roof, thatched or boarded, is attached to posts in such
a way that it can be easily set up or down, and adjusted to the
quantity of hay under it. These erections are here called Dutch
barns. Nutting thought hay was preserved in them better than
in any way he knew, and this has been my opinion of that from
* I do not wish to recommend this machine for hay and straw, which it does not cut
as rapidly as some others, but for stalks it cannot be surpassed-cutting and splitting
them in small dice.




144       AN A.MERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
our barracks. Close barns he particularly objected to. Probably hay suffers more in them here than it does in America.
After showing us all about the farmery, he walked on with us
to a shady pasture by the river side, where was a herd of fine
mares. We sat here under an old elm for some time, looking at
them as they clustered around us, and talking with him about the
agriculture of the district. He was so easily good-natured, and
conversed so freely, asking as well as answering questions, that
we were greatly puzzled to tell whether he expected a fee, or
would be offended by our offering it. At length, when he was
about to leave, we frankly stated our difficulty, explaining that
we were foreigners, and not familiar with the English customs.
He answered pleasantly, that he was always glad of a chance to
converse with gentlemen on such subjects as we appeared to be
interested in; if they liked to give him something he did not
refuse it, but he did not wish any thing from us. We assured
him that we were much indebted to him, handing him a half
crown, which he dropped into his pocket without thanking us,
but politely replying that he considered himself fortunate in
having met us. He then said he would walk on a little further,
to direct us on a path much pleasanter than the regular travel,
and from which we might see one of the best dairy farms in the
country, with an excellent herd of one hundred and fifty cows.
The path would run through the park, and was not public, but if
we would mention his name at the lodges they would let us pass.
W~e soon came in sight of the cows. They were large, halfbred Ayrshires, which seem to be the favorite dairy stock
throughout the county. Pure bred stock of any breed is not in
favor, but the Ayrshire blood is most valued.




SOIL AND CLIMATE IN CHEESE-MAKING.                    145
CHAPTER XX.
The Cheshire Cheese District and English Husbandry upon Heavy SoilsPastures; their permanence — The use of Bones as a Manure in Cheshire
-A Valuable Remark to Owners of Improved Neat Stock — Breeds of
Dairy Stock —Horses.
THE soil of a considerable part of this county being a tenacious
clay, favorable to the growth of grasses, and difficult of tillage,
its inhabitants are naturally dairy-men, and it has been particularly distinguished for many centuries for its manufacture of
cheese. Its distinction in this respect does not appear to be the
result of remarkable skill or peculiar dairy processes, but is probably due to the particular varieties of herbage, to the natural
production of which, the properties of its soil, and perhaps of its
climate, are peculiarly favorable.*
The grounds for this conclusion are the general value placed
by the farmers upon their old pastures, where the natural assortment of herbage may be considered to have entirely obtained and
taken the place of the limited number of varieties which are arti* The best cheese is made on cold, stiff, clay soils (but not on the purest clays), and
from the most natural herbage, even from weedy, sterile pastures; but much the largest
quantity is made from an equal extent of more moderately tenacious and drained or permeable soils, spontaneously producing close, luxuriant, fine (not rank) grasses and white
clover.
10




146       AN AMIER [CAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
ficially sowed; the fact that the butter of the district is not, as a
general rule, highly esteemed; and that I cannot learn that the
process of cheese-making differs any more from that of other
districts in England or the United States, than between different
dairies producing cheese of equal value, in this district itself.
It is by no means to be inferred, however, that the quality of
cheese is not affected by the process of manufacture. There is
no doubt that the skill and nicety of a superior dairy-maid will
produce cheese of a superior quality, on a farm of poor herbage,
while an ignorant and careless one will make only an inferior
description, no matter what the natural advantages may be. The
best cheese made in the United States is quite equal to the best
I have tasted here, but the average quality is by no means equal
to the average quality of Cheshire cheese.
Superiority in the manufacture seems not to depend, however,
upon any describable peculiarities of the process, which differs in
no essential particular from that common in our dairies. Excellence is well understood to depend greatly upon extreme cleanliness in all the implements employed, and upon the purity and
moderate temperature of the atmosphere. Means to secure the
latter are used much the same as with us. Stoves and hot-water
pipes are sometimes employed in the cheese-room, and where this
is in a detached building of one story, it is considered essential
that it should have a thatched roof. In some cases where the
roof has been slated, it has been found necessary in the warmest
weather to remove the cheese to the cellar of the farm-house.
Plank shelves are more generally used, and are esteemed better
than stone.
Not only is there no uniformity in the methods of the different
dairies, to distinguish them from those of the United States, but
rarely in any single dairy are there any exact rules with regard
to the time to be employed in any parts of the process, or as to the




TIE CIIEESE-MAKING PROCESS.                   147
temperature or the measure of any ingredients. Thus the degree
of heat at setting the milk, although the skill to feel when it is
right is deemed highly important, is almost never measured, even
in the best dairies. The quantity of rennet is guessed at, and its
strength not exactly known. The quantity of salt used is undefined, and the time of swedcing or curing of cheese, when made,
is left to accident.
With regard to some of these points, however, it has been
found (as reported to the Royal Agricultural Society) that in
some of the best dairies, the milk, when judged to be of the right
temperature for coagulating, was by the thermometer at 82~ F.
(variations from  760 to 88~).  From  four to sixteen  square
inches of rennet skin in a pint of water (generally four square
inches), were used to make the cheese from fifty gallons of milk,
and 1 lb. to 1 lb. 4 ounces salt to the same quantity. It is
thought that the best cheese is made with less salt than this.
The heat of the milk-room was found to vary from 640 to 780 in
August, and it was thought desirable that it should be cooler than
this.  The reporter thought that a temperature of 50~ would be
most approved throughout the year. I never heard of ice being
used in any way in a Cheshire dairy.
Some of the best dairy-maids claim to have "secrets" by which
they are enabled to surpass others; but it is certain that they do
not lessen the necessity for extreme cleanliness, nicety, and close
observation and judgment, and that with this, in addition to what
is everywhere known and practiced, there is no mystery necessary to produce the best.*
* " A cheese dairy is a manufactory —a workshop-and is, in truth, a place of hard
work. That studied outward neatness, which is to be seen in the show dairies of different districts, may be in character where butter is the only object, but would be superfluous in a cheese dairy. If the room, the utensils, the dairy-woman and her assistants be
sufficiently clean to give perfect sweetness to the produce, no matter for the color or the
arrangement. The scouring-wisp gives an outwardfairness, but is frequently an enemy




148        AN AV  ERICAllN  ARMER IN ENL-GLAND.
The Cheshire cheese in market always has an unnaturally
deep yellow color, though of late less so than formerly. It is
given by the addition of "coloring" to the milk, immediately
before the rennet steep is applied.  This " coloring" is manufactured and sold at the shops for the purpose. It is an imitation
of annatto, formed chiefly of a small quantity of' real annatto,
mixed with tumeric and soft soap.  I think it is never used in
sufficient quantity to affect the flavor at all; but I observe that
the farmers and people in the county prefer cheese for their own
use that is not colored.
Whey Butter.-It is common in Cheshire to make butter from
the whey.  It will probably surprise many to learn that there is
any cream left in whey; but there undoubtedly is, and it may be
extracted by the same means as from milk. The only difference
in the process is, that it is set in large tubs instead of small pans,
and that the whey is drawn off by a faucet from the bottom after
the cream has risen. If allowed to remain too long it will give a
disagreeable flavor to the cream. One hundred gallons of milk
will give ninety of whey, which will give ten or twelve gallons
of cream, which will make three or four pounds of butter.  So
that besides the cheese, twenty to twenty-five pounds of butter
are made in a year from the milk of each cow-an item of some
value in a large dairy.  The butter is of second-rate quality, but
not bad-worth perhaps three cents a pound less than milk
butter.
The farms in the country over which we walked in Cheshire
were generally small-less, I should think, than one hundred
acres. Frequently the farmer's family supplied all the labor
to real cleanliness."-MARsHALL'S VALE OF GLOUCESTER. Besides the means of securing
this inner cleanliness, sweetness, and purity, which must be of the air too, as well as of
the utensils, etc., it is probable that the dairy-maids' secrets are in a knowledge of the
best temperature, particularly of that at which the milk should be curdled.




MILKING - PASTURES — BONES.              149
upon them-himself and his sons in the field, and his wife and
daughters in the dairy-except that in the harvest month one or
two Irish reapers would be employed. The cows, in the summer,
are kept during the day in distant pastures, and always at night
in a home lot. During the cheese-making season, which on these
small farms is from the first of May till November, they are
driven home and fastened in shippens, or sheds, between five and
six o'clock, morning and night, and then milked by the girls,
sometimes assisted by the men. On a farm of one hundred acres,
fifteen to twenty cows are kept, and three persons are about an
hour in milking them. From twenty to thirty gallons of milk
(say six quarts from each cow) is expected to be obtained on an
average, and about one pound of dried cheese from a gallon of
milk. From two to five cwt. (of 112 lbs.) of cheese may be
made from the milk of each cow during the year. Three cwt. is
thought a fair return on the best farms. In a moderately dry
and temperate summer, more cheese is made than in one which
is very wet.
The pastures are generally looked upon as permanent; the
night pastures are sometimes absolutely so, as it is supposed that
they have not generally been broken up for many hundred years.
During the last ten years the pasture lands have been very
greatly, and, as they tell me, almost incredibly improved by the
use of bone-dust. It is applied in the quantity of from twenty to
forty cwt. on an acre, as top-dressing; and I was told that pastures on which it had been applied at the rate of a ton to an acre,
eight or nine years ago, had continued as good (or able on an
average of the years to bear as many cows) as similar land topdressed with farm-yard dung every two years, probably at the
rate of thirty cubic yards to an acre. There seems to be no
doubt at all that lands, to which inch bones were applied ten
years ago, are yet much the better for it. They are usually




150       AN~ AMIE'RICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
applied in April, and the ground is lightly pastured, or perhaps
not at all, until the following year. The effect, the farmers say,
is not merely to make the growth stronger, but to make it sweeter; the cattle will even eat the weeds, which before they would
not taste of. However, in poor land especially, it is found to
encourage the growth of the more valuable grasses more than
that of the weeds; so that the latter are crowded out, and a clean,
thick, close turf is formed. If the ground has been drained, all
these improvements are much accelerated and increased. Upon
newly laid down lands, however, the effect is not so great; it is
especially on old pastures (from which the extraction of the
phosphates in the milk has been going on for ages sometimes,
uninterruptedly) that the improvement is most magical. The
productive value of such lands- is very frequently known to have
been doubled by the first-dressing: of bones.
Both boiled and raw bones are used, and though there is a
general belief that the latter are more valuable, I do not hear of
any experience that has shown it; on the contrary, I am told of
one field which was dressed on different sides equally with each
sort, and now, several years after, no difference has been observed
in their effect. A comparison must, of course, be made by measure, as boiled bones are generally bought wet, and overweigh
equal bulks of raw about 25 per cent. Dry bone-dust weighs
from 45 to 50 lbs. to a bushel.
I have not heard of super-phosphate of lime, or bones dissolved
in sulphuric acid, being used as a top-dressing for pastures.
I quote the following from the journal of the Royal Agricultural Society, as a mark of deep significance to American farmers,
beyond its proof of the value of bones:-" Before bones came
into use in this country, the farmers made a point of selecting a
hardy and inferior description of stock for their clay lands, farmers finding that large, well-bred cows did not at all answer upon




IIPRO VED DAIRY STOCK.               151
them; but now they find" (in improved pasture) " that the best
of stock find ample support, not only to supply the cheese-tub
freely, but also to do justice to their lineage, by retaining, if not
improving, their size and symmetry; so that the farmer has not
only the advantage of making considerably more cheese, but also
of making more money by his turn of stock."
I cannot now ascertain the amount of bones annually exported
from the United States to England, but it must be very great, as
I know one bone-miller, near New York, that has a standing
order to ship all he can furnish at a certain price, and who last
year thus disposed of 80,000 bushels.
Breeds of Dairy Stock.-I have already described most of the
dairy stock that we have observed along the road. We have
seen scarcely any pure bred stock of any kind. Ayrshire blood
seems to predominate and be most in favor on the best farms.
The points of the short-horns are also common, and in the south
we saw some Herefords. The best milkers seemed to be a mixed
blood of Ayrshires, and some other large and long-horned cattle,
with a smaller red and black breed, probably Welsh. I incline
to think that experience has taught the dairy-men to prefer half
or quarter bred stock to full bloods of any breed. For beefmaking it is otherwise. I have seen no working oxen. Horses
are the only beasts of draught on the farms; they vary greatly
in quality, but are generally stout, heavy, hardy, and very powerful. On a farm of one hundred acres, three will be kept,
sometimes four, and at about that rate on the larger farms, with
an additional saddle-horse or two for his own use, if the farmer
can afford it. Farmers generally raise their own cows, choosing
heifer calves from their best milker for the purpose. Cattle are
not commonly reared for sale here. Few sheep are raised; but
many are brought lean from Wales and Ireland, and fatted here.




152       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XXI.
Tillage - Size of Farms - Condition of Laborers - Fences - HedgesSurface Drainage —Under Drainage-Valuable Implements for Stiff
Soils, not used in the United States.
I SHOULD think that more than three-quarters of the land
we have seen is in grass and pasture. I suppose that it would
be more productive of human food, and support a much larger
population, if it were cultivated; but the farmers being generally
men of small means, barely making a living, are indisposed to
take the trouble to break up and till the tough sward and stiff
soil, from which, while it is in pasture, they are always sure to
realize a certain product of cheese without any severe labor. The
cultivation is not, either, very thorough, because the strongest and
most efficient implements and great brute forces are needed to
effectually act upon such a soil. Accordingly we have observed
on the large farms, where the extent of ground to be, of necessity, cultivated,warranted the purchase of clod-crushers and other
strong and expensive implements, and made it necessary to employ a considerable number of laborers, the proportion of land
under tillage was more extensive, and much more thorough work
was made with it.
I wish I could say that the condition of the laborers appeared




HEDGES.                       153
to be elevated with that of agriculture, by the leasing of the land
in larger tracts, and to men of larger capital. It is true that the
tendency is to increase the rate of wages and give employment to
more hands; but it is also evident that, by the engrossment of
several small farms in one large one, a number of persons must
be reduced from the comparatively independent position of small
farmers to that of laborers, and I cannot see that for this there is
any compensating moral advantage.
Another evil of the small farms (not exclusively however), is
the quantity of land injured or withdrawn from cultivation by
the fences. These are almost universally hedges; and not only
are they left untrimmed and straggling, thereby shading and
feeding upon the adjoining land, but a great many large trees
have been allowed to grow up in them, of course to the injury of
any crops under their branches. These are sometimes kept low,
the limbs being trimmed off for firewood (in which case they are
called pollards), or are left to grow naturally. In the latter case,
of course, they add exceedingly to the beauty of the landscape,
and eventually become of value for timber; but high as this is
here, I cannot at all believe it will ever compensate for the loss
occasioned to the farm-crops. Where every five or ten acres is
surrounded by a hedge and ditch, the damage done cannot be
slight. By way of improvement, we have seen where lately
some hedges have been grubbed up, two old fields being thrown
together. We have also seen a few wire fences in use. These
latter were very slightly set up, and could hardly be intended for
permanence. We have also seen some fine, low, narrow hedges,
taking up but little room, and casting but little shade. When a
hedge is thus well made and kept, I am inclined to esteem it the
most economical fence. The yearly expense of trimming it is
but trifling (less than one cent a rod), and it is a perfect barrier
to every thing larger than a sparrow. The farmers seem to set




154       AN AMERICAN FARMER I37 EN~GLAND.
much value upon the shelter from cold winds which the hedges
afford.
Drainage.-The need of thorough draining is nowhere so
obvious as upon clay soils with stiff sub-soils. There will be but
a few weeks in a year when such soils are not too wet and mortary, or too dry and bricky, to be plowed or tilled in any way to
advantage. In the spring it is difficult to cart over them, and in
the summer, if the heat is severe and long-continued, without
copious rain, the crops upon them actually dwindle and suffer
more than upon the dryest sandy loams. To get rid of the surface-water, the greater part of the cultivated land of Cheshire
(and, I may add, of all the heavy land of England) was, ages
ago, plowed into beds or " butts." These are commonly from five
to seven yards wide, with a rise, from the furrows (called the
"reins") to the crown, of three or four inches in a yard. The
course of the butts is with the slope of the ground; a cross butt
and rein, or a wide, open ditch by the side of the hedge, at the
foot of the field, conducting off the water which has collected from
its whole surface. When the land is broken up for tillage, and
often, even after thorough under-drainage, these butts are still
sacredly regarded and preserved.
Thorough under-draining, by which all the water is collected
after filtering through the soil to some depth, was introduced here
as an agricultural improvement within the last eight years. The
great profit of the process upon the stiff soil was so manifest that
it was very soon generally followed. The landlords commonly
furnished their tenants with tile for the purpose, and the latter
very willingly were at the expense of digging the drains and
laying them. Wishing, however, to do their share of the improvement at the least cost, the tenants have been too often
accustomed to make the drains in a very inefficient manner, being
guided as to distance by the old reins, and laying their tile under




AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS.                     155
these, often less than eighteen inches from the surface. The
action of the drains was thus often imperfect. It is now customary for the landlords, when they furnish tile, to stipulate the depth
at which they shall be laid. They sometimes also lay out the
courses and distances of the drains. The Marquis of Westminster employs an engineer, who appoints foremen, and, to a certain
extent, suitably-trained laborers, to secure the drainage of his
tenant-lands in the most lastingly economical and beneficial
manner. Last winter he had two hundred men so employed, in
addition to the labor furnished by the tenants themselves, and
over one million tiles were laid by them. I heard nowhere any
thing but gratification and satisfaction expressed with the operation of the thorough-drains.*
Implements.-After breaking up the sward of these heavy
lands with a deep, narrow furrow-slicing plow, an admirable instrument, quite commonly in use and everywhere spoken well of,
for crushing and pulverizing the soil in a much more effectual
and rapid manner than the harrow, is Croskill's Patent Clodcrusher Roller.
" This implement," according to the inventor's advertisement,
" consists of twenty-three roller parts, with serrated and uneven
surfaces, placed upon a round axle, six feet wide by two and a
half feet in diameter. The roller-parts act independent of each
other upon the axle, thus producing a self-cleaning movement.
Of course the roller must only be used when the land is so dry
as not to stick.
" The following are the various uses to which this implement
is applied:
* A careful account was kept with one large farm, drained eight years ago by the Marquis of Westminster. The increased production attributed to the operation is now equal
to 27 per eetie. per annum on the expenditure, and it was lately leased with a corresponding improved rental




156       AN A MERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
"1. For rolling corn as soon as sown upon light lands; also
upon strong lands, that are cloddy, before harrowing.
" 2. For rolling wheats upon light lands in the spring, after
frosts and winds have left the plants bare.
"3. For stopping the ravages of the wire-worm and grub.
"4. For crushing clods after turnip crops, to sow barley.
"5. For rolling barley, oats, etc., when the plants are three
inches out of the ground, before sowing clover, etc.
" 6. For rolling turnips in the rough leaf before hoeing, where
the plants are attacked by wire-worm.
"7. For rolling grass lands and mossy lands after compost.
"8. For rolling between the rows of potatoes, when the plants
are several inches out of the ground.
"Cash prices, with traveling wheels complete, 6 feet 6 inches,
~21; 6 feet, ~19 10s.; 5 feet 6 inches, ~18."
For still more deeply stirring, and for bringing weeds to the
surface of soil recently plowed, a great variety of instruments
entirely unknown in America are in common use here. They all
consist of sets of tines, or teeth, placed between a pair of wheels,
and so attached to them that, by means of a lever, having the
axletree of the wheels for a fulcrum, the depth to which they shall
penetrate is regulated; and they may at any time be raised entirely above the surface, dropping and relieving themselves from
the weeds and roots which they have collected. Thus, they may
be described as combining the action of the harrow, the cultivator,
and the horse-rake. (The wire-tooth horse-rake is used as an
instrument of tillage by Judge Van Bergen, at Coxsackie, N. Y.)
They are designated variously by different manufacturers-as
grubbers, scarifiers, extirpators, harrows, and cultivators. The
" Uley Cultivator" is one of the simplest and most efficient. In
this the tines are raised by turning a crank, each complete turn
of which raises or depresses them one inch. The depth to which




AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMIENTS.              157
they are penetrating at any time, is marked by a dial near the
handle of the crank. Something of the kind, more effectual than
any thing we yet have, is much needed to be introduced with us.
Clean and thorough culture of stiff clay soils can hardly be performed without it.
I should remark of English agricultural implements in general,
that they seem to me very unnecessarily cumbrous and complicated.




158        AN AMERICAN FARMER IN E.NGLAND.
CHAPTER XXII.
The general condition of Agriculture-Rotation of Crops-Productiveness - Seeding down to Grass —Comparison of English and American
Practice - Practical Remarks - Rye-grass, Clover - Biennial Grasses —
Guano - Lime - The Condition of Laborers, Wages, etc.- Dairy-maids
-Allowance of Beer.
MUST say that, on the whole, the agriculture of Cheshire, as
the first sample of that of England which is presented to me,
is far below my expectations. There are sufficient reasons to
expect that we shall find other parts much superior to it; but
what we have seen quite disposes of the common picture which
our railroad and stage-coach travelers are in the habit of giving
to our imagination, by saying that "all England is like a garden."
Meaning only a "landscape garden," a beautiful and harmonious
combination of hill and dale, with the richest masses of trees, and
groups and lines of shrubbery, the greenest turf and most picturesque buildings, it might be appropriately said of many parts;
but with reference to cultivation, and the productiveness of the
land, it might be quite as truly applied to some small districts of
our own country as to this part of England.
In commencing the cultivation of land that has been in grass,
the first crop is usually oats; and the most approved practice
upon the stiff soils seems to be, to plow deeply in the fall or




ROTATION OF CROPS.                  159
winter, and in the spring to prepare the ground with some strong
implement of the cultivator sort. Oats are sowed much thicker
than is usual with us. I hear of six bushels to the acre; but
with regard to this there is much difference of opinion. The crop
of oats is not often large (from thirty to forty bushels from an
acre is common); but oats seldom make a large crop upon clay
soils. The next year the ground will be summer-fallowed, or, by
the more enterprising farmers, cropped with turnips, beets, or with
potatoes. The potatoes are sold, the turnips and beets fed to the
cows during the winter. On the poorer farms, the cows get little
but hay from December to April; and cheese-making is given up
during the winter. Others, by the help of turnips, beets, and
linseed cake, keep a constant flow of milk, and cheese-making is
never interrupted. (Of course the milking of each cow is interrupted for awhile at her calving time, which they try to have in
March.)
The crop after roots is commonly barley; after fallow, wheat,
of which twenty-five to thirty bushels is a common crop, and forty
not uncommon. After wheat, oats again, and perhaps after the
oats another crop of wheat; if so, the land Is manured with bones
or boughten manure, and sometimes limed at the rate, say of four
tons to the acre of stone lime.
Grass.-With the last crop of oats or wheat, clover and grass
seeds are sowed. Grass was thought to come better after wheat
upon under-drained land. The best farmers sow a very great
variety and large measure of grass seeds; the poorer ones are
often content with what they can find under their hay bays, sowing it, weeds and all, purchasing only clover seed.
The quantity of grass seeds sowed is always much greater here
than in America. I should think it was commonly from a bushel
to three bushels on an acre; rarely less than one, or more than
three. I do not think more than one quarter of a bushel, or




160       AN A MERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
perhaps half a bushel of the lighter seeds, is often sowed in the
United States. I should attribute the more general evenness and
closeness of the English meadows in a great degree to this,
though, doubtless, much is due to the moister climate. Land
intended for permanent pasture receives much more seed, and a
larger variety, than that which is intended to be mown only for a
few years, and then be brought to tillage again. Of the good
policy of the English practice for pastures (and the same applies
to lawns and public greens) I have no doubt. Among the great
variety of grasses in an English meadow, there will be one that
springs up and grows strongly, furnishing a wholesome and delicious bite to the cattle, as early after the first warm breath of
spring as the ground will be dry enough to bear a hoof (and on
drained lands it is rarely not so). This will be succeeded by
others, and in May by others; and in July, those natural to the
dryest and warmest soils will be in perfection; and so through
the year there is a constantly renewing perfection. A ranker
sward, and one that would for a season support more cattle, I
think would be obtained from sowing a smaller quantity and less
variety of seed.
I am  not prepared to recommend the English practice for
mowing lands. To obtain the largest quantity of grass hay from
an acre, without regard to quality, plow deep, manure deep, and
sow one variety of seed in such quantity that when it comes up
it will speedily tiller, and occupy the whole ground, yet not stand
so closely as to greatly crowd and compress the stools, thereby
dwarfing the reeds from their natural size, and obstructing the
flow of sap in their vessels. Cut it when it has attained to its
greatest size, while it is yet entirely succulent, just at the time
that the blood of the plant begins to be drawn up into the forming
seed, and the bottom dries into such tough, close, ligneous fibre
that nourishment can no longer ascend from the root. The right




QUANTITY OF GRASS SEED TO AV ACRE.           161
quantity of seed for this will vary in different soils —a very rich,
deep soil needing less than a more sterile one, because in the
latter the roots cannot extend far enough to collect the requisite
food and drink to make a large, strong, open stool, and more
herbage will grow upon the same space by having the stools
stand closer.
In some degree proportionately to the closeness of the fibre
and the fineness of the grass, will be its nourishing quality, so
that ninety pounds of fine, close-grown hay, from a thick-seeded
meadow, may be of equal value with a hundred pounds of a
coarser, ranker quality. But the nourishment is by no means in
the inverse ratio of size; so that for all ordinary purposes, with
all the usual hay-grasses, the farmer will find his profit in studying to obtain the largest burthen of grass. For this end, I am
inclined to think English farmers often sow too much seed —
Americans not enough. It seems, however, to be the best farmers
in other respects that sow the most seed in England.
There is one consideration that I have omitted to mention,
against the common practice on American farms, where hay is an
important staple crop: it is generally an object to retain a clean
sward of grass as long as possible, without the necessity of
breaking up, from the grass having run out, that is, given place
to weeds, or to finer and less profitable grasses. Where the seed
has been thickly sown, the grass takes more entire possession of
the surface, and retains it longer. The thicker grass seed is
sown, therefore, other things being equal, the longer it will lay.
I have known, in a district where it was the custom to sow
four to eight quarts of timothy seed, on two occasions, twenty
quarts sowed. The result was a finer grass in both cases; in one
it was thought the crop was much larger, and in the other that it
was somewhat smaller, than where ten quarts was sowed along11




162        AN AMERICANV FARHMER IN ENGLAND.
side. The probability is, that in an average of ten years it will
prove the larger crop on thile thickest sown, in both fields.
The commonest grass seed sowed in England is rye-grass, or
ray-grass (perennial). It is a much smaller, closer-growing grass
than our timothy; I think it has a sweeter taste, is probably bulk
for bulk, considerably more nutritious, and perhaps so pound for
pound; but I think more fat and muscle can be made from an
acre, if sowed with timothy, than with rye-grass. A valuable
quality of rye-grass is its early spring growth. A field of ryegrass will be up some inches, offering a tempting bite to cattle,
before a field of other grasses will begin to show a green surface.
I believe that it ripens earlier too than timothy, and is better for
mowing-ground on that account, to be sown with clover, which is
much injured by over-ripeness, if not cut till timothy is in its best
state to make hay. I have seen no timothy in England, but I
know that it is sometimes sowed.
Rye-grass has stood at the head of the mowing grasses in some
parts of England for centuries. In districts of light and dry soil,
it is less in favor than elsewhere, but, I judge, beeomes of more
value with the improvement of husbandry generally. Marshall
(1796), writing from Gloucestershire, speaks of the general
strong prejudice of the farmers against ray-grass, "smothering
every thing and impoverishing the soil, until it will grow nothing!" they say; and, arguing against them, he makes an observation of value with reference to the question of quantity of seed.
" If real ray-grass has ever been tried alone, and without success,
it has probably risen from too great a quantity having been sown.
Be it ray-grass or rubbish, I understand seldom less than a sackful" (three heaped bushels) "an acre is thrown on, whereas one
gallon an acre of clean-winnowed real ray-grass seed is abundantly
sufficient on such soil as the vale in general is covered with.'
The soil is " a rich, deep loam."




CLOVER AND RYE-GRASS.                   163
Clover (red and Dutch) is more sowed here for hay than with
us, though it is much more difficult to make good hay of it in this
climate. It is sowed in the spring, as with us, perhaps 20 lbs. to
the acre. We commonly sow 5 to 10 lbs. Arthur Young tried
about a dozen experiments to ascertain the most profitable quantity of clover seed to sow, and concluded his record of them  as
follows:
" The more seed, as far as 20 lbs. per acre, undoubtedly the
better. This is a plain fact, contradicted by no part of the experiment; and the great inferiority of 5 to 7 lbs. shows equally
clear that such portion of seed is too small for an acre.  Where
land is well manured, less seed is required; 12- lbs. seems the
proper quantity" (on very rich, gravelly soil).
A bushel of clover seed weighs 60 to 64 lbs.
In ground intended for mowing but one or two years, biennial
varieties of the rye-grass are sown, which are of stronger growth
than the perennial. They are also sowed sometimes with permanent grasses, giving, on a deep, rich soil, a heavier burthen of
grass the first year of cutting than these would do. For this
purpose, I have thought it might be well to sow the biennial or
sub-perennial rye-grass seed with timothy, which does not usually
yield a fair crop at its first cutting, and have twice attempted to
make trial of the Italian rye-grass, but in both cases the seeds
that I had procured failed of germination.
I may hereafter notice several species of herbage that are
much valued in England, that have not been generally introduced
in the United States.*
The grass is mowed for hay for a longer or shorter course of
years; sometimes broken up after one or two seasons, sometimes
becoming permanent or perennial pasture, and so running on in* Fifteen or twenty varieties of grass seeds are sowed together, and the expense for seed
in laying down for pasture is often ten or twelve dollars an acre.




164       AN AIMERICA4N FARMER IAr ENGLAND.
definitely; and sometimes being mowed for a number of years.
One field I saw that had been mowed eight years, and having
received a dressing of 30 cwt. of bones, promised fair yet to bear
heavy swaths. Mowing lands are usually top-dressed at the end
of the second year, and afterwards every second or third year.
All the homestead dung is commonly reserved for this purpose,
and all other manure is purchased from the towns. Guano for
turnips and wheat is coming into general use; some think very
profitably, others have been disappointed. For wheat, it is
applied at the seed sowing, and sometimes again as a top-dressing
in the spring; but in a dry season it is thought that this second
application has done more harm than good. Guano has been a
good deal tried as a top-dressing for pastures, and it has been
said to improve the quality of cheese when so used. The immediate effect upon grass, when applied in the spring, is always very
advantageous; but later in the summer, particularly if the season
is dry, the good effect disappears, and sometimes the result is
unfavorable.
Of course the round of crop varies according to every farmer's
notion. What I have described is as common as any, though not
probably among the best farmers. Another crop is beans, which
is introduced between either of those I have mentioned, sometimes
at the head. Not uncommonly the first crop is wheat, the ground
having been summer-fallowed. Wheat is drilled or sowed broadcast-most commonly sowed in this county-and is either plowed
or harrowed in, opinions varying as to which is best. My own
experience on a stiff soil is decidedly in favor of plowing in.
Laborers.-Wages, as they have been reported to me, vary
much, and unaccountably. I should think the average for ablebodied men as day-laborers, working and receiving pay only in
days that commence fair, was $2.25 a week, perhaps averaging
thirty-three cents a day. The rent of a laborer's cottage, with a




LABORERS- WAGES.                        165
bit of garden attached (less than a quarter of an acre), is from
$15 to $25. In addition, they have sometimes a few perquisites
from the farmers who regularly employ them. A great many
laborers in winter are without work, and wages are then a trifle
less than I have mentioned, as in harvest time they are also a
trifle more. The reader will understand that out of this thirtythree cents, which I have supposed to be the average receipts of
a laborer per day, he has to pay his rent, and provide food and
raiment for his family.  Of course his diet cannot be very sumptuous (the cost of provisions being, perhaps, ten per cent. higher
than with us), but I have not learned particulars.
The wages of farm servants, hired by the month or year, and
boarded in the family, are for men, from $45 to $65 a year; for
boys, $15 to $25; maid-servants, $30 to $40; dairy-maids,
greatly varying, say from $50 to $100.*
It is customary to give all laborers and servants a certain
allowance of beer besides their wages. It is served out several
times a day, and may be supposed to cost, on an average, ten
cents a day for each person. One farmer estimated it at twice
that.
* Wages have since advanced considerably, while provisions have fallen in price. Agriculture is nevertheless more profitable, agricultural improvement having been very
great.




166       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XXIII.
Remarks on the Cultivation of Beet and Mangel-wurzel.
I FOUND the best farmers in all the south of England, and
throughout Ireland, where the soils were at all stiff, increasing
their crops of these roots. For the production of milk they are,
undoubtedly, a more valuable crop than turnips or ruta-bagas,
though it is asserted that the milk is more thin and watery.
Some thought them equal, and even superior, weight for weight,
for fattening cattle. I think it is certain that, in such soils, a
larger amount of nutriment can be obtained from a crop of them
on an equal measure of ground. Donaldson says the beet yields
a larger weight per acre, both in roots and leaves, than any other
root crop known. I have heard of crops of from fifteen to thirtyfive tons an acre; and in one instance, near New York, at the
rate of forty-four tons an acre, from one quarter of an acre.
Chemical analyses and practical experiments in feeding, to ascertain their value as compared with other roots, or with hay, differ
so very greatly, that nothing can be said with any certainty about
it. The climate of the United States, like that of France, is
much better adapted to the beet, and much less favorable to the
ruta-baga, than that of England. The beet is much less liable
to be injured by insects or worms than the turnip or ruta-baga,




CULTIVATION OF THE BEET.              167
though I incline to think the latter is much more favored with us
than in England in this respect.
The ground for beet crops is prepared the same as for turnips;
that is, it is finely and deeply tilled (and there is no crop which
will better show the value of draining and subsoil plowing), and
manured with well-decomposed dung, compost, bones, or guano,
in drills from twenty-seven inches to three feet apart. The seed
is usually prepared by steeping for from twenty-four to forty-eight
hours, and is then rolled in lime. As rapidly as possible after
the manure is deposited, it is covered with soil and the seed
dropped, sometimes being drilled like turnip seed, but more commonly dibbled. There are two simple machines used here for
dibbling. Whatever way the seed is planted, it must be expected
that a large part will fail to germinate.
I have found dibbling by hand not very tedious, as follows:
One man making holes an inch deep, and six or eight inches
apart, with a round stick an inch in diameter, another following
and dropping three seeds in a hole, and a third covering by a
single stroke, and pressing, with a hoe. I have obtained a large
crop, planting so late as the middle of July, in the climate of
New York.
A rapid, early growth of the plant is important. When the
weeds come up, the horse-hoe or cultivator is run through, and as
often afterwards as there is need, while the size of the beets will
permit it, they are horse and hand-hoed. It is found that earthing-up with a plow is injurious. When two or three inches high,
the plants are thinned to twelve inches apart. When two or
three plants come up in a bunch one only of them must be left.
It will wilt down flat upon the ground at first, but soon recovers.
The outer leaves begin to dry and decay early in the fall, and
may then be plucked and fed to cows with profit, and without retarding the continued growth of the root. The root may be pulled




168       ANT A MERI-CAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
by hand, and is harvested more readily than any other. It will
keep (at New York) in the open air, in stacks four feet wide and
high, covered with straw and six inches of earth, a small hole
being left in the top for ventilation, until April, and is then of
great value to new milk-cows and ewes with lambs.
I particularly recommend the cultivation of the sugar and
mangel-wurzel beets to cottage-farming gentlemen, who wish to
keep a small dairy with a limited extent of land.




WREX.,HA'.                     169
CHAPTER XXIV.
Delightful walk by the Dee banks, and through Eaton Park - Wrexham -
A Fair — Maids by a Fountain — The Church - Jackdaws- The Taproom and Tap-room Talk —Political Deadness of the Laboring ClassA Methodist Bagman.
FOLLOWING Nutting's directions, we had a most delightful
walk along the river bank and under some noble trees, then
through thick woods and over a bit of low, rushy land, where
some Irishmen were opening drains, and out at length into the
private park-road-a pleasant avenue, which we followed some
miles. The park here was well stocked with game; rabbits
were constantly leaping out before us, and we frequently started
partridges and pheasants from a cover of laurels, holly, and hawthorn, with which the road was lined.
We came out at Pulford, when we lunched at the Post Office
Inn; and thence walked by an interesting road, through a village
of model cottages not very pretty, over a long hill, from the top
of which a grand view back, and by a park that formerly belonged to Judge Jeffreys, of infamous memory, to Wrexham.
Wrexham is a queer, dirty, higgledy-piggeldy kind of town,
said to be the largest in Wales (it is about as large as Northampton). It was the latter part of a fair-day, and there had been a




170       AN AMIERICAN FARMlIER IN ENGLAND.
mustering of the yeomanry of the shire, so that the streets were
crowded as we entered. In the balcony of a hotel in the marketplace, a military band was playing to a mass of up-turned, gaping
faces, through which we worked our way. The inns were generally full of guzzling troopers, dressed in a very ugly fashion;
but we finally found one, some color of the bear family-blue, I
believe-which seemed tolerably quiet, where we stopped for the
night.
After dining and resting awhile, we took a walk about the
town. MIost of the houses out of the market-place are very mean
and low, the walls plastered with mud and whitewashed, and the
roofs thatched. Noticing a kind of grotto in a back street, about
which a pretty group of girls in short blue dresses, engaged in
lively talk, were standing with pitchers, we approached it. We
came close upon them before they noticed us, but instead of
showing any timidity, they glanced at our hats and laughed clear
and heartily, looking us boldly in the face. Catching one alone,
however, as we descended to the fountain, and asking her to let
us take her mug to drink from, she handed it to us, blushing
deeply, and said nothing; so we were glad to leave quickly to
relieve her. There was a spring and pool of remarkably clear,
cool water within the grotto, from which all the neighborhood
seem to be supplied. Our California hats attracted more attention at Wrexham than anywhere else in Europe, but we met with
no incivility or impertinence beyond a smile or laugh.
The church at Wrexham is curious, from the multitude of
grotesque faces and figures carved upon it. It is a large and fine
structure, and the tower is particularly beautiful, as seen from the
village. There were jackdaws' nests in it, and a flock of these
birds, the first we have seen, were hovering and screeching
around them. They are of the crow tribe, black, and somewhat
larger than a blue-jay.




TAP-ROOM POLITICS.                 171
Returning to our inn, we found in the parlor a couple of lisping
clerks, who were sipping wine in a genteel way, and trying to say
smart things while they ogled the landlady's daughter. Retreating from their twaddle, I called for a pipe and mug of ale, and
joined the circle in the tap-room. There was a tall, scarletcoated fellow, who told me he was a sergeant of the Guards, recruiting here; an older man, who had been in India; a half-tipsy
miller, with a pleasant-speaking, good-natured wife trying to coax
him to come home; and half a dozen more rustics, all muddling
themselves with beer and tobacco.
The conversation was running on politics, and was not at all
interrupted by my entrance; on the contrary, I thought the old
Indian was glad of a stranger to show himself off before. He
was the orator of the night, and the others did little but express
assent to his sentiments, except the miller, who every few moments interrupted him with a plain and emphatic contradiction.
The sergeant said very little either way except he was appealed
to, to substantiate some assertion " as a military man," but leaned
on the bar, drinking hot gin-and-water, and whispering with the
bar-maid.
There was news that the French minister had taken "diplomatic
offense and demanded his passports, and war was threatened.
War there certainly would be, according to the ex-soldier, and a
terrible time was coming with it. England was going to be
whipped-out —it was inevitable. Every body assented "it was
inevitable" except the miller, who said it was fol-de-rol. "Why,"
continued the Indian, "isn't every country in Europe against
England?-don't they all hate her? and isn't every Frenchman
a soldier?"  Then he described the inefficient state of the
national defenses, and showed how easy it would be for a fleet
of steamers, some dark night the next week, to land an army
somewhere on the coast of Wales, and before they heard of it, it




172       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
might be right there amongst them! He would like to know
what there was to oppose them. The miller said there was" gammon." The sergeant, on being asked, admitted that he was
not aware of any respectable force stationed in that vicinity, and
the miller told him he was a "traitor then." Indian said miller
knew nothing about war, and the company unanimously acquiesced. Indian then resumed his speech-asked if government
would dare to give arms to the people, and pictured an immense
army of Chartists arising in the night, and, with firebrands and
Frenchmen, sweeping the government, Queen and all, out of the
land, and establishing "a republican kingdom," where the poor
man was as good as the rich. The company all thought it very
probable, and each added something to make the picture more
vivid. A coarse joke about the Queen's bundling off with her
children produced much laughter; and the hope that the parsons
and lawyers would have to go to work for a living, was much
applauded.
It was strange what a complete indifference they all seemed to
have about it, as if they would be mere spectators-not in any
way personally interested. They spoke`of the government and
the Chartists, and the landlords and the farmers, but not a word
of themselves.
Late in the evening there was some doleful singing, and a
woman came in and performed some sleight-of-hand tricks, every
one giving her a penny when she had concluded. We were
obliged to sleep two in a bed, one of us with a Methodist young
man, who traveled to make sales of tea, among country grocers
and innkeepers, for a Liverpool house. He said that what we
had seen in the tap-room would give us a very good notion of the
character of a large part of the laboring class about here. He
thought their moral condition most deplorable, and laid it much
to the small quantity and bad quality of the spiritual food that




A METIIODIST BAGMAN.                 173
was provided for them. He seemed well informed about America, and, excepting for slavery and steamboat explosions, greatly
to admire our country. He had some idea of going to it; and
said his present business was exceedingly disagreeable, as it compelled him to be so much at inns, where he rarely found any one
with whom he could pleasantly associate.




174       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XXV.
Morning Walk through a Coal District —Ruabon- An Optimist with a
Welsh Wife - Graveyard Notes - A Stage-wagon — Taxes — Wynstay
Park — Thorough Draining — A Glimpse of Cottage Life — " Sir Watkins
Williams Wyn."
June 4th.
THE most agreeable chimes from the church tower we had
ever heard, awoke us this morning at three o'clock. It is
light enough here at that time to read or write, and the twilight
at evening does not seem to be over at half-past ten. I felt stiff
and sore, but arose and wrote till half-past six, when we got the
bar-maid up, paid our bill (we were charged only sixpence a
piece for our lodging), and were let out into the street; no signs
that any one else in the town was yet stirring.
Our road ran through a coal district, tall chimneys throwing
out long black clouds of smoke, and pump-levers working along
the hill-tops; the road darkened with cinders; sooty men coming
home from the night-work to low, dirty, thatched cottages-the
least interesting and poorest farmed country we had yet traveled
over. After walking six miles, we stopped at the Talbot Inn,
Ruabon, to breakfast.
in the tap-room, over his beer, was a middle-aged man, a currier by trade, who told us he had come hither nine years ago from




SIR WATKINS W YN.                 175
Staffordshire, had married a nice Welsh girl, and settled himself
very comfortably. He said wages were good here, and it did not
cost so much to live as it used to. He had a cottage in the village; the landlord, Sir Watkins Wyn, was an excellent man, and
his agent was very kind to poor people. He did not see any
need of grumbling, and, for his part, thought the world a pretty
fair world.
After a good breakfast, in a room adorned with sporting pictures and a likeness of Sir Watkins Wyn, as colonel of the local
yeomanry, I returned to talk with him. When he had work, his
wages were six dollars a week, but just now he was out of work.
The rent of his cottage and four roods of land was one hundred
and twenty dollars, and Sir Watkins paid the poor-rates. Sir
Watkins was not very generally liked by his tenants, because he
was not so liberal with them as his father; but his father had
been extravagant, and run the estate deeply in debt, and he had
need to be more particular; and he was sure he was always very
easy with poor folks. He had had a deduction made on his rent
more than once when the times were hard with him, and this
year the farmers all were allowed ten per cent. of their rents,
because corn is so low.
I had told him I was from America, and he was asking me
some questions about it, when he suddenly stopped, fidgeted about
a moment, and then, looking at a woman coming across the street,
said, with a laughing, swaggering air, " There's my wife coming;
now you'll see a specimen of a Welsh girl!" His wife, a stout,
hard-looking woman, walked briskly in, stood up straight before
him, folded her arms, and, in a deep, quiet, determined way, gave
him a regular Caudling. He tried for awhile to make a joke of
it, and to appease her. "Come now, missus, don't be hard upon
un'; sit ye down now, and take a pint; these gentlemen be from
Ameriky, and I talks with'um about going there. Come now,




176       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN EiVGLAND.
how'd thee like to go to Ameriky?" As we were thus introduced, she glanced fiercely at us, and we retreated at once without the door. He tried for a moment longer to brave her, and
called loudly for another mug of ale. She turned her head to
the bar-maid, and said, "You'll get no more ale!" and the barmaid minded her.
She said he had been there before this morning, and when he
began drinking in the morning, it was always the last of him for
the day. He whimpered out that he had come home and breakfast wasn't ready, and he hadn't anything else to do but to come
back here. It was ready, she said, and he might have been
looking for some work, and so on. In a few minutes they went
off, arm in arm.
Opposite the inn was an old church and a graveyard. There
were more monkey-faces on the church, and two effigies in stone,
of knights-the forms of their bodies, with shields, barely distinguishable, and their faces entirely effaced.  Many of the
gravestones had inscriptions in Welsh, and both here and at
Wrexham I noticed the business of the deceased person was
given; as, John Johnes, Wheelright; William Lloyd, Tanner, etc.
On a flat stone near the church, the following was inscribed
(letter for letter), perhaps by a Welsh stone-cutter following an
English order, given verbally —" This his the end of the vault."
Returning from the church, we found the currier again drinking beer in the tap-room, with a number of other men, a drunken
set, who probably had come passengers by a " stage-wagon" that
stood in the road. This was an immense vehicle, of pre-railroad
origin, like our Pennsylvania wagons, but heavier and higher.
It had a heavy freight of barrels, cases, and small parcels, on the
top of which, under the canvass-hooped cover, a few passengers
were cheaply accommodated, there being a ladder in the rear for
them to ascend by. Behind one of the hind-wheels was a roller,




WYNSTA Y PARK.                   177
attached by chains on either side the wheel to the axletree, so
that if the wagon fell back any, it scotched it-a good idea for
heavy loads in a hilly country. There were six stout cart-horses
to draw it, and all in a line, the wheeler being in shafts. The
driver said he had a load of eight or ten tons, and drove three
miles an hour with it. He paid about sixteen dollars a year
taxes for his horses, and two dollars for a very ugly bull-dog, that
stood guard over the establishment for more than an hour, while
he was refreshing himself in the inn. At length we saw the
whole company come out, and the wagon started again, all very
jolly; the currier and another man, with their hands on each
other's shoulders, staggered across the street, singing " Oh, Susannah!"  At the churchyard gate both fell, rolled over and
embraced each other, once or twice tried ineffectually to get up,
and then both went to sleep there on the ground. No wonder
the sample Welsh girl had a hard look.
After finishing our letters to send by the steamer, we visited
Wynstay Park. It is much more picturesque than Eaton, the
ground being diversified and the trees larger.! The Hall, which
is a plain building, was undergoing repairs.
We separated here for a few days, my friends wishing to see
more of Welsh scenery, and going to the vale of Llangollen
(pronounced Langothlan), while I had a letter I wished to
deliver in another direction.
The park was covered with lines of recently-made underdrains, and I hunted over it in hopes to find men at work, that I
might see the manner in which they were constructed. Going
to a pretty checkered timber-house to make inquiries, I was so
fortunate as to meet the foreman of the draining operations, Mr.
Green, an intelligent Warwickshire man, who kindly took me to
a field a mile or two distant, where he had thirty men at work.
The soil was a gravelly loam, with a little heavier subsoil. The
12




178       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN EfNGLAND.
drains were laid twenty-seven feet apart, and dug three feet deep
(ordinarily), and one foot wide from top to bottom; in the middle
of the bottom a groove was cut for the pipe, so the top of it would
be three feet from the surface. No narrow tools were used, except to cut the grooves for the pipe. The foreman said that,
though a man could work to much better advantage in a widermouthed drain, the extra dirt to be moved compensated for it, and
made this plan the cheapest.
I thought then, and since, until I came to try it in gravelly and
stony land, that the work might be done much more rapidly with
the long, narrow tools described by Mr. Delafield,* making the
bottom of the drain only of the width of the pipe intended to be
laid; but I find these can only be used to advantage in free
ground. The method here described is probably the best for
draining soils, where many stones larger than a hen's egg are to
be met with.
Cylindrical pipes, of either one or one and a half inch bore,
were laid in the grooves at the bottom of the drain; collars, connecting them, were only used in the loosest soils. The mains
were laid one foot deeper than the collecting drains, and the pipes
in them were from two to six inches bore. No series of drains
were run more than seventy yards in length without a main, and
all the mains emptied into an open ditch at the lowest side of the
field, which was made deep enough to allow of a drop of one foot
from the mouths of the pipes. Where such a ditch was likely to
gully, the sides were sloped and turfed.
The wages of the men employed at this work averaged $2.25
a week; boys, 16 cents a day.
Mr. Green sent a lad to guide me across the park to the road
I wished to take-a remarkably bright, amiable boy, with whom
I had a pleasant talk, as he led me on by the most charming way
* Transactions N. Y. State Agricultural Soc., 1848, p. 232.




THE GOOD LANDLORD.                 179
among the old oaks, and through herds of deer. He could read
and write, and knew something of geography and arithmetic,
having been instructed by the curate of Ruabon, whom he seemed
to have much loved. (I think he had died lately.) He also
spoke kindly of Sir Watkins and lady, to whom his father was
shepherd, and said that all their servants and poor people were
much attached to them. Passing near the Hall, I asked for some
water, and he took me into one of the servants' cottages to get it.
There was an old woman rocking a cradle, and a young woman
ironing linen, both very neatly dressed; the furniture plain and
meagre, but every thing clean, and an appearance of a good deal
of comfort about the room.
While the repairs were being made upon the Hall, the family
lived in a cottage completely embowered among trees and shrubs,
which we afterwards passed; and I had the honor of catching a
glimpse, through the foliage, of a form in a gray coat which, I
was assured, was the good Sir Watkins himself.
Soon after leaving the park, I crossed the Esk by a very high
stone arch, built "by Sir Watkins," as some ragged boys and
girls, who were employed in collecting for manure the horse-dung
that dropped upon the road, informed me, and this was the last I
heard of Sir Watkins.




CHAPTER XXVI.
Stone Houses —Ivy- Virginia Creeper -A Visit to a Welsh Horse-Fair
- English Vehicles- Agricultural Notes- Horses- Breeds of Cattle -
Herefords, Welsh, and. Smuthy Pates- Character of the People - Dress
- Powis Park.
Shrewsbury, June 7th.
I HAVE been visiting a gentleman to whom I was introduced
by Prof. Norton. His residence is on the east border of
Wales, amidst very beautiful scenery of round-topped hills, and
deep, verdant, genial dells. He has the superintendence of a
large number of mines of coal and metals, and of several agricultural estates, the extent of which may be imagined from the fact,
that he is preparing to thorough-drain 5000 acres next winter.
He is building a tilery, and will employ seven draining-engineers,
each with two foremen to oversee the work. The cost, it is estimated, will be from $23 to $25 an acre; drains, seventeen feet
apart and three feet deep.
The house is of stone, and is covered with ivy, which I mention that I may contradict a common report, that ivy upon the
wall of a house makes it damp. The contrary, I have no doubt,
is the fact. The ivy-leaves fall one over another, shedding off
the rain like shingles; and it is well ascertained that in a long
storm, the inside walls of those rooms in a house which are pro



STONE B UILDIVGS- IVY.                   181
tected by the ivy, are much less damp than those not so shielded.
It is also generally supposed in America that stone houses are
much damper than wood.  This may be so with some kinds of
porous stone, but I can testify from my own experience that it is
not so with others. A slightfurring out on the inside, and lath
and plaster, will in all cases remove this objection to any stone.
A good stone house is warmer in winter, cooler in summer,*
equally dry and healthful, and, if built in convenient and appropriate style, every way much more satisfactory and comfortable
than our common, slight-framed buildings. As for the ivy, I
think it is one of the most beautiful things God has given us, and
the man who can and does not let it beautify his habitation, is
sinfully ungrateful. It grows luxuriantly on the north side of a
house or wall in the climate of New York. (My experience is
with the Irish ivy.) t
The day after I reached here, my host had occasion to go to a
horse-fair at Welsh Pool, a place some twenty miles distant, and
invited me to accompany him. We went in a dog-cart, a kind
of heavy gig, which here takes the place of our light boat-wagon.
It is a box (large enough to hold a dog or two in driving to sporting ground), hung low, between two small, heavy wheels, with a
seat on the top of it for two, looking forward, and sometimes
another in which two more can sit looking backward. On the
back, to exempt it from the tax upon more luxurious vehicles, is
painted the owner's name, business, and place of residence, thus:
"John Brown, Farmer, Oswestry, Shrops."  All the humbler
class of carriages are thus marked here, including farm carts.
The landscapes were agreeable in the country we passed
* In a late rapid change of weather, the thermometer on the outside of my house rose
in 18 hours from 19 deg. to 35 deg., while that within the walls remained stationary at
20 deg., not rising even one degree, though there was no fire within two rooms of it,
t I am sorry to say it has been sadly cut down by the winters of 1856 and 1857.




182       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
through, but the farming in much of it no better than in some
parts of the Connecticut Valley. Coarse, rushy grass, indicating
the need of draining, grew in much of the meadow land-as I
think it does, to the exclusion of more valuable grasses, in land
that is ordinarily dryer than such as would spontaneously produce
it in America. The buildings along the road were such as I
have previously described; but I saw one old shackling board
barn which, but for its thatched roof, would have looked very
home-like.
Welsh Pool is a small, compact town (population 5000), with
a market-house, and a single small church, on the tower of which
a union-jack was hoisted, and within which there is a peal of
three bells, that continually, all day long, did ring most unmusically; there were booths in the main street, in which women sold
dry goods, hosiery, pottery, etc. In another street horses were
paraded, and in other places cows and swine.
There was present a considerable crowd of the country people,
which I observed carefully. I verily believe, if five hundred of
the common class of farmers and farm-laboring men, such as
would have come together on similar business-say from all parts
of Litchfield County, in Connecticut-had been introduced among
them, I should not have known it, except from some peculiarities
of dress. I think our farmers, and particularly our laborers,
would have been dressed up a little nearer the town fashions, and
would have seemed a little more wide awake, perhaps, and that's
all. I not only saw no drunkenness, except a very few solitary
cases late in the day; no rioting, though there were some policemen present, but no gayety; every body wore a sober business
face, very New England-like.
The small farmers and laboring men all wore leggins, buttoning from the knee to the ankle; heavy hob-nailed shoes; little,
low, narrow-brimmed, round-topped felt hats, and frocks of linen,




R USTIC DRESS H-ORSES - CATTLE.           183
blue or white in color, the skirts reaching below the knee, very
short waists, a kind of broad epaulette, or cape, gathered in,
boddice fashion, before and behind, loose shirt-like sleeves, and
the whole profusely covered with needle-work. I suppose this is
the original smock-frock. An uglier garment could not well be
contrived, for it makes every man who wears it appear to have a
spare, pinched-up, narrow-chested, hump-backed figure. The
women generally wore printed calico jackets, gathered at the
waist, with a few inches only of skirt, and blue or gray worsted
stuff petticoats, falling to within a few inches of the ankle -a
picturesque, comfortable, and serviceable habit, making them
appear more as if they were accustomed to walk and to work,
and were not ashamed of it, than women generally do. Most
incongruously, as a topping off to this sensible costume, a number
of women had crowded their heads into that ultima thule of
absurd invention, a stiff, narrow-brimmed, high-crowned, cylindrical fur hat. What they did with their hair, and how they
managed to keep the thing on their heads, I cannot explain.
They did do it, notwithstanding something of a breeze, as well as
the most practiced man, and without showing evidence of any
particular suffering.
There were, perhaps, a hundred horses offered for sale; among
them one pair only of fine carriage-horses, one large and fine
thorough bred cart-horse, and a few pretty ponies. All the rest
were very ordinary stout working-horses, much like our Pennsylvania horses. The average price of them was but a trifle over
$100, about what they would bring at New York.
There were still fewer cattle, and they were all comprised in
three breeds and their intermixtures: first, Hereford, which
predominated; second, Welsh, small, low, black beasts, with
large heads and white faces, black muzzles and long spreading
horns; third, Smutty Pates, an old Welsh breed hardly to be




184       AN ANMERICAN FARMIER IN ENGLAND.
found in purity now. They are longer and somewhat larger than
Devons, a little lighter red in color, with invariably black or
brindle faces. They were generally in fair condition, and would
cut up particularly heavy in their hind quarters. A Smithfield
man told me that he thought a cross of this breed with the Hereford made the best beef in England.
After dining with a number of gentlemen, most of whom had
come from a distance to attend the fair, I took a walk out into
the country, about the town. The only object of interest that I
remember was "Powis Castle," the seat of a nobleman, nobly
situated in a picturesque, mountain-side park. The castle itself
is upon a spur of the mountain, and is hidden among fine evergreen trees. I had toiled up to within about ten feet of the edge
of the plateau upon which it stands, when I heard a low, deep
growl, and, looking up, saw above me a great dog asking me, with
bristling back, curling faings, and fierce grinning teeth, what business I had to be there. Considering that I had no right to be
visiting the residence of a gentleman who was a stranger to me,
unless I had some business with him, and concluding upon short
reflection that indeed I had none I determined upon a retrogade
movement; and taking care not to attempt even to apologize to
his dogship for the intrusion until I had brought a few trees
between us, I found that he backed down just about as fast as I
did, so that at a distance of half a dozen rods he appeared a handsome, smooth, generous-natured mastiff, and I began to consider
whether the earl would not probably be pleased to have an intelligent stranger see the beauty of his castle; but the moment I
stopped, the dog's lips began to part and his back to rise again,
and I concluded that whatever the earl's wishes might be, I could
not make it convenient just then to accommodate him, and returned forthwith to the village.




THE MASTIFF.                   185
The true mastiff is a somewhat rare dog in England, and I
don't think that I ever saw one in America. He is very large
and powerful, and smooth-haired.




186       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XXVII.
English Vehicles —A Feudlal Castle and Modern Aristocratic Mansion —
Aristocracy in 1850 - Primogeniture - Democratic Tendency of Political Sentiments — Disposition towards the United States — Combativeness
Slavery.
J  AND C., after a tramp among the mountains of Wales,' which they have much enjoyed, reached the village nearest
to where I was visiting last night. This morning a party was
made with us to visit   Castle. We were driven in a "Welsh
car," which is much the same kind of vehicle as the two-wheeled
hackney cabs that a few years ago filled the streets of New York,
and then suddenly and mysteriously disappeared. Two-wheeled
vehicles are "all the go" in England. They are excessively
heavy and cumbrous compared with ours, the wheels much less
in diameter, and they must run much harder, yet, over these
magnificent roads, they can load them much more heavily.
The castle is on high ground, in the midst of the finest park
and among the largest trees we have seen. The moat is filled
up, and there are a few large modern windows in the upper part,
otherwise it differs but little probably from what it appeared in
the time of the crusaders. The whole structure is in the form of
a square on the ground, with four low round towers at the corners,




ARISTOCRATIC L UXUR Y.               187
and a spacious court-yard in the centre. The entrance is by a
great arched gateway, over which the old portcullis still hangs.
We were kindly shown through all its parts, including much
not usually exhibited to strangers, and I confess that I was not
more interested in those parts which were its peculiar features as
a feudal stronghold, than in those that displayed the sumptuous
taste, luxury, and splendor of a modern aristocratic mansion. The
state apartments were palatial, and their garniture of paintings,
sculpture, bijoutry, furniture, and upholstery, magnificent and
delightful to the eye beyond any conception I had previously had
of such things. Let no one say it will be soon reproduced, if it is
not already excelled, in the mansions of our merchant-princes in
America. Excelled, in some respect, it may be, but no such
effect can be reproduced, or furnished at once to the order of
taste and wealth, for it is the result of generations of taste and
wealth. There was, in all, never a marvelous thing, or one that
demanded especial attention, or that proclaimed in itself great
costliness; and while nothing seemed new, though much was
modern, most of the old things were of such materials, and so
fashioned, that age was of no account, and not a word was said by
them of fleeting time. The tone of all-yes, the tone-musical
to all who entered, was, Be quiet and comfortable, move slowly
and enjoy what is nearest to you without straining your eyes or
your admiration; —nothing to excite curiosity or astonishment,
only quiet contemplation and calm satisfaction.
I liked it, liked to be in it, and thought that if I had come
honestly to the inheritance of it, I could abandon myself to a few
months living in the way of it with heartiness. But in the first
breath of day-dreaming, I was interrupted by the question, Is it
right and best that this should be for the few, the very few of us,
when for many of the rest of us there must be but bare walls,
tile floors, and every thing besides harshly screaming, scrabble




188       AN A MERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
for life? This question, again, was immediately shoved aside
unanswered, by another: Whether, in this nineteenth century of
the carpenter's son, and first of vulgar, whistling, snorting, rattling,
roaring locomotives, new-world steamers, and submarine electric
telegraphs; penny newspapers, free schools, and working-men's
lyceums, this still, soft atmosphere of elegant age was exactly the
most favorable for the production of thorough, sound, influential
manhood, and especially for the growth of the right sort of legislators and lawgivers for the people.
It seems, certainly, that it would be hard for a man, whose
mind has been mainly formed and habited in the midst of this
abundance, of quiet, and beauty, and pleasantness, to rightly understand, and judiciously work for, the wants of those whose
" native air" is as different from this as is that of another planet.
Especially hard must it be to look with perfect honesty and appreciating candor upon principles, ideas, measures, that are
utterly discordant with, and threaten to interrupt, this costly nursery song, to which his philosophy, religion and habits have been
studiously harmonized.
I may as well here record my observation of the general disposition of the English people towards our nation, which I confess
I did not find to be exactly what I had anticipated, and which I
think must be generally much misconceived in the United States.
There is a certain class of the English - conservative whigs
more than tories, as I met them-who look upon the United States
as a nation of vulgar, blustering, rowdy radicals; very much as a
certain set with us look upon the young mechanics and butcherboys of the town-troublesome, dangerous, and very "low," but
who are necessary to put out fires, and whose votes are of value at
elections, with whom it is as well therefore to keep on civil terms.
A considerable number of pretending, sub-aristocratic, super-sensible people, follow more or less in their wake. But the great




FEELING TOWARDS THE UNITED STATES.            189
mass of the educated classes regard us quite differently; not with
unqualified respect and unalloyed admiration, but much as we of
the Atlantic States regard our own California —a wild, dare-devil,
younger brother, with some dangerous and reprehensible habits,
and some noble qualities; a capital fellow, in fact, if he would
but have done sowing his wild oats.
This may be well enough understood in the United States; but
further, there is not in the English people, so far as I have seen
them, rich or poor, learned or ignorant, high or low, the slightest
soreness or rancorous feeling on account of our separation from
them, or our war of separation. No doubt there are still a few
" aged women of both sexes" who worship the ghost of that old
fool, " the good King George," who look upon us with unaffected
horror, as they do equally upon their own dissenters and liberals.
Yet it never happened to me, though I met and conversed freely
with all classes except the noble, while I was in England, to encounter the first man who did not think that we did exactly right,
or who was sorry that we succeeded as we did in declaring and
maintaining our independence.*
The truth is, I suspect, that, at that time, the great mass of
thinking men in England were much of that opinion. Our war
was with George and his cabinet, not with the people of England,
and if they did reluctantly sustain the foolish measures of the
king, it was precisely as our Whigs, who were opposed to the
measures that led to the war with Mexico, sustained, with money
and with blood, that war when it was inevitable. It is a remarkable thing, I have noticed, that there are many men in England
who were born at the time of, or shortly subsequent to, our Revolutionary War, who are named after the American heroes of that
war-Washington, Jefferson, and Franklin.
* I have lived nine months in England since I wrote this sentence, and it still remains
literally true (1858).




190       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
This and other circumstances, early in my visit to England,
made me reflect that the hostile feeling of the people had never
been deeply engaged against us; while it soon became also evident, that very much less of so much hostility as they once had
towards us had descended to the present than we are in the habit
of calculating for.
The reason of the great difference in this respect of the popular
feeling in the two countries is evident, though it often extremely
puzzles and offends a liberal Englishman, who has been in the
habit of looking with a strong feeling of fraternity towards the
people of the United States, to find himself, when he comes among
them, expected in all his opinions and feelings to be either a
traitor to his own country or an enemy of ours. It is easily explained however.
There is a fondness for hostility in our nature that wants some
object towards which to direct itself. Seventy years ago, and
forty years ago, that object to us as a nation was the kingdom of
Great Britain. No other object, until within a few years, has
been offered to us to weaken that traditional hostility. All our
military and naval glory, the most blazing, though by no means
the most valuable, jewels of our national pride, have been our
victories in war with Great Britain. Almost our only national
holidays have been in a great part exultations over our successful
hostilities with Great Britain. "The enemy" and " the British,"
came to me from my fighting grandfather as synonymous terms.
When I was a child I never saw an Englishman but I was on my
guard against him as a spy, and would look behind the fences to
see that there was no ambuscade of red-coats. I made secret
coverts about the house, so that when they came to sack and burn
it, and take our women and children into captivity, I could lay in
wait to rescue them. In our school-boy games the beaten party
was always called " British." If a law was odious it was termed




TElIE AMERICAN REVOL UTION.             191
a British law; if a man was odious he was called an " old Tory;"
and it has been with us a common piece of political blackguardism till within a short time, if it is not now, to speak of those of
an opposite party as under British influence.
The war had been with us a war of the people; not a woman,
as she sipped her tea, but imbibed hatred to the taxing British,
and suckled her offspring with its nourishment; not a man of
spunk in the country but was hand to hand fighting with the
British, and teaching his sons never to yield to them.
In England, on the other hand, comparatively few of the
people knew or cared at all about the war; even the soldiers
engaged in it were in considerable numbers mere hirelings from
another people, whom the true English would have rather seen
whipped than not, so far as they had any national feeling about
it. Their hostile feeling was even then more directed towards
France than towards America; and now, I do not believe there
is one in a thousand of the people of England who has the slightest feeling of hostility towards us, descending or inherited, from
that time.* It was much so again in the later war. England
was at war with half the world in those days, and if a general
disposition of enmity towards us had been at all aroused in the
course of it, all recollection of it was lost in the fiercer wars with
other nations that immediately followed. I doubt if one in a
hundred of the voters of England could tell the name of a single
ship engaged in the war of 1812; whether it was General Hull
or Commodore Hull who was heroized in it; whether, in the
assault upon New Orleans or Washington, it was that their forces
were successful; or whether, finally, they carried or lost the diplomatic point for which their soldiers and sailors had been set to
fighting.
Even if the people of England could remember us equally
* Such a supposition is now to me utterly preposterous (1858).




192      1AN AIMERICAN FARMER IN ENiGLAND.
among other important nations as their enemy, it would be a very
different feeling towards us that it would lead to, from the remembrance of us as their old and only enemy; so that not only was
our original share of the hostile feeling of the people of England
a very small one, being principally confined to the king and his
sycophants, and the idolaters of the divine right, but the pugnacious element in the nature of an Englishman, of our day, is
directed by much more vivid remembrances towards France, or
Spain, or Germany, than towards us.
Altogether, considering the exceedingly queer company English
travelers seem usually to keep when in the United States, and the
atrocious caricatures in which, with few exceptions, they have
represented our manners and customs to their countrymen, I was
surprised at the general respect and the degree of correct appreciation of us that I commonly found. There is no country, not
covered by a British flag, in the world that the British of 1850
have any thing like the degree of sympathy with, and affection
for, that they have for the United States.
On the other hand, it is happily evident, that since our war
with Mexico has given us a new military glory, it has also diverted our national combativeness, in a degree, from our old
enemy; and since the general intercommunication between the
countries has been made so much more frequent and speedy, and
cheaper than it used to be, the disposition of our people towards
the British has been much less suspicious, guarded, and quarrelsome than it very naturally, if not very reasonably, was, until
within a few years.
OPINIONS differing with the views I have presented having
been lately expressed by several persons in honorable positions,
for one at least of whom I entertain the highest respect, I wish




ENGLISH OPINION OF AMERICA.             193
to repeat that, in the five months during which I traveled in Great
Britain, in almost every day of which time I heard the United
States talked about with every appearance of candor and honesty,
I do not recollect to have heard any expression of hostile feeling
(except from a few physical-force Chartists, with regard to slavery) towards our government or our people, and only from a
few stanch Church-and-State men, against our principles of government. Perhaps the highest eulogy on Washington ever put
in words was written by Lord Brougham. The Duke. of Wellington lately took part in a banquet in honor of American independence. Having observed that Mr. Howard was threatened
with a mob, for keeping an English ensign flying from a corner
of the Irving House, I will add that I more than once saw the
American ensign so displayed in England, without exciting remark; and I know one gentleman living in the country who
regularly sets it over his house on the Fourth of July, and salutes
it with gun-firing and festivities; so that the day is well known,
and kindly regarded. by all his neighbors, as "the American
holiday."
The following paragraph is the commencement of a "leader"
in the London Times, the organ not of the Government, as is
supposed by many who do not see it in the United States, but of
a power stronger than the Government. I quote it as confirmation of my view of the way in which the American Revolution is
regarded in England:
" One hundred and fifty years after the formation of our principal plantations in North America, the sense of a common wrong
and a common danger drove thirteen loyal English communities
most reluctantly to form themselves into a Congress for mutual
defense and protection. The hint was not taken, the same rash
and overbearing policy was persisted in, the wisdom of Burke
and the eloquence of Chatham were poured forth in vain, the star
13




194       AN AMERICANl FARMER IN ENGLAND.
of our ascendancy gradually waned, and a dominion planted by
our own hands, an empire boundless in extent, fertility, and natural resources, the proudest exploit of the nation, the noblest
proof and offspring of our civilization, was violently rent from us
for ever. One would have thought that so signal and disgraceful
a calamity, so terrible an exception to that career of prosperity
with which we have been blessed, would have made an indelible
impression on the then present and all future generations, and that
a dread of quarrels with our colonies, and an aversion to union
between them, would be among the traditional instincts of the
empire. It is now sixty years since we set ourselves to repair,
in the great southeastern continent of Australia, the disgraces and
reverses which our arms and policy had sustained on the shores
of the Northwest."




PAINTINGS.                     195
CHAPTER XXVIII.
Paintings - Cromwell —Pastoral Ships -Family Portraits and Distant
Relations- Family Apartments- Personal Cleanliness — The Wrekin.
THE pictures which most interested me were portraits of
Cromwell and Charles, one of Rubens, two of very beautiful
women of the family by Sir Peter Lely, a female face by Carlo
Dolci, and two or three little things by Rubens. The portrait of
Cromwell appears as if he might have sat for it, as, if I remember rightly, is asserted. It looks like one's idea of him, but not
in the best light of his character-a deep melancholy, stern, and
somewhat sour face.
There is a large landscape representing a brook tumbling over
a rock into the sea, on which is a fleet of shipping. The story
is, that it was painted by a French artist on a visit here, and
when first exhibited had, in place of the sea, a broad meadow
through which the brook meandered. Lady - suggested that
a few sheep on the broad, green ground of the meadow would be
a pleasing addition. "Sheeps! mi lady?" said the chagrined
artist, " suppose you better like it with sheeps, I shall make de
sheeps;" and so he painted a blue sea over the green meadow,
and abruptly embouched his brook into it, that he might appropriately gratify Lady -'s maritime penchant.




196       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
Among the family portraits one was shown having a title that
sounded familiarly to us, and, after a moment's thought, we both
remembered it to be that of the single nobleman, whom an antiquarian friend had informed us that our family had been, long
before its emigration, connected with by marriage. If it had
been a Scotch castle, we might perhaps have felt ourselves more
at home in consequence. It was an odd coincidence, and made
us realize the relationship of our democracy, even to aristocratic
England, quite vividly.
In consideration of this, I think I may say a few words of the
private apartments of the family, through nearly all which, apparently, we were shown. They were comparatively small, not
larger or more numerous, and certainly not as expensively furnished as those of many of our New York merchants; but some
of them were delightful, and would be most tempting of covetousness to a man of domestic tastes, or to a lover of art or of literary ease. Generally, there was exquisite taste evident in colors
and arrangements, and forms of furniture, and there were proofs
of high artistic skill in some members of the family, as well as a
general love and appreciation of the beautiful and the excellent.
Some of the rooms were painted in very high colors, deep blue
and scarlet and gold, and in bizarre figures and lines. I hardly
could tell how it would please me if I were accustomed to it, but
I did not much admire it at first sight, and it did not seem English or home-like. It is just the thing for New York though, and
I have no doubt you'll soon see the fashion introduced there, and
dining-rooms, dressing-rooms, counting-rooms, and steamboat
state-rooms, all equally flaring.
The bed-chambers and dressing-rooms were so furnished as to
look exceedingly cosy and comfortable, but there was nothing
very remarkable about them except, perhaps, the great preparation made for washing the person. I confess, if I had been




TIlE WR EKIN.                   197
quartered in one of them, I should have needed all my Yankee
capabilities to guess in what way I could make a good use of
it all.
There is a story told of two members of our Legislature, who
came together from " the rural districts," and were fellow-lodgers.
One of them was rather mortified by the rough appearance of his
companion, who was of the "bone-and-sinew" sort, and by way
of opening a conversation in which he could give him a few hints,
complained of the necessity which a Representative was under to
pay so much for "washing."  "How often do you shift?" said
the Hon. Simon Pure. " Of course I have to change my linen
every day," he answered. " You do?" responded his unabashed
friend. "Why, what an awful dirty man you must be! I can
always make mine last a week."
The ball-room, or ancient banqueting-room, was a grand hall
(120 feet long, I should think), with a good deal of interesting
old furniture, armor, relics, etc. It also contained billiard-tables,
and other conveniences for in-door exercise. A secret door, cut
through the old oak wainscot which lined its wall, admitted us to
the private apartments.
We peeped into a kind of broad well into which prisoners used
to be lowered, like butter, for safe keeping, and ascended to the
battlements of one of the towers, from which there is a very extensive and beautiful view, extending, it is said, into sixteen
counties. A gauzy blue swelling on the horizon was pointed to
as the Wrekin, a high mountain-the highest in midland England;
hence the generous old toast, " To all around the Wrekin." We
were let out through a narrow postern, which gave us an opportunity to see the thickness of the wall: it was ten feet-and in
some parts it was said to be sixteen-of solid stone and mortar.
The castle was a border fortress of Wales, on the dyke or ancient
military wall between that country and England, remains of




198       AN AMERICAN FA4RMER IN ENGLAND.
which can be seen running each way from it. It has withstood
many sieges, the last by Cromwell, the effect of whose artillery
is largely manifest within the court. A decree of the Long Parliament is on record ordering it to be razed to the ground.




VISIT TO A FARM.                  199
CHAPTER XXIX.
Visit to a Farm - Farm-House and Farmery - Fatting Cattle - SheepVetches - Stack Yard - Steam Threshing — Turnip Sowing - Excellent
Work- Tram Road - Wages.
IN the afternoon we were taken to visit a farmer who was considered to be about the best in the district (Shropshire). The
house was in the middle of a farm of three hundred acres, and
was approached by a narrow lane; there were no " grounds" but
a little court-yard, with a few trees in it, in front of the house,
which was a snug, two-story, plain brick building.
On entering, we found the farmer, a stout elderly man, sitting
alone at a dinner-table, on which were dishes of fruit and decanters. He insisted on our joining him, and we were obliged to sit
some time with him over his wine, while he talked of free trade,
and questioned us how low we could afford to send wheat from
America, and how large the supply was likely to be.
He then led us into the farmery, which was close by the house,
the rear door almost opening into a cattle-yard. I mention this,
as it would be considered extraordinary for an American, who
could afford wines at his dinner, to be content with such an arrangement. There was not the least attempt at ornament anywhere to be seen, beyond the few trees and rose-bushes in the




200       AN AMllERICAN FARMIER ILN EN3TGLAND.
enclosure of a rod or two, in front of the house: not the least
regard had been had to beauty except the beauty of fitness; but
every thing was neat, useful, well-ordered, and thoroughly made,
of the best material —the barns, stables, and out-buildings of
hewn stone, with slated roofs, grout floors, and iron fixtures. The
cattle stables were roomy, well ventilated and drained, their
mangers of stone and iron; fastenings, sliding chains; food, freshcut vetches, and the cattle standing knee deep in straw.
The fatting cattle were the finest lot I ever saw, notwithstanding the forty finest cows that had been wintered, had been sold
within a fortnight. These forty had been fattened on ruta baga
and oil-cake, and their average weight was over 10 cwt., some of
them weighing over 12 cwt. They were mostly shorthorns.
Those remaining were mostly Hereford bullocks.
Sheep were fattening on a field of heavy vetches: Cheviots
and Leicester, and crosses of these breeds.
The VETCH is a plant in appearance something like a dwarf
pea; it is sown in the autumn upon wheat stubble, grows very
rapidly, and at this season gives a fine supply of green food,
when it is very valuable. It requires a rich, clean soil, but grows
well on clay lands. I think it has not been found to succeed well
in the United States.
In the rear of the barns was a yard half filled with very large
and beautifully made-up stacks of hay, wheat, oats and peas.
The hay was of rye-grass, a much finer (smaller) sort than our
timothy. The peas were thatched with wheat-stra-w. The grain
stacks were very beautiful, several of them had stood three years,
and could not be distinguished from those made last year. The
butts of the straw had been all turned over at regular distances,
those of one tier to the top of that below it, and driven in, so the
stack appeared precisely as if it had been served with straw-rope,
and I supposed that it had been, until I was told. The thresh



MODEL FAR IING.                    201
ing of the farm is done by steam, the engine being in the stackyard, the furnace under ground, and the smoke and sparks being
carried off by a subterranean flue to a tall chimney a hundred
yards distant. (I have seen a hundred steam-engines in stackyards since, without this precaution, and never heard of a fire
occasioned by the practice.)
The grain on the farm had all been sowed in drills. The proprietor said that if he could be sure of having the seed perfectly
distributed, he should prefer broad-cast sowing (i. e., as well as
a first-rate sower could distribute it in a perfectly calm day).
The wheat was the strongest we have yet seen, and of remarkably equal height, and uniform dark color. The ground was
almost wholly free from weeds, and the wheat was not expected
to be hoed.
We found fourteen men engaged in preparing a field for turnips; opening drills with plough, carting dung, which had been
heaped up, turned and made fine; distributing it along the drills;
plows covering it immediately, and forming ridges 27 inches
apart over it; after all, a peculiar iron roller, formed so as to fit
the ridges and furrows, followed; leaving the field precisely like
a fluted collar. The ridges were as straight as the lines of a
printed page; and any inequality to the hight of half an inch,
was removed by the equal pressing of the roller. A more perfect piece of work could not be conceived of. Seed (3 lbs. to the
acre) will be sown immediately on the ridges, by a machine
opening, seeding, closing and rolling six drills at once. The field
is thorough drained (as is all the farm, three feet deep) and subsoil plowed.
I saw no farming that pleased me better than this, in all England. It was no gentleman or school farming, but was directed
by an old man, all his life a farmer, on a leased farm, without
the least thought of taste or fancy to be gratified, but with an eye




202       AN AIMERICA N FPARMER IN ENGLAND.
single to quick profit; with a prejudice against "high firming,"
indeed, because it is advised by the free-traders as a remedy
for low prices. He declared no money was to be made by farming: do his best, he could not pay his rent and leave himself a
profit under the present prices. He had been holding on to his
wheat for three years in hopes of a rise, but now despaired of it,
except the protective policy was returned to.
There was a coal mine and lime-kiln within the boundary of
the farm, and a tram-road from it to the railroad about two miles
distant. A tram-road is a narrow track of wooden rails, on which
cars are moved by stationary power or horses. On extensive
farms they might be advantageously made use of. A road running through the barns and out-buildings of a farmstead, on which
straw, feed, dung, etc., could be easily moved by hand, would
cost but little, and often afford a great saving of labor.
The fences were all of hawthorn, low and close-trimmed.
The farm servants had from  $65 to $75 a year and their
board. (The very next day a man told me he paid just half
these sums.)  Day-laborers from  $2 to $2.50 a week (fair
weather) and board themselves. A boy just over fourteen years
old (under which age it is by law forbidden) told me he worked
in the coal mines for sixteen cents a day.




ENGLISH COMMON SCIOOLS.               203
CHAPTER XXX.
Visit to Two English Common Schools.
IN compliance with our desire to visit an English common
school, we were driven from the castle to a village in the vicinity, in which was a school for boys, under the guidance of the
British and Foreign Society, and one for girls under the control
of the National or State Church Society. The schoolhouse of
the former was a simple but tasteful stone building, standing a
little to one side, but not fenced off, from the principal street,
with a few large trees and a playground about it. The interior
was all in one room, except a small vestibule. It was well lighted, the walls were plastered and whitewashed, and had mottoes,
texts of Scripture, tables, charts, etc., hung upon them; there
was no ceiling, but the rafters of the roof, which was high-peaked,
were exposed; the floor was of stone. There were long desks
and benches all around against the wall, and others, the form of
which I do not remember, filling up the most of the body. The
house and furniture was much too small and scanty for the number of scholars present, and the labor of the teacher must have
been very arduous.
The boys all rose as we entered, and remained standing during our visit, a request from us that they might be seated not be



204        AN AMERICA~N FARMiER IN ENGLAND.
ing regarded.  Classes in arithmetic, geography and spelling
were examined before us. The absence of all embarrassment,
and the promptness and confidence of the scholars in replying
to our questions, was remarkable. In mental arithmetic great
proficiency was shown in complicate reductions of sterling
money. In geography their knowledge of America was limited
to the more important points of information, but so far as it went
was very accurate and ready.  With regard to Great Britain,
their information was minute. The boys were bright, readywitted and well-behaved, and surprisingly free from all excitement or embarrassment before strangers.
The schoolmaster was also parish-clerk, and his pay from the
two offices was about $500 a year.* I judge that he had intended to make teaching his business for life, and had thoroughly
prepared and accomplished himself for it. His manner to us,
and two or three incidents which it would be impossible to relate,
gave me the impression that his position in society was far from
being a pleasant, or what we should deem a proper one for a
teacher.
The " National School" for girls was a building of more highly finished architectural character, and had a dwelling for the
schoolmistress attached to it. The whole school was engaged in
sewing when we entered, the mistress, assisted by some of the
older scholars, going from one to another, giving instructions and
examining the work. It was not interrupted by our entrance,
though the girls all rose, curtseyed, and continued standing.
There were one hundred and thirty present in a room about
twelve yards by six in area. The girls were neatly, though exceedingly plainly, dressed, and were generally very pleasing in
* Advertisements for common school teachers, C" capable to instruct in reading, writing,
arithmetic and the principles of the Christian religion," appear in the Times, offering
salaries of from $150 to $300, with lodging and board.




MTIE NATIONAL SCHOOL FOR GIRLS.          205
their appearance. They seemed well instructed, and without
the least want of desirable modesty, showed much more presence
of mind, and answered our questions with more promptness and
distinctness than any school of girls I ever visited before.
Both schools are conducted on the Lancasterian plan.




206       A N AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XXXI.
Shrewsbury- Angling in Curricles- Sheep-walks-Effect of Thorough
Draining on Dry Soils- Gorse -Church Stretton- Churchyard Literature - Encounter with an enthusiastic Free-Trader.
Shrewsbury, June 7th.
WE arrived at this fine old town by rail, this morning, and
have again had much delight in ancient domestic town architecture. The houses are of the same general style as those at
Chester, but with every conceivable variation of form, and each
with something peculiar to itself, so that we cannot tire of rambling through the steep, narrow streets to study them. There are
a great many old churches, too: one remarkable for a very light,
tall, simply-tapering spire; another, the abbey church, has a great
mingling of styles, and in some parts is very rich and elegant.
Near it I noticed that some religious house, once connected with
it, had been built upon, roofed over, and converted into a brewery. The roofs are universally of flat tiles here; a few miles
north we saw nothing but slates.
On one of the bridges over the Severn, which here divides into
two small streams, between which most of the town is beautifully
situated, we saw a number of anglers with curricles, a light portable boat made of hide, stretched out like an umbrella-top by a




GORSE- UNDER-DRAIRING.                207
wicker frame. It is easily carried on one arm, and forms a usual
part of a salmon-fisher's equipment in Wales.
In the afternoon J. and I walked on to Church Stretton, thirteen miles; our road, most of the way, through a level valley,
with high, naked, bleak hills on each side. A man joined us who
had been most of his life a miller, and had lately rented a sheepwalk of sixty-three acres on one of these hill-tops, or, rather,
mountain-tops. They are to all appearance totally barren, except
of gorse, and he said he could only stock at the rate of one and a
half sheep to the acre.
Gorse (furze or wkhns) is an evergreen shrub, growing about
three feet high, rough, thorny, prickly; flourishes in the poorest,
dryest land, where, if it gets possession, it is extremely difficult
to eradicate. It is sometimes used as a hedge plant, and for that
purpose is planted thickly on high ridges. In some parts of
England fuel is made of it, and when bruised by powerful
machines made for the purpose, it forms palatable and nutricious
food for horses and cattle. Hereabouts, however, we could not
learn that it was made of any use, or regarded otherwise than as
a weed. Half the surface of the hills was overgrown with it.
A strange story has been told me of the effect of draining on
soils of this sort. A considerable estate, mainly on the tops of
such hills, having come into possession of a friend of my informant, he immediately commenced under-draining it in the most
thorough and expensive manner. The whole country thought
him crazy. "Why! the hills were too dry already — the man
was throwing away his money;" and his family interposed with
expostulation and entreaty to check what they deemed a ruinous
and disgraceful "folly."  But he patiently carried it on, and
waited the result; which was, that the increased rental in a very
short time more than paid for the whole outlay, and the actual
value of the land was trebled.




208           AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLA.ND.
Church Stretton is a little village mostly made up of inns on
the  main  street.  We chose the  Stag's  Head, a  picturesque,
many-gabled cottage, part of it very old, and, as we were told,
formerly a manor-house of the Earl of Derby, who spent one
night (ever to be remembered!) in it. It was close by a curiously-carved church, and graveyard. From among a great many
" improving" epitaphs, I select the following as worthy of more
extended influence;
I.
A NON SEQUITUR.
" Farewell, my wife
And children dear, in number seven,
Therefore prepare yourself for Heaven."
II.
"AN HONEST MAN."
" Erected by the Curate of Church Stretton."
III.
" Farewell, vain world, I have seen my last of thee;
Thy smiles I court not, frowns I fear,
My cares are past, my head lies quiet here,
My time was short in this world, my work is done,
My rest I hope is in another,
In a quiet grave I lie, near my beloved mother."
IV.
" A Friend so true,
There is but few,
And difficult to find;
A man more just,
And true to trust,
There is not left behind."
V.
" You that are young, behold and see
How quickly death has conquered me;
His fatal shaft it was so strong,
And cut me off while I was young,
But God above, lie knew for why,
That in my youth I was to die."




A MERCANTILE AGENT.                  209
The following, or something very like it, is to be found in almost every churchyard in England, often several times repeated:
VI.
"Afflictions sore
Long time I bore,
Physicians' aid was vain;
Till God did please
To give me ease,
And free me from my pain."
On the other side of the churchyard were two long rows of
cottages built closely together, the street between them only nine
feet wide.
After ordering supper, we were shown into a little room where
there was a fire and newspapers, and two men sitting. One of
them was a young, well-dressed farmer, stupid and boozy; the
other a traveling mercantile agent, very wide awake. The latter
almost immediately opened conversation.
"Did you notice the white nag in the stables, gents?"
" No."
" Ah, you should. It's not every day you'll see such a horse.
It would be really worth your while, if I may be permitted to
advise, to step out and see him. Why! if you'll believe me, sir,
we gave the stage-coach twenty minutes start and beat her two
and a half in eight, besides stopping-how many times?-a go
of gin first and-two of brandy afterwards, wasn't it Brom? and
now there he is-eating his oats just like a child!"
We showed no disposition to see this phenomenon, but putting
our knapsacks on the table, had commenced reading the papers,
when he again addressed us, suddenly exclaiming,
"Hem-wool's heavy!"
"What, sir?"
"Hops scarce?"
14




210       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
"What?"
"Sheffil line?"!"  (Stare of perplexity.)
"Tea?" glancing at our packs.
"Tea! oh no!"
" Oh, I thought it might be tea you were    Brummagem
way?"
"We are-"
"Oh! ah! Good market at Le'm'ster?"
"We are from New York-traveling merely to see the country; our packs have —"
"From New York? why, that's in America."
" Yes, sir; we are Americans."
" What! Americans, are you?  Hallo! why, this is interesting. Brom! I say, Brom!-look! do you see? from America;
you see? furriners! If you will permit me, sir-your very good
health, gentlemen. Brom! (damn it, man,) your health — their
health.... Now look here! you'll allow me, sir (and he
caught my leg); you brought this, I presume, from New York?"
" Yes."
"]Made there?"
"Probably."
"And the wool?"
"Very likely from these hills."
"Exactly, sir; exactly!  You see now, Brom —what was I
telling you?-that's FREE TRADE, Brom. Most happy to meet
you, sir; (intelligent persons, Brom! first-class furriners;) you
are welcome here, sir; and, gentlemen-(your good health, sir)
-and no one to molest or make you afraid-r(won't you try the
gin? I can recommend it)-wandering up and down, seeking
what you may, eh?-see! Yes, sir, the sea is the highway of
nations-else what is it mentioned in Scripture for?'the great




AN ENTHUSIASTIC FREE-TRADER.             211
sea —to bring nations together —with ships thereon, stretching
from Tiberia to Siberias, and from Jericher to,' eh?-hem —eh?
-somewhere!"
"Your tea is ready, gentlemen," said the waiter; and we
hastily took leave.




212       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XXXII.
Country Carrier's Cart-Independent Breakfast-Beauty- Old InnJack up the Chimney — Bacon and Bread - Beer and Rum - Ludlow -
An Apostolic Church- The Poor-House - Case of a Broken Heart - Refreshment.
WE rose the next morning at daybreak, and walked some
miles before we saw any body else awake. At the first
public house we found open, we stopped to breakfast. In front
of it was a carrier's cart —a large, heavy, hooped, canvas-topped
cart, drawn by one horse. As any body who reads Dickens
knows, this kind of rural package-express is a common thing on
the English roads, the carrier taking orders of country people for
what they need from the towns, and bringing them any parcels
they send for; taking live freight also when he is not otherwise
filled up: David Copperfield, for instance. The representative
of "Mr. Barkis" and "honest John Peerybingle" was in the
kitchen of the public house, and very glad to see us, pressing us
politely to drink from his glass, and recommending the ale as the
best on the road.
The house, however, was of a very humble character; the
"good woman" was gone to market, and the landlord, though
very amiable and desirous to please, was very stupid and illprovided. He could not even find us an egg, every thing having




RUINS OF A CASTLE.                  213
been swept off to market. There was some good bread, however,
which the carrier had just brought, and milk. We found a saucepan, cleaned it, and scalded the milk, and, stirring in the bread
with pepper and salt, soon made a comfortable hot breakfast,
greatly to the admiration of our host and the carrier.
Fine English weather to-day: gleams of warm, thick sunshine
alternating with slight showers of rain. The country beautiful;
the road running through a rich, well-watered vale, with the same
high, steep hills as yesterday, but now regularly planted with
wood to the summits. Before us they fall back, one over another,
till they become blue under the thick mists that curl about the
tops of the most distant, and then, again, blush red before the sun,
when the breeze lifts this veil.
Seeing a singular ruin a little distance from the road, we went
to visit it. It had been a castle, with a church or large Gothic
chapel attached. Different parts of it, having received more
modern, yet ruinously decayed, timber and noggin additions, were
occupied as sheep-stables, granary, and workshop. A moat remained about it, enclosing also a court-yard; and on the opposite
side of this from the main structure, was a high, four-gabled timber-house, with a gateway through it, entered across the moat by
a bridge, formerly a draw-bridge, and with some remains of a
portcullis. The wood-work of the gables, and much of the timber, the heavy brackets and the doorways, were covered with
quaint carvings. An interesting history it must have had, yet all
we could learn of it was, that it was " farmer's barn."
At noon we stopped at a superannuated old stage-coaching
house, going at once to the kitchen, which was a large room with
heavy beams in the ceiling, from which depended flitches of
bacon; a stone floor, a number of oak benches and tables, rows
of pewter mugs hanging about the walls, and a great fireplace
and chimney. A stout, driving landlady received our orders; a




214       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
piece of meat was set to roasting before the fire on the old turnspit, and we were left alone to dry ourselves. Soon we noticed
that one end of the spit with the meat was being raised, and we
attempted in vain to readjust it. It continued to rise, and I tried
to disconnect the chain by which it was turned, and which was
now drawing it up the chimney; I could not, and still it rose. I
clung to it, and hallooed for assistance. In rushed the landlady,
three maids, and a man-servant, and I yielded the spit to them; but
the power was too strong-their united weight could not long detain it; up it rose-rose-rose, till the prettiest maid stood first on
tiptoe, and then began to scream; then the landlady, disengaging
the meat from it, and dropping it hastily on a plate, fell back exhausted on one of the oak benches and laughed-oh! ha, ha! oh!
ha, ha! ha, ha! ho, ho! ha, ha, ha!-how the woman did laugh!
As soon as she recovered, she sent the man and the maids up to
the machinery, being too much out of breath to go herself; and
in a few minutes the chain, which had fouled on the rusty crank
at the chimney top, was unwound and the spit lowered to its
place, the joint put on and set to turning again, all right.
While we were eating our dinner, five young men — laborers
-came in for theirs; most of them ate nothing but bread and
cheese, but some had thin slices of bacon cut from the flitch
nearest the fire, which they themselves toasted with a fork and
ate with bread which they had brought in their pockets, as soon
as it was warmed through. All drank two pints of beer, and,
after dining, smoked, except one, who took hot rum-and-water.
It appeared that while three of them preferred to spend their
money for beer rather than bacon, none of them chose bacon at
the expense of beer. The man who took rum drank two glasses
of it, and the others two or more pints of beer; but no one who
took beer took any rum at all, nor did he who took rum take any
beer. A similar observation I have frequently made. The




LUDLO W.                     215
habit of beer-drinking seems to weaken the taste for more alcoholic stimulants.
We remained about the inn, looking at some pretty model cottages erected by Lord Clive, until C., who had made a quick
walk of nearly thirty miles to overtake us, arrived, and then
walked into Ludlow.
Ludlow is a pleasant town, beautifully planted in the bight of
a broad, shallow, musical stream, amongst high, bluffy hills. It
has a ruined castle, celebrated in Royal history, parts of which,
half hidden by tall old trees among which it stands, and adorned
with ivy, are very picturesque. There are fine avenues and public walks about it, and just over the river, which is crossed by
two bridges, is a very large common, extending to the top of
high and steep hills, which is used as a public pleasure-ground.
In the middle of the town is a venerable old church, with richly
painted windows and many curious monuments and effigies of
Crusaders and learned doctors sleeping with their wives. In it
I also first saw a beadle in the flesh, and very funny it was, in
cocked hat, red nose and laced coat. There are many curious
old houses, particularly one of the inns, (" The Feathers;") and
over the Ludford bridge there is a pretty little rural church and
a number of pretty cottages, both ancient and modern, the modern
being built in the fashion of the timber houses that I described
in Cheshire.
Our chess-playing friend on the ship had given us a note to a
relative residing here, and having left it with our card at his
house, he very soon called upon us, and was extremely kind in
his attentions and offers of service. C. had asked with regard to
the religious service which would be held in the town the coming day; after replying to his inquiries, he remarked that he
belonged to a congregation of Christian brethren, whose worship




216       AN' AMiERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
he would be gratified if it would be agreeable for us to attend.
They had no distinct organization, but simply met as a company
of believers, to worship as they were prompted in the spirit.
They liked to have any one join with them, who loved Jesus
Christ, whatever his theoretical opinion might be.
The next morning I breakfasted with this gentleman, and afterwards attended the meeting of the brotherhood. It was held in
a plain "upper room," apparently designed for a school-room,
which was well filled with people, representing every class, except the aristocratic, in the community, females being slightly
preponderant. The services were extremely simple-much like
those of a Presbyterian prayer-meeting, with the addition of a
rather lengthy exhortation from one who, I was told, was, like
myself, a stranger to the most of those present, and concluded
with the administration of the communion.
Nothing could be greater than the contrast of the place and its
furniture, and the style of the exercises, with what I had seen
and heard at the cathedral the previous Sunday; yet I could not
but notice the marked resemblance between the simple solemnity
of manner and sincere unendeavoring tone of the gentleman who
conducted the ceremony of the communion, and that of his robed
and titled brother who performed the same duty within those
aweing walls.
In the afternoon I went with one of "the brethren" to the
Union poor-house, which is a little out of the town. The inmates,
so far as I saw them, were nearly all aged persons, cripples, or
apparently half-witted, and it all appeared very much like a hospital. The chilling neatness, bareness, order and precision, reminded me of the berth-deck of a man-of-war. Among the sick
was a young woman who had now for four days refused to take
food or to speak; when broth was set before her in our presence,
she merely moaned and shook her head, closed her eyes and sank




THE TNDEPENDENT MIN~1IS TER.          217
back upon her bed. Her disease was a broken heart. A week
ago her cottage was destroyed by fire, and her child (illegitimate)
burned to death in it.
At sunset we found much such a company strolling on the
common opposite the town as that we saw promenading the walls
at Chester last Sunday night. The shaded walks about the
castle were also thick with happy-looking, grateful-looking, orderly men and women, boys and girls, superabundantly attended by
healthy, sturdily-tottering babies.
In the evening C. called on the Independent clergyman. He
spoke highly of the spiritual character of the brethren, but he
evidently regarded them as rather wild and untractable abstractionists. They had drawn away several of the leading members
of his flock, and, in his observations upon them, he possibly
showed a little soreness on this account. He continued on terms
of friendly intercourse, however, with them.




218       AN AMERICAN FARMER INV ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
Physical Education-A Rustic Village-Farm-House Kitchen-An Orchard- Stables- Leominster- A Trout Brook- Fruit Culture.
Monday, June 10th.
AFTER another breakfast with the Independent minister, (the
term clergyman is never applied in England except to those
of the established church,) he walked with us for six miles out
of town upon our road. Three little boys and girls, the youngest
six years old, also accompanied us. They were romping and
rambling about all the while, and their morning's walk must have
been as much as fifteen miles; but they thought nothing of it,
and, when we parted, were apparently as fresh as when they
started, and were very loth to return.
After looking at several objects of interest near the road, we
were taken by a narrow, crooked lane to a small hamlet of picturesque old cottages, in one of which a farmer lived who was a
parishioner of our guide's.  It was a pretty, many-gabled,
thatched-roofed timber-house, almost completely covered with
vines and creepers. We were sorry to find the farmer not at
home; his wife, an elderly, simple-minded dame, received us
joyfully, however. In entering the house, as we have noticed
to be usual in old buildings, whatever their purpose, we found




AN ORC HARD.                     219
that the stone floor of the narrow hall was a step below the street
and general surface of the ground outside. The kitchen, to
which we were at once conducted, was a large square room,
lighted by a single broad window, and having a brilliant display
of polished metal utensils upon and about a great chimney, all as
neat and nice as a parlor. "The huge oak table's massy frame
bestrode the kitchen floor;" a linen cloth was spread upon it,
and coarse but excellent wheat bread, butter and cheese, brought
from the pantry, and cider and perry from the cellar. The cider
was "hard" enough; the perry, (fermented juice of pears,) a
beautiful, bright, golden liquid, tasted much like weak vinegar
and water. We had entered the district of cider and apple-trees,
for these liquors were home-made, and the first extensive orchard
that we have seen, adjoined the rear of the house: during the
rest of our day's walk the road was frequently lined with them
for long distances.
The trees, in a considerable part of this orchard, were of every
age, and stood very irregularly at various distances from each other. It appeared as if when an old tree was blown down, or became worthless from age and decay, and an unshaded space was
thus left, or likely to be, two young trees were planted at a little
distance on each side of it, and thus perhaps the orchard had
been renovated and continued on the same ground for several
generations. Two hundred years ago it was considered that
"the best way to plant an orchard is to set some kernels of the
best and soundest apples and pears, a finger deep, and at a foot
distance, and to leave the likeliest plants only in the natural
place, removing the others only as time and occasion shall require." The orchards of the Rhine, at the present day, in which
apple, pear, cherry and nut-trees are intermingled, seem to
have been planted with as little regard to regularity of distance.
The grafts were commonly inserted at from six to eight feet from




220       AN AM.lERICAN FARMER IN ENrGLAN1D.
the ground, and the limbs trimmed so as to allow free passage to
cattle beneath them. The land was in an old weedy sward, and
was pastured by horses and cows. It had not been in any way
drained, and was in some parts boggy. In these, willows, and
sallows or osiers, (basket willows,) were growing. The trees
all appeared to be unhealthy, mossy and stunted. A few peartrees grew here and there, indiscriminately, among the apples.
The cider-mill was just like the old fashioned ones, with a stone
wheel, common in New England.
After seeing the orchard in such condition, I was surprised to
find excellent, neat and well-ordered stables. The horse-stalls
were large, with iron racks and mangers, and a grating and drain
to carry off the liquid. The manure in the yard was piled up in
a large, oblong heap, covered with earth, to prevent evaporation,
with a space of clean pavement, wide enough for a cart to pass
all around it. The liquid overflow of the yard was conducted
off by a drain, so as to flow over the orchard pasture.
We reached Leominster at noon, after a few miles further of
walking through a pleasant country, remarkable for its pretty
old cottages. At Leominster, (pronounced Leminster,) there are
also a more than usually quaint sort of houses, grotesquely carved; and on the market-house, an odd old building, there are
some singular inscriptions. I recollect only one, which runs in
this way: "As columnes do pprope up" a house, so do a gentry
support a state.
In the afternoon we walked for some distance on the banks of
a trout brook, in which a good many ladies and gentlemen were
angling, with but poor success. The trout were small, and if I
recollect rightly, rather lighter colored than ours, and not so
prettily mottled. Some of the anglers called the stream "the
Arrow," and some "the Harrow."




FRUIT CULTURE.                    221
The field-bean is a common crop here; it is now in blossom,
and a peculiarly sweet scent from it, every now and then, comes
in a full, delicious flood over the hedges.
The country over which we walked in the afternoon, between
Leominster and Hereford, was in some parts extremely beautiful: considerable hills, always, when too steep or rocky or sterile
for easy cultivation, covered with plantations of trees; the lesser
hills and low lands shaded by frequent orchards. These were
generally of apples, sometimes with pears intermixed — somewhat rarely entirely of pears. Many of them appeared much
like the one I have described, and occasionally there was a regularly planted one of fine, thrifty trees. In the poorer orchards,
where the trees were of all ages, they frequently were planted
not more than fifteen feet apart, and when so, as far as I observed, were invariably small in size and unhealthy. In the better
ones, the trees stood oftenest thirty feet apart one way, and
twenty another; rarely at much greater distance than this, but
sometimes as much as forty.




222       AN AMERICAN FARMER LV ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
English Orchard Districts- The Most Favorable Soils and Climate -Lime
- Practical Deduction- Diseases - Prevention and Remedies- Suggestions.
THERE are but few orchards in England, except in certain
districts, and in these they abound, and are often very extensive. The inquiry naturally arises, What has given those
districts their distinction in this respect? Have they any natural
advantages which makes orcharding more profitable in them
than in other parts of the country? In reply, I learn, that the
orchard districts are all distinguished for a comparatively mild
climate. They are nearly all in the south and south-western
counties, while in the northern and eastern counties I know of
none. Hereford is a somewhat hilly county, and, as I have remarked, where the hills are too steep for easy cultivation, it is
usual to plant orchards; but the south side of such hills is preferred to the north, and, even here, a crop is sometimes entirely lost by a late and severe spring frost. A south-east slope
is preferred, the south-east winds being the driest. I suspect
another reason why it is found better is, that the south-west winds,
coming off the ocean, are the stronger. My own observation has
led me to think that the apple-tree is much affected by an ex



MOST FA VORABLE SOILS AND CELIMIATE.    223
posure to severe winds. Few trees thrive well upon the seashore, and this is usually laid to the account of salt spray or "salt
in the air." It will be found, however, that trees grown inland
upon very exposed sites, have the same peculiarities with those
in the vicinity of the sea; that is, they are slow of growth and
"scrubby."
Another important circumstance to be noticed, as distinguishing the apple districts, is in the nature of their soils. These are
found, however varying otherwise, invariably to have a large
proportion of lime, and generally of potash, in their chemical
composition. With reference to this I quote the observations of
Mr. Frederick Falkner.*
" Great light has been lately thrown upon the adaptation of soils to particular plants, and it is now easy to account for the predilection, so to
speak, of the apple-tree for soils that abound in clays and marls. All deciduous trees require a considerable proportion of potash for the elaboration
of their juices in the leaves, and are prosperous, or otherwise, in proportion
to the plentiful or scanty supply of that substance in the soil. Liebig has
shown, that the acids generated in plants are always in union with alkaline
or earthy bases, and cannot be produced without their presence... Now
the apple-tree, during its development, produces a great quantity of acid;
and therefore, in a corresponding degree, requires alkaline, and, probably,
earthy bases also, as an indispensable condition to the existence of the
fruit."
Again, the same writer:
"It cannot be denied that ammonia, and also the humus of decaying
dung, must have some influence on the growth of the tree in such soils, and
also of the development of the fruit; but it is most certain, at the same
time, that these alone would be perfectly inefficient for the production of
the fruit without the cooiperation of (the alkaline bases.) The size, and
perhaps the flavor of the fruit, may be somewhat affected by the organic
* Journal of the Royal Agricultural Society, vol. iv, p. 381.




224;AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAN~D.
part of the manure, but its very existence depends upon the presence in the
soil of a sufficient quantity of those inorganic or mineral substances which
are indispensable to the formation of acids."
But it is also found by analysis that lime enters into the composition of the wood of the apple-tree in very large proportions.
By the analysis of Fresenius, the ash of the wood of the apple
contains 45.19 per cent. of lime, and 13.67 per cent. of potash.
By the analysis of Dr. Emmons, of Albany, N. Y., the ash of
the sap-wood of the apple contains of lime 18.63 per cent., and
17.50 per cent. of phosphate of lime.
But it is not wherever soils of the sort I have described (calcareous sandstones and marly clays) abound in a district, that
you find that the farmers have discovered that it is to their interest to have orchards; nor are they common in all the milder
latitudes of England; but I believe that wherever you find a
favorable climate, conjoined with a strongly calcareous and moderately aluminous soil of a sufficient depth, there you will find
that for centuries the apple-tree has been extensively cultivated.
Evelyn speaks, 1676, of the apples of Herefordshire, and says
there were then 50,000 hogsheads of cider produced in that
county yearly. The ancient capital of modern Somersetshire,
one of the present "Cider Counties," was known by the Romans
as Avallonia, (the town of the apple orchards.) It would not be
unlikely that the universal ceremony in Devonshire, of "shooting
at the apple-tree," (hereafter described,) originated in some
heathen rite of its ancient orchardists.
To obtain choice dessert fruit, the apple in England is everywhere trained on walls, and in the colder parts it is usual to
screen a standard orchard on the north by a plantation of firs.
There is no part of the United States where the natural summer
is too short for most varieties of the apple to perfect their fruit.
In Maine, and the north of New Hampshire and Vermont, the




MOST FA VORABLE SOILS AND CLIMATE.           225
assortment of varieties is rather more limited than elsewhere, I
believe; but I have eaten a better apple from an orchard at Burlington, Vermont, than was ever grown even in the south of England. We may congratulate ourselves then, that all that we
need to raise the best apples in the world, anywhere in the
northern United States, is fortunately to be procured much more
cheaply than a long summer would be, if that were wanting.
The other thing needful, judging from the experience of England
for a length of time past record, in addition to the usual requisites
for the cultivation of ordinary farm crops, is abundance of lime.
This is experience; and science confirms it with two very satisfactory reasons: first, that apple-tree wood is made up in a large
part of lime, which must be taken from the soil; and, second,
that before the apple-tree can turn other materials which it may
collect from the soil and atmosphere into fruit, it must be furnished with a considerable amount of some sort of alkali, which requisite may be supplied by lime.
There is but little else that we can learn from the English orchardists, except what to avoid of their practices. The cider
orchards, in general, are in every way miserably managed, and
the greater number of those that I saw in Herefordshire were, in
almost every respect, worse than the worst I ever saw in New
England. The apple in England is more subject to disease; and
I should judge, from what was told me, that in a course of years
it suffered more from the attacks of insects and worms than in
America. The most deplorable disease is canker. This malady
is attributed sometimes to a "cold, sour" soil, sometimes to the
want of some ingrefis in the soil that are necessary to enable
the tree to carry on its healthy functions, sometimes to the general barrenness of the soil, and sometimes to the "wearing out of
varieties." The precaution and remedies used by gardeners
(rarely by orchardists): for it, are generally those that would
15




226       AN AMERICAN FARAMER IN ENGLAND.
secure or restore a vigorous growth to a tree. The first of these
is deepening and drying the soil, or deep draining and trenching.
The strongest and most fruitful orchards, it is well known, are
those which have been planted upon old hop-grounds, where the
soil has been deeply tilled and manured for a series of years
with substances that contain a considerable amount of phosphorus,
such as woolen rags and bones. The roots of the hop also descend far below the deepest tillage that can be given it; (in a
calcareous gravelly subsoil they have been traced ten feet from
the surface;) a kind of subsoiling is thus prepared for the apple
by the decay of the hop roots. In some parts it is the custom to
introduce the hop culture upon the planting of a young orchard,
the hops occupying the intervals until the branches of the trees
interfere with them. Nothing is more likely than this to insure
a rapid and healthy growth of the trees.
I recommend to those who intend planting an orchard, to have
the ground for it in a state of even, deep, fine tilth beforehand,
and to plant in the intervals between apple or pear-trees, some
crop which, like hops, will be likely to get for itself good feeding
and culture for several years.
An impenetrable bottom of stone, at not more than three feet
from the surface, is frequently made use of by gardeners, as a
precaution against canker. I have been told that in the ancient
orchards attached to monasteries, such a flagging of brick or
stone is often found under the whole area of the orchard. This
would seem at first sight to be directly opposed to the other precaution, of thorough-draining and deepening the surface soil; but
it may be considered that the injury which stagnant water would
effect is in a degree counteracted when the roots do not descend
below the influence of the atmosphere and the heat of the sun.
It is not unlikely that these influences would extend to a depth
of three feet from the surface, in a soil that had been so thorough



SUGGESTIONS.                      227
ly trenched and lightened up as it necessarily must be to allow
of a paving to be made under it. The paving does not probably
much retard the natural descent of water from the surface, nor
does it interfere with its capillary ascent; the trenching makes
the descent of superabundant water from the surface more rapid,
while the increased porosity of the trenched soil gives it increased
power of absorption, both from the subsoil and the atmosphere,
as well as of retention of a healthy supply of moisture. The
paving also prevents the roots from descending below where this
most favorable condition of the soil has been made to exist. The
effect would doubtless be greatly better if thorough-draining were
given in addition; but so far as it goes, the under-paving and
trenching is calculated to effect the same purpose as deep drainage: to secure a healthy supply of heat, light and moisture to all
the roots.
It is evident that the precautions and remedies which have
been found of service against canker, whether operations upon
the roots or the foliage, are all such as are calculated to establish
or replace the tree in circumstances favorable to its general
thriving, healthy condition.
This suggests the idea that canker may be the result of a general constitutional debility of the tree, not occasioned by any one
cause or set of causes, but resultant from all and any circumstances unfavorable to the healthy growth of a tree; and it is a
question whether the same may not be thought of the peculiar
diseases of other trees, the peach, the pear, the plum, the sycamore, and perhaps even of the rot of the potato.




228       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XXXV.
Decay of Varieties -Two Theories: Knight's, Downing's -English Theory and Practice —Practical Deductions —Causes of Decay —Remedies
- Hints to Orchardists — Special Manures - Pruning — Thorough Drainage- A Satirical Sketch- Shooting the Apple Tree.
IT is known that many varieties of apples, which fifty years
ago were held in high esteem as healthy, hardy sorts, bearing
abundantly very superior fruit, have now but a very poor reputation, and varieties which a hundred years ago were very highly
valued and extensively cultivated, are now extinct. It is believed, too, that the most celebrated old varieties that are yet
cultivated, are much more subject to canker than others; or,
in other words, that trees of these varieties are more easily affected by unfavorable circumstances, or have a more delicate constitution.
To account for this, there are two theories held by different
scientific horticulturists.  The first-which originated with the
late Mr. Knight, a distinguished vegetable physiologist of England, who devoted much attention to the subject, and made a long
series of experiments upon it-may be stated as follows:
Each seedling tree has a natural limit to its life, and within
that will have a period of vigor, succeeded by a natural and inevitable decline, corresponding to the gradually incrasing feeble



VARIO US TFEORIES.                      229
ness which attends the latter part of the natural life of a man.
And all trees also which have been propagated from such a seedling by means of buds or grafts, or, in other words, all trees of
the same variety, are to be considered as merely extensions of
that seedling, and will have a cotemporary vigor and decline
and decease with it. The period of vigor or decline may be
much extended by circumstances favorable to the general health
of any particular tree, and by unfavorable influences it may be
shortened: but however well situated, sooner or later it will manifest feebleness by the change in the quality of its fruit, the small
quantity it is able to bear, by the decay of branches, and especially by its liability to be attacked by disease, such as the' canker,
which rapidly destroy its remaining vitality. These diseases
may be guarded against, and may often be cured; but the longer
the period since the origin of the variety from a seed, the greater
the liability and the more difficult the cure.*
This theory is entirely discredited by other distinguished botanists and horticulturists, among whom are Dr. Lindley in England, Decandolle on the Continent, and Mr. Downing and H. W.
Beecher in America.
These consider that there is no such similarity between the
life of a tree and the life of an animal, and that a bud and a seed
contain equally the germ of new life; that they are, in fact, the
same thing, except that they are prepared to be developed under
different circumstances. That each bud, twig, and branch, has a
life of its own, and the trunk is but an association of roots, or of
connections between each bud and its roots. It may be separated
* Professor Turner, of Illinois College, advocates the view that every time a seedling
tree is divided, whether in root or top, its natural longevity and proportionate vital force
are proportionally divided, abstracted and shortened; and believes that some of the
worst forms of hereditary, and also of annual diseases, flow from a succession of such
mutilations through a series of generations, or are produced by an effort of nature to
resist and repair this interference with her natural process.




230        AN AMERICAN FARMER 1N ENGLAND.
from this trunk as a seed is, and will continue to live if ingrafted
upon another trunk, where it will connect itself again in the
ground and grow, and through it other independent lives will be
produced and sustained. Or it may be removed from its parent
and placed upon the ground, where it will make roots and extend
and reproduce again as independently, in all respects, as a seed.
It is held that the death of trees does not arise from any natural
period being assigned to their existence, but that the tissues of a
tree, as they grow old, become dry and hard; no longer transmit
sap, lose their vitality, and gradually decay; yet the process of
growth may continually be renewed exteriorly to this death, so
that large cavities will often exist in the interior of trees. As,
however, the peculiar natural food of the tree, within the limits
to which it can extend its roots, becomes exhausted, or, as other
unhealthy circumstances affect it, its vital power and its re-vitalizing power will be diminished, and finally may become extinct.
If, however, a bud or germ of a new branch can be taken from
the tree before its decay, or from any part of it that yet retains
its vigor and health, and be transplanted by means of cuttings
in the earth, or inoculations or grafts upon another healthy stock
of the same species, it will have all the vital energy, and, in
every respect, all the natural character, of a seedling.
In explanation of the general deterioration of certain favorite
old varieties, according to the theory of Downing and Lindley,
their state should be compared (taking care not to run the
analogy too far into the ground) to what is popularly understood
as a scrofulous condition of human beings, rather than to the decrepitude of old age. From various causes — want of proper
food, unfavorable climate, propagation upon unhealthy stocks,
high feeding, and any unnatural stimulus producing imperfect
succulent growth, and from constant repropagation from trees
that have in a greater or less degree so suffered-the trees of




SCROFULO US TREES.                   231
the variety have very generally lost their natural, strong, active,
resisting, and recuperative vital energy, and have a general tendency to disease, which will be developed in different forms
according to circumstances. A wound upon a scrofulous subject
is more difficult to heal; exertion produces more fatigue, and rest
brings less return of strength. Food, which in its natural state
would be most nourishing and healthful, it can no longer digest,
and it does it more harm than good; exposure to cold, to malaria,
or contagion, is more dangerous, and if it escapes all acute disease, it gradually grows more and more feeble, until finally it has
" died of a decline."
Sterility attends the decrepitude of age, but not the scrofulous
debility in man, neither does it the degeneracy of the old trees.
But the scrofulous habit is hereditary in man; so it is believed
to be in the old varieties. If, however, the scrofulous inheritance
is not very virulent, by a judicious course of regimen it may be
gradually overcome, and a strong vigorous constitution once more
reestablished. So it is argued, and facts are cited that seem to
sustain the position, may the old varieties be restored to their
pristine excellence, by care to select scions from the most healthy
trees, and from the most vigorous parts of them, and to propagate
these under the most favorable circumstances for their healthy
growth.
The predisposition to disease in these ill-treated trees may
result in a contagious malady, and this may spread beyond them
and attack trees of ordinarily good constitution, and in the most
salubrious situations, though, of course, the liability of these to
take the malady, and their recuperative power under its attack,
will be proportionate to their strength and soundness. The disease known as the yellows, in peach-trees, seems to be of this
nature.
There are many facts unfavorable to both these theories, and




232       AN.AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
many phenomena which neither of them, in my opinion, satisfactorily explain. The popular judgment in England seemed to
have accepted Knight's hypothesis. But while every body was
mourning over the degeneracy of old favorites, the utter neglect
or miserable mismanagement of their orchards seemed to me to
bear strong testimony to the correctness of the contrary theory.
The practical deduction, it may be remarked, from either view,
does not greatly differ. By judicious management, the health,
vigor, and profit of a fruit-tree, which would otherwise, after a
certain time, pine away and die, may be greatly extended, if not
made permanent; and trees which are already failing from decrepitude or disease, may be restored. On the other hand, if
trees are planted in unhealthy positions, insufficiently supplied
with those materials that are necessary to the formation of strong,
compact wood; if they are cruelly mutilated, crowded too close
together, etc., they will not only be feeble and unproductive, but
will be particularly liable to the attacks of vermin, disease, and
parasites, and, in their weak condition, will soon yield their life
to these enemies. Moreover, the insects which are bred in them
will extend their ravages to surrounding trees, the seeds from
their parasites will be scattered over the neighborhood, and the
disease which is generated in them may be indefinitely extended
among their species.
The most common causes of disease, decay, and decline of a
fruit-tree, which it is in the power of the orchardist, in a great
degree, to control, are these: the exhaustion from the soil of those
materials which are its necessary food; the attacks of vermin,
and the growth of moss or parasites; the loss of large limbs or
other severe wounds; too great exposure of the trunks to the
sun; too rapid and succulent growth from the stimulus of heat or
exciting manures; and an impervious subsoil, which will allow




SPECIAL MANURES.                     233
water frequently to stagnate about its roots, producing what is
commonly called by farmers " a cold, sour soil."
Some of my readers, who have not yet studied the subject,
may be glad to have me concisely indicate the most approved
means of avoiding or counteracting these dangers.
Manures should be applied to orchards frequently and in moderate quantities, rather than in heavy supplies at distant intervals;
and, to avoid unhealthy stimulation, they should be well decomposed. The best ordinary manure in the United States has been
found to be a mixture of dung with an equal quantity of peat or
black swamp-earth, chip-dirt, or rotten wood or leaves; and it is
better that this compost should be mixed some time (the longer
the better) before it is applied.
But, in addition, I have shown from the English experience
that the apple-tree requires a more than ordinary supply of lime,
(say a: peck of air-slaked stone or shell lime to each tree, every
year.) In the same way the pear is known to require especially
potash, iron, and phosphorus.
Iron is found in sufficient quantity in most clay soils; where
needed, it may be supplied by scattering bog-ore (found generally
underlying swamps in America), or iron filings, or the sweepings
and scoriae from forges. One pound of crude potash dissolved in
water and poured over the compost manure, or half a bushel of
wood ashes, to a tree, will be a good yearly allowance of potash;
and half a peck of bones to a tree will supply the phosphorus.
For the plum and the quince, salt is found particularly useful,
and ashes for the peach. But let it not be forgotten that the
apple cannot live on lime alone, nor the peach on potash, only
that it is a special supply of these that they more particularly
require.*
* Copperas (sulphate of iron) seems to act as a tonic upon trees, If applied to feeble,
pale-leaved shrubs and trees, it will often wonderfully invigorate them. It may be dis



234        AN AMERICAiN lARMER IN ElNGLANlD.
The Hereford orchards suffer much more from moss, parasites,
and insects, and less pains are taken to guard against them or to
destroy them than is usual in New England.  There is a fine
moss that will not easily be detected, that often collects upon the
branches, and, diverting the juices of the tree to its own nourishment, eventually, if not removed, destroys the bark; and limbs
are seen frequently thus denuded of their natural defense, and the
wood consequently decaying. This is doubtless a common cause
of organic disease. The ordinary preventive and remedy for
every thing of this sort is to wash the trunk and principal limbs
of the tree every year with a weak lye-in which it is a good
plan to put a little sulphur-all insects having a particular repugnance to it.*  If there is much dead, scaly bark, it should be first
rubbed or scraped off.
Trees should be allowed to branch low and naturally. The
"trimming up" and unnatural exposure to the sun of the trunk
of the pear-tree is known to particularly predispose it to a most
fatal malady. Where trees are properly managed while young,
it will never be necessary to prune their limbs in our climate;
and there can scarcely ever be a case where the cutting off a limb
larger than a man's arm will not be likely to do more harm than
good. Wherever it is done, or wherever a large branch has been
blown off, the stump should be squared off neatly, and a salve of
clay and cow-dung spread over it and secured upon it by a cap
of canvas or sheet-lead. Smaller stumps should be covered with
paint, or with a coating of shellac dissolved in alcohol.
Too rapid and succulent growth, making imperfectly formed
wood, through which the future processes of the growth of the
tree or the fruit formation will be inefficiently performed, is occasolved in water. A mild solution of sulphate or muriate of ammonia has a similar effect,
but must be used with care.
* 1 lb. of potash, or 1 quart soft, soap, and 4 oz. sulphur, to I gallon of water.




UNDER-DRAINING ORCHARDS.                     235
sioned either by too stimulating food in the soil, or by a forcing
heat in the climate, which excites a growth unnatural to the
original habit of the tree.  There are also probably other yet
unexplained causes for it. The preventive must be determined
by the cause. The immediate remedy is shortening-in with a
knife one-quarter or one-half of the growth of each year. This
is absolutely necessary to the successful cultivation of the peach
in many situations in the United States, and, as I have shown,
is sometimes used as a remedy for canker in the apple-tree in
England.*
Too retentive a subsoil, or a cold, sour, malarious bed for the
roots of an orchard, is only to be remedied by under-draining.
Mr. Thompson, of the London Horticultural Society, gives a
striking instance of the profit which may attend this operation.
Having detailed several experiments, he remarks, that " want
of drainage deprives the roots of proper nourishment, subjects
them to a chilling temperature, and forces them to absorb a vitiated fluid." He then describes an orchard planted, in 1828, upon
a retentive marly clay. He says, " the trees grew tolerably well
for some time; but after seven years they began to exhibit symptoms of ill thriving, and were every year getting worse. I saw
them in 1840, and instead of increasing in size they seemed to
be decreasing." The trees grew worse, and the following year
several died. It was then determined to drain the land: 3000
feet of draining-tile were laid, 3 feet deep, in parallel lines, 48
feet apart. In the spring of 1843, and in the autumn of the same
year, 3000 feet of drain pipes, 14 inch bore, were laid at 30
inches deep, so that the drains were then only 24 feet apart; the
* The principal enemy of the peach-tree is the borer, a worm which works under the
bark, near the surface of the ground. Its presence may be known by the exudation of
gum. Trees should be examined for it every spring and fall; and it may be easily
pricked out and killed with a sharp-pointed knife




236       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
ground at the same time was dug over eight inches deep, and the
trees pruned. The following year the proprietor writes: "I
never housed any thing like 50 bushels before; now there are at
least 75 bushels, while my summer fruit was at least double the
usual quantity."  Upon this, Mr. Thompson remarks: —" The
lopping-in of the trees and digging the ground, as above described, were doubtless advantageous proceedings; but the draihing
of the ground was unquestionably the main cause of the extraordinary change in the condition of the trees; for stunted specimens,
that previous to the draining were covered with moss, had made
no shoots for years, and were in such a state of decrepitude that
there was nothing to cut away but dead wood; these had produced vigorous shoots when I saw them in 1847, and have continued to do so up to the present time. Such vigor cannot be
attributed to the cutting-in, for in these cases it was not practiced;
nor to the digging of the ground, for although this was done
before draining was thought of, yet the trees went backwards;
the decay of their branches increased under all circumstances till
1843, when recourse was had to draining, and since then they
have continued to do well, producing vigorous shoots —shoots
upwards of three feet in length; and in the present season the
fruit was abundant, large, and highly colored."
A case was mentioned before the Staten Island Farmers' Club,
in 1850, of an under-drain having been run near two greengage
plum-trees, which had previously been for many years entirely
barren; the year after, without any other operation upon them,
they bore bushels of fruit.
The following satirical sketch of the management of the Devonshire orchards, contains an amusing account of the ceremony
of "shooting at the at the apple-tree," before alluded to.*
* From the London Gardeners' Chronicle.




A DEVONSHIRE CIDER F.R-OLIC.                   237
"The trees are planted, to a large extent, apparently without considering
what sort of soil or situation is best, and without making any previous
preparation; a situation is chosen, a pit is dug with a curious clumsy bit
of iron, having a large socket-hole at one end of it, in which is driven a
large, strong pole, which answers for a handle; it is worked with both
hands over one knee; the depth that the roots are buried does not seem to
be of any moment, provided the trees are firmly fixed, so as to prevent the
wind from driving them down. I have never observed any pruning performed, except such as is done by bullocks, horses, donkeys, etc.; and as I
have not observed any "horse-ladders " here in use, of course the pruning
is not very effectively performed about the top part of the very lofty trees.
The only digging or stirring the surface of the ground among the trees that
I have observed is done by pigs, which are occasionally allowed to rove in
some orchards, at certain seasons of the year, with the rings taken from
their snouts. In a moist season these intelligent animals occasionally turn
up the-ground in a tolerable regular manner; and where this is the case
the good effects of their industry are obvious. However, it is only on rare
occasions that they are allowed to perform this surface operation. The
animals that do the pruning are the principal business-performing creatures,
as, in addition to that operation, they tread down the under crop of grass,
weeds and other rubbish, take the fruit to the cider-mill, and the cider to
the consumer; besides, on rare occurrences, a little manure is conveyed by
them, and placed over the roots, close to the trunks of the trees; it is sometimes, although rarely, placed at the great distance of three or four feet
from the trunk. Bipeds, notwithstanding, perform some of the most interesting and essential parts, such as planting, collecting the fruit, consuming
it in part, and assisting in making the cider; together with shooting at
trees annually on Old Twelfth-night. Let it rain, hail, blow or snow, this
very essential and interesting ceremony is always commenced at 12 o'clock
at night, a tremendous fire being kept up for several hours afterwards.
They repeat or sing the following interesting song, with all the might which
their lungs will permit. The juice of the fruit is generally made use of for
many hours, pretty freely, previously to this interesting ceremony, so that
a perfect ripeness of address and expertness in gunnery is the result. Guns
and firelocks long laid by are on this remarkable occasion brought forward.
The following is what I have heard sung on these occasions, although much
more is added in some localities:




238           AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
"EHere's to thee, old apple-tree,
Whence thou mayest bud, and whence thou mayest blow;
And whence thou mayest bear apples enow;
Hats full, caps full!
Bushel, bushel-sacks full!
And my pockets full too!
If thee does not bear either apples or corn,
We'll down with thy top, and up with thy horn."
(Here the natives shoot at the tree.)




T[LE AND THATCHED ROOFS.                239
CHAPTER XXXVI.
Roofs; Shingles; Tile; Thatch: The Advantages and Disadvantages of
each -The use of Thatch in America - Hereford - Christian Hospitality
-A Milk Farm — The Herefords — A Dangerous Man — Primitive Christianity.
SOMEWHERE in this region, we passed two small churches
or chapels with roofs of wooden shingles; in both cases the
pitch of the roof was very steep, and the shingles old, warped
and mossy. These were the only shingle roofs I recollect to
have seen in England; but I was told they were not very uncommon upon old farm-buildings in Devonshire. The roofs
hereabouts, generally, are of flat tile. In moulding these tile,
which are of equal thickness at both ends, a hole is made in the
upper part, by which they are pegged to slats, which run horizontally across the rafters; (about London a protuberance is
moulded upon the tile, by which it is hung.) This peg is covered, as the nails of a shingle are, by the lower part of the tile
of the next tier above it. If no precaution to prevent it is taken,
there will sometimes be crevices in a tile roof, through which
snow will drive; in dwellings, a thin layer of straw is often laid
under the tile, and sometimes they are laid in mortar. Pan-tiles
(common on old houses in New York) are also made tight with
mortar. Roofs of this kind will last here about twice as long as




240       A N AMERICAN FAR MER IN ENGLAND.
shingle roofs with us, without repairs, and are fire-proof. Unless
laid over straw, they give less protection than shingles against
heat and cold.
The roofing material changes completely often in one day's
walk; flat tiles giving place to slates, slates to pan-tiles, etc. In
Monmouthshire, the roofs are generally made of a flat, shaly
stone, called tile-stone, quarried not less than an inch thick. It
is laid with mortar, or straw or moss, like tile, and requires
strong timber to support it. The better class of houses and
modern farm-buildings, almost every where, are slated; sometimes metal roofed; rarely covered with compositions or felt.
Cottages, and old farm-houses and stables, every where, except
in the vicinity of slate quarries, are thatched. Straw thatch is
commonly laid about eight inches thick. Its permanence depends
on the pitch of the roof. Ordinarily it may last twenty-five
years; and when a new roof is required, the old thatch is not removed, but a new layer of the same thickness is laid over the old
one. Frequently three and sometimes more layers of thatch
may be seen on an old building, the roof thus often being two
feet thick. It is a cheaper roof than any other, and is much the
best protection against both cold and heat. The objection to it
is that it harbors vermin, and is more liable to take fire from
sparks than any other. The danger of the latter is not as great,
however, as would be supposed. I saw and heard of. no house
on fire while I was in England, except in London. I frequently
saw cottages in which coppice-wood was being burned, the top
of the chimney not a foot above the dry straw thatch, and the
smoke drifting right down upon it. The dangers from fire would
be somewhat greater in America, where wood is more commonly
used as fuel, and rain is much less frequent. There are some
situations in which it might be safely employed, however, (if on
dwellings, the chimney should be elevated more than usual,) and




COTTAGE WALLS.                   241
where it would form the cheapest and most comfortable, and
much the most picturesque and appropriate, roof.
The cost of the thatched roof of a double cottage, fifty by fifteen feet, is estimated at one hundred and forty dollars, of which
about forty dollars is for straw, forty dollars for thatcher's work,
and the remainder for the frame, lath, etc.
The walls of laborer's cottages are of stone, or brick and timber, or of clay. In making the latter, which travelers frequently
describe as "mud walls," and which are very common, the clay,
having been well forked over and cleaned of stones, is sprinkled
with water, and has short straw mixed with it, and is then trodden with horses and worked over until it becomes a plastic mass.
The more it is trodden the better. A foundation of stone is first
made; one man forms the prepared clay into balls, or lumps as
large as bricks, and passes these to another, who lays and packs
them well and firmly together, dressing off smooth and straight
with a trowel. After the height desired for the wall is attained,
it is commonly plastered over inside and out with a thin coat of;
more carefully prepared clay, and whitewashed. This makes an
excellent non-conducting wall, equal, in every respect, except in
permanence, and almost in that, to stone or brick. Very respectable houses, as villas and parsonages, are sometimes built in this
way. The cost is about 30 cts. a square yard.
I once or twice saw the walls of cottages made of or covered
with thatch, and have no doubt, as long as vermin were kept out
of them, that they were, as was asserted, exceedingly comfortable.
These were gentlemen's country boxes, not laborers' cottages.
On reaching Hereford, a city of 10,000 inhabitants, we were
met by a gentleman to whom it seemed that word had been sent
by some of the "Brethren" at Ludlow, who begged us all to
come to his house, and, upon reaching it, we found rooms prepared for us, and his family expecting us.
16




242       AN AMIERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
After tea he walked with us about the town, and even took us
into the country, to see a small milk-dairy and orchard-farm.
The cows were of the Hereford breed, but not full-blooded, nor
have we seen many that were. Most of the cattle in this vicinity have more or less of the marks of the breed, and their quality
is about in proportion to its purity. The poorest cattle I have
seen in England were within two miles of Hereford, but there
was no mark of Hereford blood in them, and they had probably
been bought out of the county, and brought there to fatten. The
best milkers on this farm were not the best-bred cows. The
average value of the herd was about $35 a-head. They were
kept in a long stable; mangers and floor of wood, a slope of half
an inch in a foot to the latter, with a gutter in the rear. They
were entirely house-fed, on green clover. They were milked by
women, and the milk all sold in the town.
Late in the evening, our host called with us on the Rev. Mr.
a right warm, manly, Christian gentleman, who, though in
domestic affliction, on learning that we were Americans, received
us cordially. We found him singularly familiar with American
matters, both political and theological; a portrait of Dr. Bushnell, of Hartford, along with that of Dr. Arnold, and other worthies, was over his mantel, the last "New-Englander" on his
table, and a fragrance peculiarly adapted to make an American
feel at home, soon pervaded the atmosphere of his study. We
had a most agreeable conversation, and it was long before we
could return to our hospitable quarters for the night. Mr.
is an Independent, or, as he prefers to be called, a Congregationalist; bat is accounted somewhat heterodox, and treated with a
cold shoulder by some of the scribes and doctors of that persuasion, we were afterwards informed.
When we came into the parlor, at half past seven next morning, we found a breakfast party met to greet us. Our host had




WARM BREAKFAST AND WARM HEARTS.             243
been to an early daylight prayer-meeting, and some business had
detained him; but his friends introduced each other to us, and
we went to breakfast without waiting for him. It was a good,
warm, respectable breakfast-fit for a Christian. English breakfasts in general are quite absurd; not breakfasts at all, but just
aggravations \of fasts, and likely to put a man in anything but a
Christian humor for his day's work. As for the better part of
the meal, see C.'s letter, (from which I here extract):
"I shall not soon forget those earnest, simple-hearted men.
In many circles one would be repelled by such constant use of
religious phrases, but in them it did not seem like cant at allrather the usual expression with them of true feeling. It was a
company too well worth considering. Opposite me sat a middleaged gentleman, who had been a major-general in the East India
service, and who belonged to one of the first families in the kingdom. Yet he had given up his commission and his position in
society for the sake of doing good as an humble Christian. His
half-pay, too, he had refused, believing it inconsistent for a religious man to receive money for services of such a nature. He
had been a scholar also, and had written a dictionary of the
Mahratta tongue. Besides him, there was a lieutenant in the
navy, who had thrown up his commission from similar religious
scruples, and a prominent surgeon of the city, devoted, like the
rest, to Christian efforts almost entirely. They had been to a
prayer-meeting, and the conversation, with the Bible open on the
table, commenced at once on a passage in John. It was beautiful, the simple, natural way they all conversed of religious topics
-no straining for sanctity, but easily and earnestly, as men
usually would speak of weighty political matters.
" But, free as is the plan of these brethren, I am sorry to say
that in real liberality they do not go beyond most others. The
conversation during breakfast turned on the Roman Catholics.




244       AN AME RICA N FARMER IN ENGLAND.
Most of them went so far as to doubt whether a Papist ever could
be a Christian. The major disagreed with them, and it was
noble, the enthusiasm with which he spoke of the pure and earnest Pascal. Generally, however, their feeling toward men of
different doctrinal opinions was much like that of any sectarians.
The Independent clergyman at Hereford says that the most he
has known are men of the Church of England, and that they
have just grasped a few great ideas, which the Independents have
been preaching since the time of Cromwell. And certainly, as
compared with'the Church,' their religious character is most
simple and free."
In addition to the evidence of the sincere character of the
" Brethren" instanced above, I may mention that another of our
company had been an apothecary, and given up his business from
a conviction that Homeopathy was a better way than the common
drugging, and that we afterwards met one, a near relative of one
of the most distinguished noblemen and statesmen of Great Britain, who had retired from a highly honorable and lucrative official
position, from a desire to live more in accordance with his religious aspirations than his duties in it permitted. I shall omit
to narrate what more we saw of them, as we proceeded further
on our journey; but must say, to conclude, that if, in letting no
man judge them in meat or in drink, or in respect of a holy day
-if, in teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and
hymns and spiritual songs-if, in bowels of mercy, kindness,
humbleness of mind, meekness, self-sacrifice, and zealous readiness to every good work-if, especially, in real genuine hospitality to strangers, there be any thing of "primitive Christianity,"
our entertainers seemed to us to have had no ordinary degree of
success in their purpose to return to it. They certainly were not
without their share of bigotry and self-confidence in such matters
of creed as they happened to hold in common; but this did not




PRIMITIVE CflRISTIANITY.              245
seem to have the effect upon them of destroying geniality and
good fellowship, nor of cramping the spirit of practical, material,
and unromantic benevolence. They were quite different, too, in
their way of talking upon those subjects on which they conceived
their minds to be "at rest," from the theological students at —,
whom   ~  describes as studying as if they had bought tickets
for the night-train to heaven, and, having requested the conductor
to call them when they got there, were trying to get into the most
comfortable position to sleep it through.




246       A N AMERICAN FAR MER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
The County Jail - English Prison Discipline - The Perfection of the Present - Education and Taxation - What Next? - Captain Machonochie -
The Mark System- The Christian Idea of Punishment.
A FTER breakfast, we visited the county prison. It is on the
plan of the celebrated Pentonville model prison, near London, which is supposed to be an improvement on what is called
the Philadelphia plan. Any of my readers who are much interested in the great and puzzling problem of prison discipline, are
probably familiar with the elements of the last experiment of the
British Government upon the sad subject.
This specimen of it at Hereford was all that could be asked
for in its way. Evidently, no skill in planning and no expense
in execution had been wanting to make it as perfect as such a
thing could be.
WVe were first conducted through several long, light, and airy
corridors, upon which opened the well-ventilated sleeping-cells of
the prisoners-each cell appearing the perfection of a cell, as if
made to the order of some rich amateur rascal, in the most complete and finished style which would be appropriate to an apartment bearing that designation; the walls of plain hewn stone,
but white as a bishop's linen; the floor damp-proof, of asphalte;
the bedstead of iron, the bed of sufficiently appropriate coarse



HEREFORD JAIL.                   247
ness, snugly and neatly made up as if by the joint labor of a
tasteful upholsterer and a skillful laundress; warmed on the hotwater plan; furnished with a wash-bowl, and constant pure water
by pipes; softly lighted by filtrated beams of sunshine by day,
and a batswing burner at night; provided also with a bell or
signal, by which the interesting inmate may at any time, in case
of bodily ailment, summon a well-diplomaed physician to his
relief, or a perfectly authenticated, veritable and legitimate "descendant of the apostles," in case he should be taken suddenly
aback with repentance during the night: at every bed-head, too
— regularly as the crucifix in the dormitories of monks, or the
squat, yellow "Josh" in Chinese cabins-a bible. "The Bible!
ah, how must his heart melt, and his dark mind be enlightened,
as in his retirement from the wild temptations of the wicked
world, the prisoner is left to be absorbed in its glorious tidings.
What a feast, what a treasure, what a — "  Nay, the shining
leather and sticking leaves tell us that even Bible Societies may
throw pearls before swine.
"Aye," says the turnkey: "He can't read —a young chap-in
for two months; petty larceny."
We open and read:-" He that knew not, and did commit
things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. For
unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall much be required;
and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask
the more."
It was given him to have a mind uneducated, except in ignorance and criminal contrivance, and it was required of him, he
might tell us, either to starve or to steal; and then there is given
him good, comfortable, clean, wholesome air, water, food, lodging,
and exercise (not work). Moreover, there is added this sealed
book.
But we are not allowed to moralize or criticise. We are ex



248        AN AMERICAN FARMER 1N ENGLAND.
pected only to admire, and are passed along to the culinary
department.
Perfection again-of a kitchen with an admirable, stout, dignified chef, graduate of Paris doubtless, presiding. The diet-table,
he explains to us, is scientifically ordered; the beef and bread
and vegetables are of the best, and we are shown how the quantity for each man, in each particular, is accurately weighed out.
The patients are also weighed periodically, and the allowance of
food and of exercise is studiously adjusted to the condition of
each.
Next we are taken to the day-cells, which are in several separate courts. Within each is an ingeniously-contrived crank,
attached to a common shaft, revolving through all. This crank
is the exerciser. The prisoner stands at a certain distance before
it, takes hold of it with both hands, and, as it turns, a certain
motion is given to his whole body-the most healthful sort of
motion: expanding the chest, and moving every joint of his
limbs. He remains in this cell ten hours each day, Sundays excepted; and the usual allowance of exercise is half an hour, with
ten minutes rest after it, continued alternately during that time.
There is a library in the prison, from which primers, picturebooks, and tracts, are served out for the exercise of his mind
during the ten minutes bodily rests.
For Sundays there is provided another sort of cells, which are
so arranged that each prisoner can look at the same central point,
but cannot see any other prisoner. At the central point is placed
an humble vessel, (doubtless as perfect as can be made by ordinances, and duly clad in regulation vesture,) from which a stated
dose of gospel privileges is scientifically exhibited, and systematically imbibed by every patient —prisoner I mean. There are
two such rations given on Sunday, with a dinner between, and
opportunity for reflection in private, before and after.




PRISON DISCIPLINE..                 249
It is a first principle of the plan that labor should end where
it begins. The exercising shaft is sometimes applied to a pumpbrake, to fill the reservoir over the prison with water, but never
in any other way saves labor. Pains are taken in every way,
not with absolute success it is admitted, to secure utter silence,
and to prevent all communication between the prisoners. Criminals are rarely sent here for more than twelve months; and it is
said that, with all the science and care that can be devoted to
them, their health, both bodily and mental, is endangered, if their
confinement is protracted longer.
It may be, as its admirers have no doubt, the happiest idea of
a prison most happily realized that the world yet knows; yet it
is one of the most painful things to examine that I ever saw. It
is hardly possible to speak well of it but in irony, or to describe
it without sarcasm, so absurd seems all this scientific care for the
well-being — physical, mental, and moral- of these miserable
transgressors, contrasted with the studied neglect, justified and
made praiseworthy by strictly economical and religious reasoning,
of the unoffending poor. While no talent, painstaking, and complicated machinery is too expensive and cumbrous to be devoted
to the keeping of the criminal, of the unfortunate, society, through
the state, still says -Am I my brother's keeper?
Hold the hand! Dash not the book behind the grate, my conservative friend; I would hint at nothing more dangerous than
education-a word one may yet speak in America without being
finally condemned as an infidel and a socialist, and a man given
to isms. Would you still call me to order, remind me that I am
writing on the subject of prisons-English prisons-and that I
may take up the subject of schools in another chapter. Yet there
may be lessons learned from prisons, and English prisons teach
lessons that all who do not care for the subject of education would
do well to heed.




250       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
In the prisons of England, in 1841, it was found that out of
every hundred criminals then supported by the state33 had never learned to read or write;
56 were able to read and write imperfectly;
7 were able to read and write well; and only
1 in two hundred and twenty-two had been favored with
" instruction superior to reading and writing." *
Only 28 in every hundred were over 30 years of age.
The chaplain of the Brecon jail reports, that though the majority of the prisoners to whom he ministers are able to read
imperfectly, yet their education has been so defective that they
have no notion of the bearing and connection of one part of a
sentence with another. Nine out of ten of them were ignorant
of the merest rudiments of Christianity. The chaplain of the
Bedford jail states, that the great majority of prisoners there
confined are " ignorant, stupid, and unconcerned." Another jail
chaplain observes of those " children, or men still childish," under
his care, who had been instructed in reading and writing, " they
had not learned to think about or understand any thing that they
had been taught; the ears had heard, the tongue had learned
utterance, but the mind had received no idea, no impression."
(The reader may be reminded of what I said of sailors' reading.t)
From the Bucks county jail it is reported that about half the
prisoners have never been taught to read and write, and about
one quarter are ignorant of the alphabet; and that "ignorance is
uniformly accompanied with the greatest depravity." +
To return to the Hereford jail: I intimated that every thing
said in admiration of it seemed necessarily ironical and bitter;
but I do recall one pleasant, and, I doubt not, true word, for it"it is a palace compared with the old one."
* Parliamentary Document, 1842.
t P. 25.
$ Jail Returns to the House of Commons, 1848




WTHAT NEXT?                           251
Yes, to be sure, that is good. No one will ask us to go back
to packing criminals, and all under surveillance of the law, promiscuously into stone pens, giving them rotten straw to rest upon,
and supplying only the cheapest food that may answer the purpose of keeping body and soul together. Few will be inclined
to think that the world's prisons-hell triumphant in Austria and
Naples, excepted-are not better now than in the day of Howard.
Progress there has been; progress there must be. This palaceprison is but a mile-stone on the road.
What next? There are some pamphlets before me in which
an answer to this question is attempted to be given.* The matter
is one of so much difficulty and so great importance, so nearly
connected with the progress of Christianity and civilized law, and
the plan of a new prison is so often to be discussed and established among all our states and counties, that I must beg my
readers to carefully examine the new system of punishment that
they propose, and I urge it the more, because, so far as I know, it
has, up to this time, entirely escaped the attention of the American press.
But first let us distinctly recall to mind what is most unsatisfactory and clearly defective in our present prisons and system
of criminal punishment.
There are two general principles with regard to the punishment of crime that have been theoretically received and approved
in the minds of all enlightened and Christian people, and yet to
which there is much in our present system that is practically
false and repugnant.  We say "necessarily so," and that this
*;" The Principles of Punishment," by Captain Machonochie, R. N., K. H.: J. Ollivier,
Pall Mall, London. " Crime and Punishment," by Captain Machonochie: J. Hatchard
& Son, London. An " Essay on Criminal Jurisprudence," by Marmaduke B. Sampson:
Ilighley & Son, London. These works may all be obtained through the agency of the
publishers, and will be found to contain (especially the last) most valuable hints and
suggestions applicable to other matters besides prison discipline. Their cost is trifling.




252       AN AMERICA.N FARMER IN ENGLAND.
necessity is one of the awful results of crime or sin. God
knows if we are right. If not, we are terribly wrong.
The principles or rules with regard to punishment, to which I
refer, are these: that it should not be vindictive or revengeful,
for it is not the business of human jurisprudence to satisfy the
abstract claims of justice, " Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord."
That, on the other hand, it should be our purpose, in the treatment of criminals, so far as may be consistent with the good of
society, to do them good, to make them better, stronger and happier. This also is a corollary of the second principle, which I
would recall to mind, namely: That the great end of criminal
law is to prevent, discourage and lessen crime.
Yet, practically, among the mass of our community, the punishment of criminals is engaged in as if it were the satisfaction of
a vindictive feeling against an enemy of society, a satisfaction
that the law makes him pay in the inconvenience and suffering
of his confinement and hard labor, for the injury he has done society or some member of society. Practically, the criminal has
the counterpart of this feeling, considering that society looks upon
him as its enemy, and, when it catches him, vindictively makes
him suffer for his crime, as if it were a match between him and
the law, in which he was the loser; and the effect of looking
upon it in this way is to aggravate and intensify the evil which
we theoretically propose to cure by his imprisonment.
It is true, that in accordance with the purpose of improving
the character of criminals during (I cannot say by) their imprisonment, we employ chaplains to preach and counsel them, and
give them books, which, it is supposed, in the absence of any
other employment of the mind, may engage their attention. And
these are the only means employed at present for the purpose of
training them to be active, efficient, industrious and well-disposed
members of society, upon their releases Few will be inclined




THE CHRISTIAN IDEA OF P UNISIITMENT.         253
to deny that for this purpose these means constantly prove themselves entirely inadequate; that, in this respect, our system is a
constant and complete failure. Why?
Let us see: The criminal is sentenced, we will suppose, for
ten years, and finds himself locked into a narrow cell, where it is
only at occasional and comparatively distant intervals that he
can be communicated with, even by his keeper, chaplain or physician, the only human beings who have access to him. It may
be for a certain time each day he is set to labor; hard labor being given him, not as a privilege, not as a relief, not as a means
of bettering his condition, or in any way as to be loved and valued; but as an addition to the punishment of solitary confinement. He is mainly left to his own thoughts. His recollections
are vicious; are his anticipations likely to be virtuous?  With
ten years to be spent under these circumstances, to what will his
mind be most likely to direct itself? To relief from monotony,
to anything which promises excitement, to dramatic action, to
overcome or mislead the minds he finds acting upon him, or to
self-forgetfulness, sleep, sloth, and to the avoidance of so much of
the punishment imposed upon him as possible, that is to the hard
labor part, in which his only success must be obtained by deception. Thus, with whatever preaching in words, his training is
directly to hatred and contempt of labor as a means of no good,
but only of fatigue to himself, to Unwholesome mental excitement,
to deception and to perfect indolence and uselessness.
And is this lame, inconsistent plan, so working at cross
purposes, the end of all the philanthropic labors, private and
associated, that have been given to the subject during the last
fifty years? The result, friends, not the end. Then, in God's
name, what next?
An answer from Captain Machonochie will be found in the
Appendix B, and I again beg for it, with all earnestness, the




254         AN A.HMERICA N FARMER IN ENXGLAND.
thoughtful perusal of my countrymen. It is based on plain, distinct, uncontradictory principles, which are applicable to the
punishment of all criminals, and to the construction of all criminal laws. It is the plan of no closet philosopher, but of a coolheaded, warm-hearted sailor, who was chosen by his government,
for his manifest natural qualifications for undertaking the superintendence of criminals, to take charge of one of its most difficult
penal establishments. It is a plan that has been well considered,
and is ably defended to the minutest details, as the reader, who
is willing to study it further, will find, on referring to the pamphlets I have mentioned in the note on a previous page.*
* For a refutation of objections, see, particularly, the Report of the Committee on
Criminal Law of the " Society for Promoting the Amendment of the Law."




THE DEBTORS' PRISON.                 255
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
A Hit - The Debtor's Prison — Utter Cleanliness —" City " and " Town"
"Down " and " Up "- Hereford Cathedral - Church and State -The
Public Promenade.
I MUST not forget two incidents of our visit to the jail. Punishment is inflicted by withholding food; also, I imagine, for
slight offenses, in other ways. An officer with us noticed some
untidiness of dress upon one of the prisoners, and pointing to it,
said-" You are an Englishman: I don't want to treat you as an
Irishman." As we entered a certain apartment, our conductor
said, "This is the debtors' prison."
One of us remarked, "We have generally abolished imprisonment for debt in the United States."
The officer, quietly, "It's a pity that you have."
The quarters of the debtors were not cells, but decent rooms,
and there was a large hall common to them. Every thing here,
though, as every where else, was awfully clean, dreary and mathematical; a housekeeper gone mad, such as I know of, would
have thought it heaven. I should suppose that the prisoners
would long, more than for anything else, to have one good roll in
the gutter, and an unmeasured mouthful of some perfectly indigestible luxury. It was a relief, after being but an hour within




256       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
the walls, to step out once more into the good old mud and clouds
and smells of Nature again.
Among the debtors, one was pointed out to us as a well-educated lawyer, formerly having a large and respectable practice,
and enjoying a considerable fortune. He had been confined for
several years, but, it was thought, would soon be released. The
placards of an association for taking the part of imprisoned debtors were posted in the hall.
The title city is applied, in England, only to a town which is
the residence of a bishop, and is equivalent to "a cathedral town."
Hereford is a city; Chester is a city; but Liverpool, with ten
times the population of both of them, is not a city. The term
town, again, in England, is never applied to the subdivisions of a
county (a township), but is used to designate a place that is
closely built, and with a considerable population —what we
should give the title of city to. Thus London, the largest town,
is every where called "the town."  "The city" designates a
small part of London, near the Cathedral of St. Paul. (All over
Great Britain they speak of going "up to London," never
"down."  This use of "down" and "up," meaninglessly, in a
sentence, I had supposed was a "down-east" idiom; but it is
common in old England.)
The cathedral at Hereford, built in the time of William the
Conqueror, is in a more ornamented style of Gothic than any ancient religious edifice we had seen. I did not greatly admire it.
Considerable additions or repairs have been lately made. On
one of the new gables I was surprised to see some fifty of those
grotesque heads, freshly cut. They were not very ugly, or very
droll-indeed, had no marked character, or any thing that showed
a genius, even for the comical, in their designer or executer.




CUURCH AND STATE.                   257
They were not necessary to the harmony of the modern work
with the old; were, I think, discordant, and what they were put
there for I don't know. Extensive alterations had lately been:
made in the choir, and it was the most convenient hall for public
exercises that I recollect to have seen in any English cathedral.
The ceiling was painted (in encaustic) in the bright-colored
bizarre style that I spoke of at the castle near Shrewsbury. As
I entered, it seemed to me to be in bad taste for a place of meditation and worship. We attended the daily morning service,
and heard some fine, gentle music —the organ sweetly played,
and the singers all boys.
I noticed that our dissenting friends seemed to have a pride
and sense of possession in the cathedral, as if they were not in
the habit of thinking of it as belonging exclusively to those who
occupied it, but as if it was intrusted to them, and as well to them
as to any other division, as representative of the whole Catholic
Church of all English Christians. This way of looking upon
"the Church" usurpations is quite commonly observable among
the dissenters. It is not so honorable to them when applied to
other things than mere furniture; as, for instance, giving the exclusive teaching of religious doctrine to the children, or paupers,
or soldiers, in whom they have a common interest, to the State
Church, from a supposed necessity of giving it to some one in
preference to all others; and if not to their particular church,
then of best right to the church of the strongest. The idea that
some State Church, separated from others by its doctrinal basis,
is expedient, and almost necessary, to a Christian government, is
quite common among dissenters. In my judgment, it cannot be
expedient, because it is very evidently unjust. What is in the
least degree unjust can never be expedient for a state, the very
purpose of which should be to elevate and secure justice among
the people who live under its laws.
17




258       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
Nor can I conceive of any thing so likely to strangle a church
as to be hung with exclusive privileges from the state. For what
are these? Bribes for the profession of doctrines and the acceptance of rules of debatable expediency; giving encouragement, so
far as they have any influence (that they would not have if the
church were independent of the power of the state), to insincerity
and the unearnest formation of opinions- to unreality, which is
deadness in a church.
That the constant practice of perjury and the most miserably
jesuitical notions of truth and falsehood, and that weakness and
imbecility of both Church and State, is the direct and inevitable
result at the present day of such a connection as is attempted to
be sustained between them in England, is as obvious and certain
to me as any thing can be, that such great and good men as the
divines and statesmen of England have different opinions with
regard to.
There is a large green, close planted with trees, about the
cathedral, and facing upon it are the official residences of the
regiment of clergy, high priests and low, that under some form or
other are provided with livings in connection with it. In front
of one of the barracks was planted a bomb-mortar — with what
signification?
There is another public promenade in Hereford, upon the site
of an old castle which was demolished by Cromwell. The ramparts are grassed over, and there are fine trees, ponds, gravelwalks, an obelisk in honor of Nelson, some graceful irregularities
of surface, and a broad, purling stream of clear water flowing by
it all. Here, before noon, we found a considerable company, of
varied character: ladies walking briskly and talking animatedly;
invalids, wrapped up and supported, loitering in the sun; cripples,
moving about in wheel-chairs; students or novel-readers in the




THE REPUBLIC IN ENGLAND.              259
deepest shades; and every where, many nursery-maids with
children. Not a town have we seen in England but has had a
better garden-republic than any town I know of in the United
States




260       AN AMiERICAN FAR1XMER IN E1VGLAND.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
Shady Lanes - Rural Sketches - Herefordshire and Monmouthshire Scenery - Points of Difference in English and American Landscapes - Visit
to a Farm-House - The Mistress - The Farm-House Garden - A Stout
Old English Farmer- The Stables and Stock- Turnip Culture- Sheep
- Wheat - Hay - Rents - Prices -A Parting - Cider.
TURNING off the main road soon after leaving Hereford, we
pursued our way, guided by the gentleman who had so kindly
entertained us, for several miles through narrow by-ways. It
was a rarely clear, bright, sunshiny afternoon, and while on the
broad highway we had found, for the first time in England, the
temperature of the air more than comfortably warm. The more
agreeable were the lanes; — narrow, dleep, and shady, often not
wider than the cart-track, and so deep, that the grassy banks on
each side were higher than our heads; our friend could not explain how or why they were made so, but probably it was by the
rain washing through them for centuries. On the banks were
thickly scattered the flowers of heart's-ease, forget-me-not, and
wild strawberries; above, and out of them, grew the hawthorn
hedges in thick, but wild and wilsome verdure, and pushing out
of this, and stretching over us, often the branches mingling over
our heads and shutting out the sky clear beyond the next turn,
so we seemed walking in a bower, thick old apple and pear trees




RURAL SCENES.                    261
with pliant twigs of hazel-wood, and occasionally the strong arms
of great brooding elms. Then we came upon a low, thickthatched cottage with many bends in the ridge-pole, with little
windows, and thick walls; a cat asleep in the door, and pigs and
chickens before it, and, lying on the ground, in the dust of the
lane, playing with a puppy, two or three flaxen-haired, blue-eyed
children; a little further, a drowsy old she-ass standing in the
shade, and a mouse-colored foal, as little as a lamb, but with a
great head and large, plaintive dark eyes, and a meek and touching expression of infantile, embryo intellect.
Now and then the hedge is interrupted by the wall of a paddock or stack-yard; beyond it, a number of dilapidated hovels,
sheds, and stables, clustering without any appearance of arrangement about a low farm-house with big chimneys, wide windows,
and a little porch half hidden under roses, jessamine, and honeysuckle.
Sometimes a big dog would bay at us, and, a woman coming
to the door, our friend would ask, "' How is the master and the
little ones?" and in turn be asked, "How is good mistress and
young master?" And then we would be presented as strangers,
who had come over the sea to view this goodly land, and would
be asked, in pitying tones, about famine, and fever, and potatoes
-the farm-wife, although she had an exceedingly sweet speech,
apparently confounding New York with Connaught or Munster.
Again, broad fields, and stout horses, and busy laborers, and
straight plow-furrows, or the bright metallic green of luxuriant
young wheat and barley, in broad glades of glancing light; and
a stout old man, who waddles towards us with a warm greeting,
wiping the sweat from his brow, and mounting " a goodish bit of
stuff, though she has seen twenty winters," rides for a little way
along with us, breathing hard and speaking huskily; grumbling,
grumbling at Free Trade and high rents, but answering all our




262       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
questions about his draining, and boneing, and drilling, and dibbling, and very frankly acknowledging how much he has been able
to increase his crops with new-fashioned ways and new-fangled
implements.
Then leaving the lane, we take a foot-path, which, crossing the
hedges by stiles, leads through old orchards, in all of which horses
and cattle are pasturing; and there are beautiful swells of the
ground, and sometimes deep swales of richer green, with rushes
and willows growing at the bottom. Reaching a steeper hill-side,
we enter a large plantation of young forest trees, and soon pass
all at once into an older growth of larger and more thinly standing wood; and near the top of this, find a clearing, where men
are making faggots of the brushwood, and stripping bark from the
larger sticks, and some little boys and girls are picking up chips
and putting them into sacks.
We reach another lane and cultivated fields, and, being on
elevated ground, at the gnarly feet of a gray, old beech-tree, lay
down, and, looking back upon the extensive landscape, tell our
friend in what it differs from American scenery.
The chief peculiarity of the English landscape is found in the
frequent long, graceful lines of deep green hedges and hedge-row
timber, crossing hill, valley, and plain in every direction; and in
the occasional large trees, dotting the broad fields, either singly
or in small groups, left to their natural open growth, (for shiptimber, and, while they stand, for cattle shades,) therefore
branching low and spreading wide, and more beautiful, much
more beautiful, than we allow our trees to make themselves.
The less frequent brilliancy of broad streams or ponds of water,
also distinguishes the prospect from those to which we are most
accustomed, though there are often small brooks or pools, and
much marshy land, and England may be called a well-watered
country. In the foreground you will notice the quaint buildings,




LANDSCAPE PECULIARITIES.                263
generally pleasing objects in themselves, often supporting what
is most agreeable of all, and that you can never fail to admire,
never see any thing ugly or homely under, a drapery of ivy or
other creepers; the ditches and banks by their side, on which the
hedges are planted; the clean and careful cultivation, and general tidiness of the agrtculture; and the deep, narrow, crooked,
gulch-like lane, or the smooth, clean, matchless highway.
There seems to me to be a certain peculiarity in English foliage, which I can not satisfactorily describe. It is as if the face
of each leaf was more nearly parallel with all others near it, and
as if all were more equally lighted than in our foliage. It is
perhaps only owing to a greater density, and better filling up,
and more even growth of the outer twigs of the trees, than is
common in our dryer climate.
There is a much smaller variety in the forest foliage, and
usually a much milder light over an English landscape than an
American, making the distances and shady parts more indistinct.
The sublime or the picturesque in nature is much more rare in
England, except on the sea-coast, than in America; but there is
every where a great deal of quiet, peaceful, graceful beauty which
the works of man have generally added to, and which I remember but little like at home. This Herefordshire reminds me of
the valley of Connecticut, between Middletown and Springfield.
The valley of the Mohawk, and the upper part of the Hudson, is
also in some parts English-like.
After all here said, I feel that there is a fascination in the
common-place scenery of this part of England, and generally of
midland, rural England, which I do not fully comprehend. I
have called it common-place, because there is nothing striking in
it; no one point to be especially noted, or which can be remembered afterwards. Yet, though I have traveled far and wide,
have visited scores of places greatly celebrated for the grandeur




264        AN AMERICAN FARlIER IN ENGLAND.
of their scenery, and have dwelt for months in the most beautiful,
purely natural scenes of a pastoral character in the world (in
Western Texas), I have been no where else so charmed as I
was continually while walking through those parts of England
least distinguished, and commonly least remarked upon by travelersi as beautiful.  The scenery is beautiful with. ut iptention or
artifice for the purpose of man, and yet is full of the convenience
of man's occupation;' and it is picturesque without being ungentle
or shabby. (1858.)
Descending into a broad, low tract of dale-land, we came at
length to a farm occupied by a relative of our guide, and which
was his destination. A branch of the lane in which we had been
for some time walking, ran through the farm, and terminated at
the farm-house. It was more picturesque and inconvenient,
deeper, narrower, and muddier than any we had before been
through.  It was explained to us that it was a "parish road"although leading to but one house-and, therefore, the farmer
was not responsible for its bad repair.*  Great trees grew up at
its side, and these the farmer was not allowed to fell or trim-the
landlord estimating the value of their increase as timber or for
fuel, or their advantage as a nursery of game, higher than the
injury they caused to the crops in the adjoining fields. Near the
house the lane widened, and one side was flanked by a symmetrical yew-hedge; on the other side, however, the trees and high
bank still continued, and two stout horses were straining every
muscle to draw a cart-load of crushed bones through the mire,
* In the proceedings of a Parliamentary Commission of the last century, the following
questions and answers are recorded:
Q. What sort of roads have you in Monmouthshire?
A. None at all.
Q. How do you travel then?
A. In ditches.-Survey of Monmoutsh.




THE FARM-HIO USE.                 265
which reached close up to the gable-end of the house. Opposite
the house was a cider-mill, cart-sheds, and some stacks; behind
it, a large yard, surrounded by stables, sties, dairy-house, malthouse, granary, etc. Into this enclosure we passed by a great
gate. A considerable part of it was occupied by a large heap
of manure and a pool of green, stagnant liquid. The buildings
were mostly old, some of them a good deal decayed, with cracks
in the brick-work, timber bending and sustained by props and
other patch-work, which spoke better for the tenant than his
landlord.
By a wide open door, directly from this filthy yard, we passed
without ceremony into the kitchen-a large, long room, with
stone floor, black beams across the low ceiling, from which hung
sides and hams of pork, a high settle, as usual, but not the ordinary kitchen display of bright metal and crockery. Old and
well worn, every thing, but neat and nice as brand-new. On a
table was a huge loaf with a large piece of cold fat bacon and a
slice of cheese, and directly a maid came up from the cellar and
added to these a pint of foaming beer —dinner or supper for the
carter just returning from the town, whither he had gone early
in the morning with a load of wool, and had now brought back
bone-manure.
We are seated in a little parlor, and the "wench," as our friend
addresses her (a buxom serving-maid), goes to call the mistress.
The parlor is a small room neatly furnished; painted deal chairs,
a printed-calico-covered lounge, the floor carpeted, and the walls
papered; an oak writing-desk, a table and a sewing-stand; no
newspapers or books, but a family-bible on the mantel and an
almanac on the desk: a door and a window open from it upon
the flower-garden.
In a few minutes the mistress enters, and, after kindly receiving us, rings a bell, and, when the maid comes, gives her a key




266       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
and tells her to bring cider. Presently she takes us into the
garden. A pleasant garden, with plenty of large and fine pansies, some roses, and great promise of more. It is extremely
neat, clean and finely kept, and it is the pride of the mistress
that she takes the entire care of it herself; as we walk, she has
her scissors in her hand, and cuts flowers, and when we are seated in a curious little arbor of clipped yew, where she had left
her "work" when she came in to see us, she arranges nosegays
and presents them to us.
The house is small; the walls are of plain red brick; the roof
of slate, with but moderate pitch; the chimneys and windows of
the usual simple American country-house form and size. There
is no porch, veranda, gable or dormer, upon the garden side,
yet the house has a very pleasing and tasteful aspect, and does
not at all disfigure the lovely landscape of distant woody hills,
against which we see it. Five shillings' worth of material from
a nursery, half-a-day's labor of a man, and some recreative work
of our fair and healthy hostess' own hands, have done it vastly
better than a carpenter or mason could at a thousand times the
cost. Three large evergreen trees have grown near the end of
the house, so that, instead of the plain, straight, ugly red corner,
you see a beautiful, irregular, natural, tufty tower of verdure;
myrtle and jessamine clamber gracefully upon a slight trellis of
laths over the door; roses are trained up about one of the lower
windows, honeysuckle about another, while all the others, above
and below, are deeply draped and festooned with the ivy, which,
starting from a few slips thrust one day into the soil by the mistress, near the corner opposite the evergreens, has already covered two-thirds of the bare brick wall on this side, found its way
over the top of the tall yew-hedge, round the corner, climbed the
gable-end, and is now creeping along the ridge-pole and up the
kitchen chimney-which, before speaking only of boiled bacon




THE STABLES- GRO UNDS.                267
and potatoes, now suggests happy holly-hangings of the fireside
and grateful harvest's home, hides all the formal lines and angles,
breaks all the stiff rules of art, dances lightly over the grave precision of human handiwork, softens, shades and shelters all under
a gorgeous vesture of Heaven's own weaving.
Soon, while we are sitting in this leafy boudoir, comes "the
master," as good a specimen of the stout, hearty, old English
farmer as we shall find, and we go-lady and all-to look at
the horses, cows and pigs. The stables are mostly small, inconveniently separated, and badly fitted up, and there is but little in
them to boast of in the way of cattle; but there is one new building, incongruously neat among the rest, and in this there are
some roomy stalls, with iron mangers, sliding neck-chains, and
asphalte floor with grates and drain. Here is the best stock of
the farm: among the rest, a fine, fat Hereford cow, which has
just been sold to the butcher for $60, and a handsome heifer of
the same blood, heavy with calf, which has been lately bought
for $15, the farmer chuckling as he passes his hand over her
square rump, as if it had been a shrewd purchase. He values
his best dairy cow at $45.
We then go to the cider-mill and the sheds to look at some
implements; next to the ground, at some distance, where the laborers are all at work ridging for turnips, (Swedes or Ruta-baga.)
The larger part of the field is already planted, and in some other
fields the young plants are coming up. The turnip crop of the
farm this year is to be grown on one hundred acres, the whole
area of the farm being less than three hundred.
The soil of this field is a fine, light loam. It was last year in
wheat; the stubble was turned under soon after harvest with a
skin-coulter-plow, an instrument that pairs off the surface before the mould-board of the plow, and throws it first to the bottom of the furrow; cross-plowed and scarified again the same




268       AN AMIERICAiN FARNER IN' EINGLA ND.
season with one of the instruments described at page 85; in the
spring, plowed again, (eight inches deep,) harrowed fine and
smooth, thrown into ridges with double mould-board plow, rolled,
and finally drilled with a two horse machine that deposits and
covers manure and seed together. The manure is ground bones,
costing in Hereford 601 cents a bushel, mixed with sifted coalashes. The expense of this application is about $12 an acre,
but it must be remembered that the ground is already in high
condition. The drills are thirty inches apart. The crop is principally used to fatten sheep, of which 500 are kept on the farm;
the breed, Cotswold and Leicester.
We next went to a paddock in which were six Cotswold "tups"
(bucks), as handsome sheep (of their kind) as I ever saw. One
of them I caught and measured: girth behind the shoulders, exactly five feet; length from muzzle to tail, four feet and eleven
inches.
Then to the wheat, of which there was also about one hundred
acres, part after turnips and part after potatoes: the former,
which had been boned, looked the best. A part of the land had
been prepared by a presser (a corrugated roller used to give
solidity to light soils), and this was decidedly superior to the
remainder. Most of the wheat was put in with drilling machines,
of which there were two used, one sowing at greater intervals
than the other. Some of the wheat upon the pressed land, after
turnips, was the finest we have seen. The farmer expected it to
yield forty bushels of seventy pounds each, but would consider an
average of thirty, from the hundred acres, a very good crop.
He said the average crop of the county was thought to be but
eighteen and a half bushels.
We afterwards walked through some pasture and a grass-field,
and examined the hay in stacks; mostly rye-grass. The hayfields yielded one to two and a quarter tons an acre, the average




PRICES.                       269
being under two tons. It took about four days to cure it after
cutting, and the whole cost of hay-making was about four dollars
an acre. Hay from the stack, of the best quality, would sell at
this time in the city of Hereford for twelve dollars a ton.
The rent of this farm was seven dollars and a half an acre;
tithes, one dollar and a quarter an acre; road-rates, seventy
cents an acre; all paid by the farmer, together with poor-rates
and other burdens.
A good pair of sound, well-broken, but rather light cart-horses,
cost here $185; horse-cart, $60; harness and gear for each
horse, $12. A smith will keep a horse shod for $5 a year. Insurance of horses in the Royal Farmers' Company, 2} per cent.
of value per annum.
After taking tea at the farm-house, our kind guide, Brother
----—,made ready t9 depart by stuffing some tracts, publications of the Brethren, mostly of a meditative character, into our
packs; we might learn more of their ideas from them, he said,
and if they did not interest us, or after we had read them, it
might do some one else good to leave them at the inns where we
stopped, or in the public conveyances. He begged us if we got
into any trouble or needed any assistance for any purpose while
in England, to let him know; and so we parted. We had never
heard of this man, nor he of us, till twenty-four hours before.
He had then merely received word that three American Christians-wayfarers-would be passing through his town that night,
and so he came out into the highwaty seeking for us, found us,
and had so entertained us as I have shown. He would now
walk several miles alone and return home by the night-coach.
The farmer afterwards had his favorite greyhound let out for
us to see, and after another short stroll, finding that we were bent
upon leaving him that night, insisted on our coming to the garden again and tasting some choice cider made from the Hagloe




270       AN A MERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
crab-the pure juice he assured us it was-a good wholesome
English drink: a baby might fill its belly with it and feel none
the worse. So sitting on the door-steps, the lady and the dog
with us, we remained yet a long time, the farmer talking first of
sporting matters, and then getting into the everlasting topics of
Free Trade, and exorbitant rents, taxes and tithes.




TILE BACK PARISH.                  271
CHAPTER XL.
Walk with a Rustic —Family Meeting —A Recollection of the Rhine —
Ignorance and Degraded Condition of the English Agricultural Laborer
-How he is Regarded by his Superiors- The Principles of Government-Duties of the Governing - Education - Slavery- The Diet of
Laborers - Drink- Bread- Bacon - Fresh Meat.
WE were bound for Monmouth that night, and soon after sunset, having one of the farm laborers for a guide, we struck
across the fields into another lane. About a mile from the farmhouse, there was a short turn, and at the angle-the lane narrow and deep as usual-was a small, steep-roofed, stone building,
with a few square and arched windows here and there in it, and
a perfectly plain cube of stone for a tower, rising scarcely above
the roof-tree, with an iron staff and vane on one of its corners"Saint Some-one's parish church." There was a small graveyard,
enclosed by a hedge, and in a corner of this, but with three doors
opening in front upon the lane, was a long, crooked, dilapidated
old cottage. On one of the stone thresholds, a dirty, peevishlooking woman was lounging, and before her, lying on the ground
in the middle of the lane, were several boys and girls playing or
quarreling. They stopped as we came near, and rolling out of
the way, stared at us silently, and without the least expression
of recognition, while we passed among them. As we went on,




272  2    AN AMERICAN.FARMER IN ENGLAND.
the woman said something in a sharp voice, and our guide shouted in reply, without, however, turning his head, "Stop thy maw
-am going to Ameriky, aw tell thee." It was his "missis," he
said.
"Those were not your children that lay in the road?"
"Yaas they be-foive of'em."
So we fell into a talk with him about his condition and prospects; but before I describe it, let me relieve my page with a
glimpse of rustic character of another sort. It is one of the
pleasant memories of our later ramble on the Rhine that writing
of this incident recalls. A simple story, but illustrative in this
connection of the difference which the traveler commonly finds
between the English and the German poor people.
We had been walking for some miles, late in a dusky evening,
upon a hilly road, with an old peasant woman, who was returning from market, carrying a heavy basket upon her head and
two others in her hands. She had declined to let us assist her
in carrying them, and though she had walked seven miles in the
morning and now nearly that again at night, she had overtaken
us, and was going on at a pace that for any great distance we
should have found severe. At a turn of the road we saw the
figure of a person standing still upon a little rising ground before
us, indistinct in the dusk, but soon evidently a young woman. It
is my child, said the woman, hastily setting down her baskets
and running forward, so that they met and embraced each other
half way up the hill. The young woman then came down to us,
and, taking the great basket on her head, the two trudged on
with rapid and animated conversation, in kind tones asking and
telling of their experiences of the day, entirely absorbed with
each other, and apparently forgetting that we were with them,
until, a mile or two further on, we came near the village in
which they lived.




BREAD AND TOBACCO.                  273
Our guide was a man of about forty, having a wife and seven
children; neither he nor any of his family (he thought) could
read or write, and, except with regard to his occupation as agricultural laborer, I scarcely ever saw a man of so limited information. He could tell us, for instance, almost no more about the
church which adjoined his residence than if he had never seen it
-not half so much as we could discover for ourselves by a single
glance at it. He had nothing to say about the clergyman who
officiated in it, and could tell us nothing about the parish, except
its name, and that it allowed him and five other laborers to
occupy the "almshouse" we had seen, rent free. He couldn't
say how old he was (he appeared about forty); but he could say,
"like a book," that God was what made the world, and that
"Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners, of whom he
was chief"- of the truth of which latter clause I much doubted,
suspecting the arch fiend would rank higher, among his servants,
the man whose idea of duty and impulse of love had been satisfied with cramming this poor soul with such shells of spiritual
nourishment. He thought two of his children knew the catechism and the creed; did not think they could have learned it
from a book; they might, but he never heard them read; when
he came home and had gotten his supper, he had a smoke and
then went to bed. His wages were seven shillings - sometimes
had been eight-a-week. None of his children earned any thing;
his wife, it might be, did somewhat in harvest-time. But take
the year through, one dollar and sixty-eight cents a-week was all
they earned to support themselves and their large family. How
could they live? "Why, indeed, it was hard," he said; "sometimes, if we'd believe him, it had been as much as he could do
to keep himself in tobacco i" He mentioned this as if it was a
vastly more memorable hardship than that, oft-times, he could get
nothing more than dry bread for his family to eat. It was a
18




274       AN AMERICAN PARIMER IN ENGLAND.
common thing that they had nothing to eat but dry bread. He
got the flour-fine, white wheatenflour-from the master. They
kept a hog, and had so much bacon as it would make to provide
them with meat for the year. They also had a little potato patch,
and he got cheese sometimes from the master. He had tea, too,
to his supper. The parish gave him his rent, and he never was
called upon for tithes, taxes, or any such thing. In addition to
his wages, the master gave him, as he did all the laborers, three
quarts either of cider or beer a-day, sometimes one and sometimes
the other. He liked cider best - thought there was "more
strength to it." Harvest-time they got six quarts, and sometimes,
when the work was very hard, he had had ten quarts.
He had heard of America and Australia as countries that poor
folks went to - he did not well know why, but supposed wages
were higher, and they could live cheaper. His master and other
gentlemen had told him about those places, and the laboring
people talked about them among themselves. They had talked
to him about going there. (America and Australia were all one
-two names for the same place, for all that he knew.)  He
thought his master or the parish would provide him the means
of going, if he wanted. We advised him to emigrate then, by all
means, not so much for himself as for his children; the idea of
his bringing seven, or it might yet be a dozen, more beings into
the world to live such dumb-beast lives, was horrible to us. I
told him that in America his children could go to school, and
learn to read and write and to enjoy the revelation of God; and
as they grew up they would improve their position, and might be
land-owners and farmers themselves, as well off as his master; and
he would have nothing to pay, or at least but a trifle that he could
gratefully spare, to have them as well educated as the master's son
was being here; that where I came from the farmers would be
glad to give a man like him, who could -" plow and sow and reap




TIlE PEASANTR Y.                 275
and mow as well as any other in the parish," eighteen shillings
a-week
"And how much beer?"
"None at all  "
"None at all? ha, ha! he'd not go then-you'd not catch him
workin' withouten his drink. No, no! a man'ould die off soon
that gait."
It was in vain that we offered fresh meat as an offset to the
beer. There was "strength," he admitted, in beef, but it was
wholly incredible that a man could work on it. A working-man
must have zider or beer-there was no use to argue against that.
That "Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners," and
that " work without beer is death," was the alpha and omega of
his faith.
The laborers in this part of England (Hereford, nMonmouth,
Gloucester, and Wiltshire) were the most degraded, poor, stupid,
brutal, and licentious that we saw in the kingdom. We were told
that they were of the purest Saxon blood, as was indeed indicated
by the frequency of blue eyes and light hair among them. But I
did not see in Ireland, or in Germany or in France, nor did I ever
see among our negroes or Indians, or among the Chinese or MIalays, men whose tastes were such mere instincts, or whose purpose
of life and whose mode of life was so low, so like that of domestic animals altogether, as these farm-laborers.
I was greatly pained, mortified, ashamed of old mother England, in acknowledging this; and the more so that I found so few
Englishmen who realized it, or who, realizing it, seemed to feel
that any one but God, with His laws of population and trade, was
at all accountable for it. Even a most intelligent and distinguished Radical, when I alluded to this element as a part of the character of the country, in replying to certain very favorable comparisons he had been making of England with other countries,




276       A N AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
said -" We are not used to regard that class in forming a judgment of national character." And yet I suppose that class is
larger in numbers than any other in the community of England.
Many have even dared to think that, in the mysterious decrees
of Providence, this balance of degradation and supine misery is
essential to the continuance of the greatness, prosperity, and elevated character of the country-as if it were not indeed a part
of the country.
A minister of the Gospel, of high repute in London, and whose
sermons are reprinted and often repeated in America, from the
words of Christ, "the poor ye have always among you," argued
lately that all legislation or cooperative benevolence that had the
tendency and hope of bringing about such a state of things that
a large part of every nation should be independent of the charity
of the other part, was heretical and blasphemous. Closely allied
to such ideas are the too common notions of rulers and subjects.
In America we hold that a slave, a savage, a child, a maniac,
and a condemned criminal, are each and all born-equally with
us, with our President, or with the Queen of England, free and
self-governing; that they have the same natural rights with us;
but that attached to those natural rights were certain duties, and
when we find them, from whatever cause-no matter whether the
original cause be with them, or our fathers, or us -unable to
perform those duties, we dispossess them of their rights: we
restrain, we confine, we master, we govern them.  But in
taking upon ourselves to govern them, we take other duties, and
our first duty is that which is the first duty of every man for
himself-improvement, restoration, regeneration. By every consideration of justice, by every noble instinct, we are bound to
make it our highest and chiefest object to restore them, not the
liberty first, but the capacity for the liberty-for exercising the
duties of the liberty —which is their natural right. And so much




GO VEYRN'MENT.                   277
of the liberty as they are able to use to their own as well as our
advantage, we are bound constantly to allow them -nay, more
than they show absolute evidence of their ability to use to advantage. We must not wait till a child can walk alone before
we put it on its legs; we must not wait till it can swim before we
let it go in the water. As faith is necessary to self-improvement,
trust is necessary to education or restoration of another: as necessary with the slave, the savage, the maniac, the criminal, and the
peasant-as necessary, and equally with all necessary-as with
the child.
Is not this our American doctrine in its only consistent extension? We govern in trust only for another, and a part of our
trust is the restoration of the rightful owner, by helping him towards that sound and well-informed mind and intelligent judgment
that makes him truly free and independent. This is the only
government that we of the free United States of America, whether
as fathers or children, statesmen or jurymen, representatives or
rabble, either claim or acknowledge. And it is of this that all true
Americans believe - "that is the best government that governs
the least." Using government in its properly restricted sense, as
the authority and forcible direction of one over another, we hold
this to be as self-evident as that the life of free love is better than
the life of constrained legality, that the sentiment of mutual trust
is nobler than that of suspicion or of fear, that the new dispensation of Christ is higher than the old one of Moses. What else
there is, than this care over the weak and diseased in the public
administration of our affairs, is no more than associated labor —
the employment of certain common servants for the care of the
commonwealth.
Education, then, with certain systematic exercise or discipline
of the governed, having reference to and connected with a gradual
elevation to equal freedom with the governing, we hold to be a




278       AN1 AMERICAN FARMTER IN ENGLAND.
very necessary part of all rightful government. Where it is not,
we say this is no true and rightful government.
But we shall be at once asked, Is your fugitive law designed
for such purposes? Do your slaveholders govern the simpleminded Africans, whom they keep in restraint on these principles?
So far as they do not, their claim is "heretical and blasphemous."
Let us never hesitate to acknowledge it —any where and every
where to acknowledge it — and before all people mourn over it.
Let us, who need not to bear the heavy burden and live in the
dark cloud of this responsibility, never, either in brotherly love,
national vanity, or subjection to insolence, fear to declare that, in
the misdirection of power by our slaveholders, they are false to
the basis of our Union and blasphemous to the Father, who,
equally and with equal freedom, created all men. Would that
they might see, too, that while they continue to manifest before
the world, in their legislation upon it, no other than mean, sordid,
short-sighted, and barbarian purposes, they must complain, threaten, expostulate, and compromise in vain. If we drive back the
truth of God, we must expect ever-recurring, irrestrainable, irresistible reaction. The law of God in our hearts binds us in
fidelity to the principles of the Constitution. They are not to be
found in "Abolitionism," nor are they to be found-remember it,
brothers, and forgive these few words — in hopeless, dawnless,
unredeeming slavery.
And so we hold that party in England, who regard their laboring class as a permanent providential institution, not to be improved in every way, educated, fitted to take an equal share with
all Englishmen in the government of the commonwealth of England, to be tyrants, and insolent rebels to humanity.  (Many of
them as good-souled men as the world contains, nevertheless.)
I have before said, and I repeat it with confidence, thiat I




FOOD AND DRINK.                   279
believe this party to be the weaker one in England. I believe
that the love of justice, freedom, and consistency, is stronger with
Englishmen than the bonds of custom, self-conceit, and blind
idolatry of human arrangement, under however sacred names it
has come to them.
But our British friends will ask, Would it be practicable to
give these poor toiling semi-brutes any-the smallest-exercise
of that governmental power, which, so far as they be not wholly
brutes is their right? Yes, we American farmers would judge:
yes, there are offices to be performed for the commonwealth of
each parish or neighborhood, of the requirements of which they
are, or soon would make themselves, fit judges. If there are not,
then make such offices. Who is a kind, firm, and closely-scrutinizing master; who is a judicious and successful farmer; who is
an honest dealer with them; who is a skillful plowman, a good
thatcher, a good hedge-trimmer, in the mile or two about them,
they always have formed a judgment.
With regard to the habits of drinking, and the customary diet
of those by whose labor England is mainly supplied with food, I
fear my statements may be incredible to Americans; I therefore
quote from authority that should be better informed.
A correspondent of the Agricultural Gazette mentions that, in
Herefordshire and Worcestershire, the allowance of cider given
to laborers, in addition to wages, is "one to ten gallons a-day."
He observes that, of course, men can not work without some
drink, but that they often drink more than is probably of any
advantage to them, and suggests that an allowance of money be
given instead of cider, and the laborers be made to buy their
drink. In this way, he thinks, they would not be likely to drink
more than they needed, and it would be an economical operation
for both parties. In Normandy, the cider district of France,
three gallons a-day is the usual allowance of laborers.




280        AN AJIERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
" The usual allowance given in Herefordshire by masters, is three quarts
a-day; and in harvest-time many laborers drink in a day ten or twelve
quarts of a liquor that, in a stranger's mouth, would be mistaken for vinegar." —Johnson and Errington on the Apple.
"Bacon, when they can get it, is the staff of the laborers' dinner." " The
frugal housewife provides a large lot of potatoes, and while she indulges
herself with her younger ones only with salt, cuts off the small rasher and
toasts it over the plates of the father and elder sons, as being the breadwinners; and this is all they want."-"A Rector and Consevvative,n in the Times.
"After doing up his horses he takes breakfast, which is made of flour,
with a little butter, and water'from the tea-kettle' poured over it. lie
takes with him to the field a piece of bread and (if he has not a young
family and can afford it) cheese, to eat at midday. He returns home in the
afternoon to a few potatoes, and possibly a little bacon, though only those
who are better off can afford this. The supper very often consists of bread
and water."-"The Times Commissioner," in Wiltshire, 1851.
It would be unjust not to add, that in a large part of England
the laborers are much more comfortable than these statements
might indicate. I am also convinced that the condition of the
laborer generally is improving; and that he is now in a much
better condition than ten years ago. The main stay of the laborer's stomach is fine, white wheaten bread, of the best possible
quality, such as it would be a luxury to get any where else in
the world, and such as many a New England farmer never tasted,
and, even if his wife were able to make it, would think an extravagance to be ordinarily upon his table.  No doubt a coarser
bread would be more wholesome, but it is one of the strongest
prejudices of the English peasant, that brown bread is not fit for
human beings. In Scotland and Ireland, and in some hilly districts of England, only, wheat bread is displaced by more wholesome and economical preparations of oatmeal.
With regard to fresh meat, a farmer once said to me, "They
will hardly taste it all their lives, except, it may be, once a year,




FRESH 3MEAT.                   281
at a fair, when they'll go to the cook-shops and stuff themselves
with all they'll hold of it; and if you could see them, you'd say
they did not know what it was or what was to be done with itcutting it into great mouthfuls and gobbling it down without any
chewing, like as a fowl does barleycorns, till it chokes him."




282       AN AMERICAN FARMIER IN EiVGLAND.
CHAPTER XLI.
Tintern Abbey and the Wye — English Screw Steamers- Tide Deluge -
St. Vincent's Rocks-Bristol-Built Vessels- The Vale of Gloucester -
Whitfield " Example Farm "- Hedge-Row Timber — Drainage — Buildings- Stock - Soiling-Manure - Wheat- Beets and Turnips-Disgraceful Agriculture- The Landed Gentry - Wages of Laborers.
Chepstow.
WE have had a fierce storm of wind and rain to-day, notwithstanding which we have "done" (I am sorry to use the
word) Tintern Abbey and the celebrated scenery of the WTye.
The first every body has heard of, and many have dined off it;
for it is the subject of a common crockery picture. It is "a grand
exhibition of Gothic ruins, admittance twenty-five cents; children half-price." It is indeed exceedingly beautiful and interesting, and would be delightful to visit, if one could stumble into it
alone and contemplate it in silence; but to have a vulgar, sycophantic, chattering showman, locking himself in with you, fastening himself to your elbow, holding an umbrella over you, and
insisting exactly when, where, what and how much you shall admire-there was more poetry on the dinner-plate.
The scenery of the Wye has, at some points, much grandeur.
They say there is nothing else like it in England. There is much
with the same character, however, in America; and as we were




BRISTOL B UIL T.                 283
familiar with scenes of greater sublimity, we found that we had
been led to expect too much, and were rather disappointed
with it.
We took passage from Chepstow to Bristol in a small iron
screw-steamer. She was sharp and neatly modeled, and made
very good speed-about fifteen knots. The captain said he
could show his stern to any side-wheel steamer of her size in
England. Near the junction of the Wye and the Severn there
is a good breadth of water, and we fbund here a heavy swell and
a reefing breeze. The little boat, with a small gaff-sail forward,
"just to steady her," threw it off one side and the other, and
made her way along handsomely and comfortably. It is my impression, that the English are a good deal ahead of us with screwcraft.
The tide-current in these rivers is a furious torrent. The rise
and fall at Chepstow is fifty-three feet! (Daniel's Shipmaster's
Directory.) At Bristol, I think it is even greater than this.
The striking effects upon the banks, and the difficulty of navigation, may be imagined. Hence it is that Bristol ships have
always been noted for strength, and so arose the term "Bristolbuilt," to describe any structure well put together.
St. Vincent's rocks, of which I had often heard sailors speak
-immense banks of solid rock, that, for some miles below Bristol, the narrow, canal-like river flows between-are indeed very
grand. It was most impressive to meet between them a merchant ship of the largest class —the tiny boy that we looked upright to see upon her royal yard not high enough by some hundred feet to look over them. And yet so perpendicular are they,
and so narrow is the stream, that they are preparing to throw an
arch over between them.
Passing with too little delay through the interesting towns of
Clifton and Bristol, I parted with my friends, and went on the




284       AN AII[ERICAN PARMIER IN ENGLAND.
same day into the agricultural region known as the Vale of
Gloucester.
The general aspect of this district is exceedingly beautiful;
undulating, like Herefordshire, with more frequent extensive fiat
surfaces, very large hedges, and much timber; thickly peopled,
the cottages and farm buildings old and picturesque, and the
fields well stocked with cattle.
The agriculture of the-ddistrict is similar to that of Cheshire,
except that it is in general much behind it, neither draining nor
boneing having been common improvements. The people I fell
in with were usually lacking equally in courtesy and intelligence,
and I learned nothing of value agriculturally, until I reached, at
near nightfall, a farm conducted agreeably to the wishes of one
of the landlords of the Vale, especially with the intention of giving his tenants an example of a better system of farming than
they were accustomed to be content with.
For this purpose, an ordinary farm of 260 acres, in the midst
of the estate, was, about ten years ago, put into the hands of an
excellent Scotch Agriculturist, Mr. Morton. His first movement
was to remove the superfluous fences and the enormous quantity
of hedge-row timber that the farm, like all others in the district,
was encumbered with. It gives us a great idea of the amount of
this, as well of the value of timber in England, to learn that
what was thus obtained merely from the fences of 260 acres was
sold for over $17,000! There is now very little, if any, interior
fencing upon the farm. The surface-water was drawn into one
channel, and the whole farm under-drained with three-feet drains.
Upon the steeper slopes the drains were laid with small stones,
otherwise with tile. This was the only case in which I heard of
stones being used by any good farmer of late years in England
for drains. Even where stone is in the way upon the surface, it
is found more economical to employ tile or pipes. After thor



" THE EXAMPLE FARI'L"                285
ough drainage, every acre of the farm was subsoiled, and gradually the whole was limed, at the rate of one hundred and twenty
bushels an acre, and divided into ten-acre lots, without fences.
Not the least unpractical labor or expense for show has been
made. The walls, gates, farm-house, stables and outbuildings,
are all of simple, even rude construction. As far as I could
judge, every arrangement and every practice upon the farm was
such as would commend itself to any farmer, and might be easily
followed by any one who could command the capital which a
similar extent of soil would seem to need for its profitable cultivation. Almost every inch of the surface outside the buildings
and the lane is tilled, there being no pasture. In the stables we
found a stock of mongrel cows, mostly of Herefbrd and Shorthorn blood, bought to be fattened. No stock is raised. Each
cow was in a separate loose box. They are fed at this season
with clover and trefoil, and supplied with a great profusion of
straw litter. The manure is allowed to accumulate under them
until it becomes inconvenient. The cows appeared to be in
healthy and thriving condition; they were generally lying down
and quietly ruminating with an aspect of entire satisfaction.
The horse-stalls were of a form and size most common in our
cities; the horses rather lighter than the ordinary English
draught-horses. A steam-engine is employed for threshing, cutting turnips, etc. All the crops but wheat, are fed upon the
farm, and all the straw is used as litter; of course an immense
stock of manure is manufactured, and little or none needs to be
bought to sustain a high fertility and large crops of every kind.
Under this system, Mr. Morton is able to grow wheat every
second year; so that one-half the farm was covered with magnificent crops of this grain, likely to yield full forty bushels an acre,
which would be worth at least $6,000. The wheat is all drilled,
and looked to me particularly clean and even. The alternate




286        AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
crops are carrots, mangel-wurzel, ruta-baga, potatoes and clover.
Of the latter, forty acres; of the roots, mangel-wurzel occupied
the largest space.  Mr. Morton told me that he had, of late,
much preferred it to turnips; thought he could get thirty tons
from an acre that would only yield twentyof ruta-baga, with
similar expense. A few acres were devoted to vegetables and
fruit for the family, and to the raising of seeds for the root-crops.
I do not recollect to have seen a weed on the farm, except among
the potatoes, which were being hoed by laborers, with very large
hoes made for the purpose.
Of course the expense of such improvement as I have described was very great; but the proprietor considers it to have
been a good investment. It is now leased by Mr. Morton and
his son.
It is called "Example Farm;" how appropriately, may be
judged by the following description of an ordinary farm of the
county, by the "Times' Commissioner:" *
" An inconvenient road conducted us to the entrance-gate of a dilapidated
farm-yard, one side of which was occupied by a huge barn and wagon-shed,
and the other by the farm-house, dairy and piggeries. The farm-yard was
divided by a wall, and two lots of milch-cows were accommodated in the
separate divisions. On one side was a temporary shed, covered with bushes
and straw. Beneath this shed there was a comparatively dry lair for the
stock; the yard itself was wet, dirty and uncomfortable. The other yard
was exactly the counterpart of this, except that it wanted even the sheltershed. In these two yards are confined the dairy-stock of the farm during
the winter months; they are supplied with hay in antique, square hayracks, ingeniously capped over, to protect the hay, with a thatched roof,
very much resembling the pictures of Robinson Crusoe's hut. In each yard
two of them are placed, round which the shivering animals station themselves as soon as the feeder gives them their diurnal ration, and then patiently ruminate the scanty contents. A dripping rain fell as we looked at
* Mr. Caird, a special traveling correspondent upon agriculture, of the Times.




LANDLORDS.                          287
them, from which their heads were sheltered by the thatched roof of the
hay-rack, only to have it poured in a heavier stream on their necks and
shoulders. In the other yard the cows had finished their provender, and
showed their dissatisfaction with its meagre character by butting each other
round the rack. The largest and greediest having finished her own share,
immediately dislodges her neighbor, while she, in her turn, repeats the
blow upon the next, and so the chase begins, the cows digging their horns
into each other's sides, and discontentedly pursuing one another through
the wet and miry yard. Leaving the yard we passed into the fields, sinking at every step in the sour, wet grass-lands. Here, little heaps of dung,
the exhausted relics of the hay, from which the cows derive their only support in winter, were being scattered thinly over the ground, to aid in the
production of another crop of hay."
I have shown how much good a wealthy landlord may find
it his profit to do in the way of improving agriculture. Mr.
Caird intimates that for such a state of things as is exhibited in
the last picture, we are also to hold the landlord accountable.
Mr. Caird likewise says, "On all hands the farmer suffers: he
pays rent for space occupied by his landlord's trees; he provides
harbor for his landlord's game, which, in return, feed upon his
crops; [it is for this reason many landlords will not allow the
fences to be touched;] if he attempts to plough out inferior pasture, his crop becomes an additional feeding-ground for the game;
whilst the small fields and crooked fences prevent all efforts at
economy of labor, and compel him either to restrict his cultivation, or execute it negligently and unprofitably."
God keep us evermore free from  a "powerful conservative
landed gentry," a curse not unmixed with good though it be.
Wages of laborers were mentioned to me at 8s. Caird says
7s. and 8s., and sometimes 6s.; but it was added, significantly,
that 6s. worth of work is only given in such a case.




288       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XLII.
Bath - Warminster- Surly Postmaster- A Doubtful Character-Polite
Innkeeper and Pretty Chambermaid - The Tap-Room fire-side —Rustic
Civility —Rainy Morning in a Country Inn- Coming to Market-The
Road in a Storm - Scudding.
IT was raining hard when I again reached Bristol, and I at
once jumped on board a train ready to leave for Bath. Here
I found that my friends had walked on, and after looking at the
6"pump-room" and a grimy old cathedral, and getting a dinner, I
determined to follow them. There was no public conveyance
that evening, and I started on foot, thinking to overtake them at
Warminster.
At the top of a high hill I stopped under a tree during a temporary torrent of rain, and looked back at what I could not help
thinking would be a grand view if there were but a gleam of
sunshine upon it; perhaps it was grander by help of the imagination in the obscurity of the rain and drifting scud and murky
cloud of smoke that was swept fragrant towards me from the city.
Bath is situated among and up the sides of extensive hills, and
the country about it is much of it well wooded and studded with
numerous villas. The town is remarkably well built, with numerous stately terrace-houses, of the same fine, soft-tinted sandstone (Bath-stone) that I described at Liverpool. It is a famous




THE WARMINSTER ROAD.                  289
old watering-place, you know; "a mort of merry-making" there
has been in it in days past, but now, though by no means a decayed town, I believe its glory in this respect has departed. I
should judge it still to be a place of great wealth and elegance,
but less distinguished for gayety and folly than formerly. All I
can say of the inhabitants really, from personal observation, is,
that they "know enough to stay in when it rains," for I hardly
saw one in the streets, except the men who were waiting by the
little covered "chairs," such as Mrs. Skewton is represented by
Cruikshanks to be wheeled about in by her lanky page. I saw
hundreds of these, ranged in the streets as hackney-coaches are
in our towns, but no carriage of any kind, public or private; perhaps the Bath coachmen had again "met to a cold swarry."
After a walk of two miles into the country, I found I had been
misdirected, and had a good deal of difficulty in finding the right
road. I once asked the way of two laborers, and their replies
were in such language, and they were so stupid, that I could not
get the least idea of what they meant. My guess was, that they
either could not understand what I wanted, or that they did not
know themselves whether or not it was the Warminster road that
they were at work upon. It was after four o'clock when I at
length got upon the straight road, with seventeen miles before me
-a hilly road, with a thin, slimy chalk-mud under foot. I
stopped once again during another tremendous torrent, taking the
opportunity to bait at a neat little inn, and reached Warminster,
after a hard pull, at nine o'clock. The first building in the town,
as you come from Bath, is a fine old church, going round the
yard of which you enter abruptly upon a close-built street of old
thatched two-story houses.
The postmaster had no letters for me, and seemed to be very
angry that I should have expected him to have. I looked from
one inn to another, not finding my friends, and finally, muddy,
19




290       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
wet, and tired enough, stopped at what seemed the last in the
street, a house of humble appearance.
I desired to be showed to my room. Master, mistress, maid,
and Boots immediately surrounded and eyed me closely, and I
could not but remember that I might, probably, bear a suspicious
appearance to them. As I take off my cape, maid-a nice, kindlooking, black-eyed little girl-catches it up, and runs off to hang
it by the kitchen fire (an absurd operation, as it is made of oiled
silk); she is back in a moment with a light, and, lifting my knapsack, shows me up to a pleasant room, with a deep, dark-curtained
bed-slides out, and is again back in a moment with slippers, and
asks to take my shoes to be dried, and what would I wish for
supper? I decline supper, and intend to go to bed at once.
Down she goes, and, after a moment more, in pops the landlord.
" Was you understood aright, sir?-no supper, sir?-not coming
down, sir? —going to bed, sir?-directly, sir, without supper, sir?"
and while saying this, he bustles about the room, locks the closet
doors, puts the keys in his pocket, and then turns towards me
with a suspicios look at my knapsack. "Yes," I answer, quietly; and, drawing out shirt, socks, and tooth-brush, "I took
supper upon the road, and I thought I had best get my clothes
off, and at once to bed."  "Ah! I see, sir; quite right, sir; ah!
yes, sir; dry stockings too, sir; yes, sir; indeed, sir, I was not
aware; beg pardon, sir: but, indeed, would you step down stairs
a moment, sir —fine fire in the tap, sir —dry yourself, if you would
please, for a moment, I would have the room put in better order
for you, sir; indeed, the bed is hardly-if you would, sir-thank
you, sir."
In the tap-room were three fellows with smock-frocks. As I
approached, one called to another, who was nearer the fire, to
give me his seat, and offered me, with truly rustic grace, his halfemptied pot of beer. I dislike to repulse what is meant for




RUSTICS.                     291
kindness; so I tasted it, and tried to enter into conversation with
them. I soon found it was impossible; for I could make nothing
of two-thirds of their replies, and I doubted if they could understand me much better. So I contented myself with listening,
while they continued to talk or mumble with each other. The
subjects of their conversation were beer and " the girls:" of the
latter topic they said nothing to be repeated; of the former, they
wished the farmers never gave worse drink than that they were
now enjoying -" it was most good for nothing, some of it, what
they gave out." And one told how he had had to drink so much
of it once, it had made him clear sick; and then another told
how, on the other hand, he had made himself sick one day, when
somebody wouldn't give him as much beer as he wanted, by
taking a draught of cold water.
When the little maid came in to say that my bed was now
" quite ready," and I rose to withdraw from the circle, they all
gave a singular jerk forward of their heads and touched their
foreheads with their right hand, as a parting salutation.
"Would you let me take something else down to be dried now,
sir, your coat, sir, or any thing - the socks, sir; thank you, sir.
Hope you'll sleep well, sir."
Well, I did sleep. It was nine in the morning when I awoke,
and there was a steady roar upon the tiles — the rain still continued. I drew the window-curtain, and there was Geoffrey
Crayon's picture almost to the life: a sleepy old gray mare
"letting it rain;" a draggle-tailed cock on a smoking dunghill,
eyeing with the air of a miserable sick saint the riotous orgies of
a company of mad ducks, deep in their favorite liquor; half a
dozen doves huddled moping together on the thatch of the stable
-a sombre tone over every thing, and rain, rain, ramn.
"Hope you rested well, sir," said the landlord, as I reached the
foot of the crooked stairs; " a dirty day, sir. Have your shoes,




292       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
sir?  What'll you please to have for breakfast, sir?  Steak, sir?
O yes, sir - or chop, sir; give you very nice chop, sir; yes, sir,
thank you, sir. Walk in here, sir?  Ready shortly, sir."
To get to the breakfast I was led through the kitchen, a large
room with saddles and box-coats and whips and straps hung up
with the bacon on the ceiling and walls. The breakfast-room
(dining-room) was much larger than any room you would have
supposed, from the front of the house, it was likely to contain.
Its plan was octagonal, with a single great red-curtained bowwindow and stately, high-backed chairs, suggesting a corporation
banquet.
" Going on, sir — yes, sir." All my things are brought, dry
and warm, and nicely folded; and now I have curiosity to know
what value is placed upon so much suavity. The landlord meets
my request with deprecating gesture and grimace, as if it was a
pity that the custom of society made such a form necessary between a host and his guest-as if he were about to say, "I am
grieved that you should mention it; really, it is I that am indebted to you for this honor; but if you insist, why"-ending the
aside, but still low, hurried, and indistinct —" sixpence for bed
and a shilling for breakfast, and (shall I say thre'pence?) for
Boots, sir."  " Yes, and the rest to that excellent little chambermaid, if you please."  "Oh, my little girl, sir; oh, thank ye, sir,
you are very good, sir-yes, sir, you can't miss it, sir; straight
road after you pass the gate, sir. Good-morning, sir; should be
glad to see you if you are this way again, sir, or any of your
friends. Good-morning, sir. Hope you'll have a fine day yet, sir!
It's slacking up e'en no*, I think. Indeed it is, sir! Ah, you'll
have a fine day for a walk, sir. Good-morning, sir."
If it slackens at all, it is only for a moment, and then the rain
pours down again densely and with renewed vehemence; and the
wind, coming from behind, fairly twists me about, and hurries me




THE ROAD IN A STORM.                 293
along in its strong, fitful gusts. It is market-day in Warminster,
and, as I go out, every body and every thing else seems to be
coming in. Men, women, and children, in all sorts of English
vehicles-spring-carts, taxed-carts, great broad-wheeled carts, or
long wagons, with bodies of a curious curved form flaring out
over the wheels, canvas tops, stretched over all, upon hoops;
sometimes two horses abreast, drawing them in a double set of
shafts; oftener two or three, and frequently four, five, or six, all
in a line (tandem), great, intelligent beasts, keeping well to the
left, where none will interfere with them, and they can legally
harm no one. (" Keep the left," is the rule of the road in England; not the right, as with us.) They are driven without reins;
and more than once this morning I saw the driver, well dosed
with beer, I suppose, and fatigued with night-work, fast asleep on
the top of his load. Once I saw a gentleman, who had nearly
run against one of these sleeping fellows, strike him smartly with
his whip as he passed-"You had best wake up, sir; who's your
master?"  "Mr., of, sir," answered the man, rubbing
himself. "Very well; I shall let him know what sort of a carter
he has." A Yankee driver, so waked up, would have replied to
the whip first, perhaps. Gentlemen come at a spanking pace, in
dog-carts, or in the saddle, screwing their heads as deep as they
can into their drab coats, bending low, and their hats pulled down
tight upon their brows, hardly ever with an umbrella, but with a
groom with gold hat-band by their side sometimes. They look
scowlingly, as they approach, at me; with my hat-brim turned
up before and down behind to shed the water from my face, my
water-proof cape tightly fastened at my waist behind, and swelling and fluttering before, my arms folded under it, I return their
inquiring stare complacently; some, as they come up, draw their
lips resolutely tighter, and give me about quarter of a nod, as if
they understood and approved my arrangement. MIen on foot,




294       AN A1MERICAN FARMER 1N ENGLAND.
and women, too, with clogs and pattens and old green and blue
umbrellas, and bundles and bags and baskets and hampers and
cages and parcels in handkerchiefs; old and young, lasses and
lads, generally three or four couples together, coming to town for
a holiday, loudly laughing and coarsely joking; bound to enjoy
themselves spite of the shameful indelicacy of the wind, and the
chill drenching of the rain, and the misplaced attachment to their
finery of the spattering mud.




WILTSHIRE LANDSCAPE.                 295
CHAPTER X/III.
The South-Downs —Wiltshire Landscape - Chalk and Flint-Irrigation -
The Cost and Profit of Water-Meadows - Sewerage Water - Irrigation
in Old Times.
SOON after leaving Warminster, began a quite different style
of landscape from any I have before seen: long ranges and
large groups of high hills with gentle and gracefully undulating
slopes; broad and deep dells between and within them, through
which flow in tortuous channels streamlets of exceedingly pure,
sparkling water. These hills are bare of trees, except rarely a
close body of them, covering a space of perhaps an acre, and evidently planted by man. Within the shelter of these you will
sometimes see that there is a large farm-house with small stables.
The valleys are cultivated, but the hills in greater part are covered, without the slightest variety, except what arises from the
changing contour of the ground, with short, fine grass, standing
thinly, but sufficiently close to give the appearance, at a little
distance from the eye, of a smooth, velvety, green surface.
Among the first of the hills I observed, at a high elevation, long
angular ramparts and earth-works, all greened over. Within
them, and at the summit of the hill, were several extensive
tumuli, evidently artificial (though I find nothing about it in the
books), and on the top of one of these was a shepherd and dog




296       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN? ENGLAND.
and a large flock of sheep, appearing of gigantic size against the
leaden clouds behind. In the course of the day I met with many
of these flocks, and nearly all the hill-land seemed given up to
them. I was upon the border, in fact, of the great South-down
district, and, during the next week, the greater part of the country
through which we were traveling, was of the same general character of landscape, though not always as green, varied, and
pleasing as in these outskirts.
Geologically, it is a chalk district, the whole earth, high and
low, and to any depth that I saw it exposed, being more or less
white, generally gray, but sometimes white as snow. The only
stone is flint, which occurs in small boulders or pebbles, cased in
a hardened crust of carbonate of lime mingled irregularly with
the chalk, more thickly on the hill-tops, and often gathered in
beds. The road is made of these flint pebbles, broken fine, and
their chalk-crust, powdered by the attrition of wheels, is worked
up into a slippery paste during such heavy rains as I was experiencing, and makes the walking peculiarly fatiguing. The soil
upon the hills is very dry and thin. In the valleys it is deeper
and richer, being composed, in a considerable part, of the wash
of the higher country, and the wheat and forage crops are often
very luxuriant. Advantage is sometimes taken of the streams to
form water-meadows, and the effect of irrigation can often be
seen at a considerable distance in the deeper green and greater
density of the grass upon them. As these meadows are of great
agricultural value, I will describe the method of construction and
management of them.
An artificial channel is made, into which the water of a brook
may be turned at will. This is carried along for as great a distance as practicable, so as to skirt the upper sides of fields of a
convenient surface for irrigation. At suitable intervals there are
gates and smaller channels, and eventually a great number of




WATER-MEADO WS.                   297
minor ducts, through which the water is distributed. The fields
are divided by low walls, so that the water can be retained upon
them as long as is desired, and then drawn off to a lower level.
Commonly, a series of meadows, held by different farmers, are
flooded from one source, and old custom or agreement fixes the
date of commencing the irrigation and the period of time at which
the water shall be moved from one to another.
The main flooding is usually given in October, after the grass
has been closely eaten off by neat stock. It is then allowed to
remain resting or quietly flowing over the land for two or three
weeks; or for two weeks, and, after an interval of a day or two,
for two weeks more. This consolidates the grassy surface, and
encourages the growth of roots. The grass springs and grows
luxuriantly after it, and, as soon as it is observed to flag, the
water is again let in for two or three weeks; it may be twice
during the winter. Whenever a scum is observed to form, indicating that decomposition is commencing below, the water is immediately drawn. In warm weather this will occur very soon,
perhaps in a day or two. I believe it is intended not to allow
the water ever to freeze upon the meadows. In the spring, by
the middle of March, sometimes, sheep and lambs are turned on
to the grass. After being fed pretty closely, they are removed,
and the meadows are left for a crop of hay. They are ready for
mowing in less than two months, and are then, after a short interval, pastured again with horned cattle and horses. Some
meadows are never pastured, and yield three heavy crops of
hay. Mr. Pusey (a member of Parliament) declares, that he
keeps sheep upon his water-meadows, in Berkshire, at the rate
of thirty-six an acre, well fed, and intimates his belief that the
produce of grass-land is doubled by irrigation. Grass and hay,
however, from irrigated meadows, are of slightly less nourishing
quality. It is generally said, that a single winter's flooding will




298       AN A-MERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
increase the growth of grass equal to a top-dressing of thirty
(thirty bushel) loads of dung.
We may judge somewhat from these facts and opinions of
practical men, whether, in any given circumstances, we can afford
to construct the dam, channels, gates, sluices, etc., by which we
may use this method of fertilizing our meadows. There are
millions of acres in the United States that could be most readily
made subject to the system. The outlay for permanent works
might often be very inconsiderable, and the labor of making use
of them, after construction, would be almost nothing. The cost
of conveying manure, and its distribution by carts and manual
labor, is a very important item in the expenditure of most of our
eastern farms; and, though this is felt less here, where labor is
cheaper, we may obtain many economical hints with regard to it
from British practice. Fields distant from the farmstead, and
hill-lands not easily accessible, should nearly always be enriched
by bone, guano and other concentrated manures; of which a man
may carry more on his back than will be of equal value with
many cart-loads of dung, or by some other means which will dispense with long and heavy transportation. I have obtained increased crops, with a saving of some hundred dollars a-year of
expenditure, in this way.
Different streams vary in their value for irrigation. The
muddiest streams are the best, as they generally carry suspended
a great deal of the fertile matter of the land through which they
have flowed; often, too, road-washings, and other valuable drainings, have been taken along with them, and these are caused to
be deposited upon the meadow. A perfectly transparent fluid
will often, however, have most valuable salts in solution; and I
noticed that most of the Wiltshire streams were peculiarly clear,
reminding me of the White Mountain trout-brooks. It is said
that streams abounding in fish, and which have abundance of




SEWERAGE MANURE.                    299
aquatic plants and luxuriant vegetation upon their borders, are
to be relied upon as the most enriching in their deposit.
Streams into which the sewerage of large towns is emptied, are
often of the greatest value for agricultural purposes. A stream
thus enriched is turned to important account near Edinburg: certain lands, which were formerly barren wastes, being merely the
clean, dry sands thrown up by the sea in former times, havinhg
been arranged so that they may be flowed. The expense of the
operation was great-about one hundred dollars an acre-and
the annual cost of flooding is very much greater than usualfour or five dollars an acre; but the crops of hay are so frequent
and enormous (ten cuttings being made in a season), that some
parts of the meadow rent for one hundred dollars a-year for one
acre, and none for less than seventy-five dollars!
It is estimated by the distinguished agriculturist, Smith of
Deanston, that the sewerage-water of a town may be contracted
for, to be delivered, (sent by subterranean pipes and branches,
so that it may be distributed over any required surface,) eleven
miles out of town, for four cents a ton. Mr. Hawksley, a prudent engineer, offers to convey it five miles, and raise it two hundred feet, for five cents a ton; the expense of carting it to the
same distance and elevation being estimated at about $1. Another estimate makes the.expense of conveying and distributing
manure, in the solid form, as compared with liquid, at fifteen dollars to seventy-five cents, for equal fertilizing values. Professor
Johnston estimates the annual fertilizing value of the sewerage
of a town of one thousand inhabitants, as equal to a quantity
of guano which, at present American prices, would be worth
$13,000. Smith of Deanston estimates the cost of manuring an
acre by sewerage, conveyed in aqueducts and distributed by jet-:pipes, at three dollars an acre, and that of fertilizing it to an
equal degree, in the usual way, by farm-yard manure, at fifteen




300        AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENVGLAND.
dollars. Considering that the expense of conveyance and distribution of solid manure is much greater in America than in England, these figures are not without personal interest to us.
The use of manure-drainings and the urine of the cattle of a
farm, very much diluted with spring water, has been found to
have such astonishing immediate effects, when distributed over
young herbage, that several English agricultural pioneers are
making extensive and costly permanent arrangements for its distribution, from their stables, over large surfaces. It is first collected in tanks, where it is retained until putrefied, and mixed
with the water of irrigation. This is then driven by forcingpumps into the pipes which convey it, so that it can be distributed, (in one case, over one hundred and seventy acres.) The
pipes are hard-burnt clay-pipes, an inch thick, joined with cement, costing here about twelve and a-half cents a-yard. The
pipe is laid under ground, and at convenient intervals there are
heads coming to the surface with stop-cocks, where a hose can
be attached and the water further guided in any direction. For
greater distances, a cart like those used for sprinkling the dusty
streets of our cities is used. It is conjectured that, eventually,
all manure will be furnished to land in a state of solution.
I believe irrigation is only used for grass in England; but it
probably would be found of great advantage to other valuable
crops. I have seen large fields of roots, apparently of the character of turnips, irrigated in China: rice, though it grows very
well on dry land, is so much benefited by irrigation that it is
hardly anywhere made a staple crop, unless there are facilities
for irrigation. I suspect that irrigation, and even that expensive
form of it that I have last described, might be profitably used,
for certain plants, by our market-gardeners; for celery and asparagus for instance; and it is well known that enormous strawberries, and unusually large and long-continuing crops of them,
""" """~""^"J  ^"'b ~ ~     0 




GARDEN IRRIGATION.                      301
have resulted from an inefficient and unsystematic kind of irrigation. A small experiment, made by myself, with Indian corn,
resulted in a great growth of stalk and in unhealthy malformed
grain.*
Irrigation is of the least advantage upon heavy clay soils, and
of the greatest upon light sandy loams with gravelly subsoils.
It is very desirable that the construction of the soil should be
such that the water may gradually and somewhat rapidly filter
through it; and it is considered of great importance, when the
water is drawn off after the flooding (drowning is the local term),
that it should be very completely removed, leaving no small
pools upon the surface. Stagnating water, either above or below the surface, is poisonous to most plants.
I may remind those who have a prejudice against new practices in agriculture, that irrigation was practiced as long ago as
the days of the patriarchs. In this part of England it has been
in use since about the beginning of the seventeenth century, at
which time an agreeably-written book on the subject was published by one Rowland Vaughan, Esq. The account of the way
that he was first led to make systematic trial of irrigation, and
the manner in which he proceeded, is amusing and instructive:
" In the month of March I happened to find a mole or wont's nest raised
on the brim of a brook in my meade, like a great hillock; and from it there
issued a little streame of water (drawn by the working of the mole), down a
shelving ground, one pace broad, and some twenty in length. The running
of this little streame did at that time wonderfully content me, seeing it
pleasing greene, and that other land on both sides was full of moss, and
hide-bound for want of water. This was the first cause I undertook the
drowning of grounds.
" Now to proceed to the execution of my worke: being perswaded of the
excellency of the water, I examined how many foote fall the brooke yielded
* I have seen extensive fields of maize irrigated, on the Rio Grande, and scarcely any
is grown except by irrigation in the valley of that river.




302         AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
from my mill to the uppermost part of my grounds, being in length a measured mile. There laye of meadow land thirty acres overworn with age, and
heavily laden with moss, cowslips and much other imperfect grass, betwixt
my mill stream and the mane river, which (with two shillings cost) my
grandfather and his grandsire, with the rest, might have drowned at their
pleasure; but from the beginning never anything was done, that either tradition or record could witness, or any other testimonie.
"Having viewed the convenientest place, which the uppermost part of
my ground would afford for placing a commanding weare or sluce, I espied
divers water falls on my neighbours' grounds, higher than mine by seven or
eight foote: which gave me great advantage of drowning more ground,
than I was of mine own power able to do.
"I acquainted them with my purpose; the one being a gentleman of
worth and good nature, gave me leave to plant the one end of my weare on
his side the river: the other, my tenant, being very aged and simple, by no
perswasion I could use, would yield his consent, alledging it would marre
his grounds, yea, sometimes his apple trees; and men told him water would
raise the rush, and kill his cowslips, which was the chiefest flower his
daughters had to tricke the May-pole withal.
"After I had wrought thus far, I caused my servant, a joiner, to make a
levell to discover what quantity of ground I might obtaine from the entry
of the water; allowing his doubling course, compassing hills to carry it
plym or even, which fell out to be some three hundred acres.
"After I had plymned it upon a true levell, I betooke myself to the favour
of my tenants, friends and neighbours, in running my maine trench, which I
call my trench-royal. I call it so, because I have within the contents of my
worke, counter-trenches, defending-trenches, topping-trenches, winter and
summer-trenches, double and treble-trenches, a traversing-trench with a
point, and an everlasting-trench, with other troublesome trenches, which in
a map I will more lively expresse. When the inhabitants of the country
wherein I inhabit (namely the Golden Valley) saw I had begun some part
of my worke, they summoned a consultation against me and my man John,
the leveller, saying our wits were in our hands, not in our heads; so we
both, for three or four years lay levell to the whole country's censure for
such engineers as their forefathers heard not of, nor they well able to endure without merryments.
"In the running and casting of my trench-royal, though it was levelled




MAIDS AND MEADOWS.                       303
from the beginning to the end, upon the face of the ground, yet in the bottom I did likewise levell it to avoyde error.
"For the breadth and depth, my proportion is ten foote broad, and four
foote deep; unless in the beginning, to fetch the water to my drowning
grounds, I ran it some half mile eight foote deep, and in some places sixteen foote broad. All the rest of the course, for two miles and a half in
length, according to my former proportion. When my worke began in the
eye of the country to carry a shew of profit, it pleased many out of their
courtesie to give it commendations, and applaud the invention."
The author then makes a considerable digression, to account
for a delay in his proceedings, which was occasioned by processes
issued against him from the courts of Star Chamber, Chancery,
and Wardes, to compel him to deliver his niece and ward into
their custody.
" These courts," he observes, " bred more white haires in my head in one
year than all my wet-shod water-works did in sixteen. So leaving my
wanton ward in London, in. the custody of a precisian or puritan taylor,
who would not endure to heare one of his journeymen sweare by the cross
of his shears; so full was he of sanctity in deceipt. But the first news I
heard was, that he had married my Welch niece to his Englis nephew; and
at my return, I was driven to take his word, that he was neither privy to
the contract, nor the marriage."
Mr. Vaughan next gives the following directions for carrying
this plan into effect:
" Having prepared your drowning course, be very careful that all the
ground subject to the same, whether meadow, pasture, or arable, be as plain
as any garden-plotte, and without furrows. Then follows your attendance
in flood-times: see that you suffer not your flood water by negligence to
pass away into the brooke, river, and sea, but by your sluice command it
to your grounds, and continue it playing thereon so long as it appears
muddy. In the beginning of March clear your ground of cold water, and
keep it as dry as a child under the hands of a dainty nurse; observing generally that sandy ground will endure ten times more water than the clay.
A day or two before you mow, if sufficient showers have not qualified the




304         AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
drought of your ground, let down your sluice into your trench-royal, that
thereby you may command so much water to serve your turn as you desire.
Suffer it to descend where you mean first to mow, and you shall find this
manner of drowning in the morning before you mow so profitable and good,
that commonly you gain ten or twelve days' advantage in growing. For
drowning before mowing, a day, or even two or three, so supplies the
ground, that it doth most sweetly release the root of every particular
grasse, although the sun be never so extream hot. This practice will often
make a good second mowing, and in walking over grounds, I will tread as
on velvet, or a Turkey carpet."




SHEPHERDS AND FLOCKS.                 305
CHAPTER XLIV.
Flocks, Dogs, and Shepherds of Salisbury Plain —Village AlmshousesOstentation in Alms-giving — A Forced March - At Home in Salisbury
-The Street Brooks- The Cathedral- Architectural Remarks and
Advice- Village Churches.
THE chalk-hills, or downs (locally called beak-land), are unenclosed, and rarely separated from the cultivated land by more
than a low turf-wall, often not at all. Once, in the course of the
morning, I came near a flock of about two hundred sheep, feeding
close to the road, and stopped a few moments to look at them.
They were thorough-bred South-downs; the shepherd sat at a
little distance, upon a knoll, and the dog was nearer the flock.
Growing close up to the edge of the road, opposite the sheep, was
a heavy piece of wheat; one of them strayed over to it. The
dog cocked his ears and turned quickly several times towards his
master, as if knowing there was business for him, and waiting fox
orders. But the shepherd was looking another way, and others
of the flock, lifting their heads as I approached them, and seeing
their comrade on the other side of the road, began to rush after
him, as is the manner of sheep; and directly there were a dozen
eagerly nipping the wheat, and more following. The dog, sitting
erect, still waited for orders, till the shepherd, turning, spoke
quickly in a low monosyllable. Right over the heads of the
20




306       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
flock, bounding from head to head, sprang the dog, yelping
sharply as he reached the road; the truants returned, and the
whole flock broke at once into a hard run-the dog dashing first
one way, then the other, closing them rapidly up, and keeping
them in a dense mass, until, at another shout from the shepherd,
who had not risen, all at once halted, and, turning heads out, went
to feeding, soon closing about the dog, leaving only a space of a
few feet vacant around him. The dogs used by most of the shepherds seem to be mongrels, generally low in the legs, with great
heads, short necks, and rather shaggy. One that was said to be
very sagacious and well-trained, and for which I was asked thirty
dollars, appeared as if a cross of a spaniel with a terrier. Generally, the dogs were valued at only from two to five dollars.
It cleared about noon; and after the rain ceased the air was
calm, hot, and steamy. I recollect but one village, two rows of
ugly, glaring, red brick houses, relieved by a church, rectory, and
two other buildings, cool and pleasing, under shade of ivy; and
a large, old establishment, with cupalo and clock, and a square,
green, shady court in front of it- devoted, as appeared by an
inscription on its front, by somebody's bequest two hundred years
ago, to the maintenance, in comfort, of a certain number of aged
widowers and bachelors of the parish. Such retreats, for various
denominations of the poor and unfortunate, called almshouses and
hospitals (vulgarly, "'spittals"), are to be seen in almost every
town in England. They are of all degrees of comfort- some
stately and luxurious - others, and these quite common, mere
cottages- hovels sometimes — generally very old, and nearly
always of ancient foundation. With more or less ostentation, the
name of the founder is displayed on the front- sometimes with
his bust, statue, arms, or a ridiculous allegorical sculpture. This
plan for sending a dying sinner's name down to future generations, with the grateful embalmment of charity, seems latterly out




THIE FORCED MARCI.                 307
of fashion. What improved type of character does it indicate,
that the rich oftener prefer now to make their tribute to public
opinion, by having their gift-money used while they yet live, and
the amount of it paraded with their names in the newspapers?
Their " left hands," probably, do not read the newspapers.
I was disappointed in not finding my friends at this village, but
soon after leaving it met two Germans traveling on foot, who said
they had met, at three hours back, two gentlemen, who wore hats
and knapsacks like mine. I feared that, not hearing from me at
Salisbury, they would conclude I had gone on by Cirencester, to
the Isle of Wight, and would go by the five-o'clock train to overtake me. It was therefore necessary that I should hasten in to
arrest them. I yet made two or three stoppages, once to converse with a shepherd, and once to sketch the outlines of a group
of cottages, intending to take the coach, which I was told would
be passing in a few minutes. But when coming up a hill, I rose
the fine spire of the cathedral, some three miles distant, and the
coach still not in sight, I strapped tight my knapsack and went
the rest of the way at " double quick." Teamsters stopped their
wagons as I met them, children at the cottage-doors called their
mothers to help look at me, and at the office of the " Wilts Game
Law Reporter," as I entered the town, taking the middle of the
street, a fat old gentleman in top-boots eagerly took out his watch
and timed me, evidently supposing it was some interesting affair
on a wager. Finding the post-office, but not finding any note for
me, I hastened on still to the station, which was well out of the
town on the other side, and which I reached at the same moment
with the delaying stage-coach. The train started a moment afterwards. The policeman in attendance was certain that no persons
such as I described had entered the station-house, and I returned
to the town, and going first to the cathedral, there found J. and
C. lying under the trees in delighted contemplation of its beauty.




308       AN AMHERICA4N FARMIER INA ENLGLAND.
We spent Sunday at Salisbury. We were fortunate in finding
a comfortable, quiet, old inn, in which we were the only lodgers.
After once getting acquainted with the crooked, elaborate stairways and passages, and learning the relative position of our chambers and the common rooms, we were as much at home, as quiet,
and as able to command whatever we had occasion for, as if we
had leased the house, furnished, and manned it. The landlady
was our housekeeper, the servants our domestics. We saw no
one but them, (till night, when we happened to discover, in a remote subterranean corner, a warm, smoky, stone-cavern, in which
a soldier, a stage-coachman, and others, were making merry with
ladies, beer, and song,) and them we saw only as we chose to.
We had a large, comfortable parlor, with dark-colored furniture,
of an age in which ease was not sacrificed to decoration; a dais
and bow-window, old prints of Nelson's victories, and Garrick
and Siddons in Shakspearian characters, a smouldering sea-coal
fire, several country newspapers, and a second-hand last week's
Times. Preposterous orders were listened to without a smile,
receipts for Yankee dishes distinctly understood in all their elaboration without impatience, and to the extent of the resources of
the establishment faithfully executed.  Only once was the mild
business-manner of our hostess disturbed by an appearance of
surprise; when we told her that we were Americans, she raised
her eyes in blank incredulity, and asked, "You don't mean you
were born in America, sir?"- meaning, unquestionably, "how
could you be so white?" The servants kept out of sight; our
room was " put to rights," our clothes arranged in a bureau, while
we were at breakfast; and when we were seated, and had got
fairly under way with an excellent home-like dinner, the girl who
acted for waiter, seeming to understand our humor, put a handbell on the table and withdrew, saying that we would please to
call her when we wanted any thing.




SALISB UR Y CA TIIEDRAL.              309
Along the sides of many of the streets of Salisbury there flows,
in little canals some six feet wide by two or three deep, with
frequent bridges to the houses, a beautifully clear, rapid stream
of water. Otherwise, the general appearance of the town is of
meagre interest compared with others we have been in. But it
has one crowning glory —the cathedral.
The cathedral, in many of its parts, and from certain positions,
as a whole, is very beautiful; the symmetrical spire, especially
against an evening sky, is very fine. It is taller by several feet
than any other in England, though overtopped by several of the
Continental churches.
We have more' pleasure in contemplating it, and enjoy more
to wander around and through it, than any we have seen before.
It is more satisfactory to us. This, I believe, is partly because
of its greater size, partly because of its completeness, its unity:
though six hundred years old, you would not readily perceive in
approaching it that it was not entirely a new edifice; no repairs,
no additions, especially no meddlesome restorations. Its history
is worthy of note with respect to this: it was only thirty-eight
years in construction, except the spire, which was added rather
later, and is more florid, which is only to be regretted.
We admire and enjoy it, and yet not nearly so much as we
should have expected to from an imagination of what such a
gre t, expensive, and artistic pile would be. You will wonder
why. I don't know that I can tell you. It fails in massiveness
and grandeur. From some quarters it appears a mere clutter of
wall, windows, buttresses, and pinnacles, each of which may be
fine enough in itself, but which gain nothing from their combination. There is nowhere a sufficient breadth and mass of wall, I
suspect, for the grandeur we demand. Once or twice only did it
awaken any thing like a sense of sublimity, and then it did not
appear to me to be due to any architectural intention.




310       AiN AMlERICAIN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
Once, late in the day, and alone, I was walking from the end
of one transept towards the other, when an emotion came over
me partaking of awe. Afterwards, in trying to analyze what had
occasioned it, I found that my face was turned towards two great,
dark windows, a considerable space of unbroken wall about them,
and a square, massive buttress, all in the deep shade between the
two transepts. From the simple, solitary grandeur and solemnity
of the dark recess, there had come a sermon on humility and endurance, to me more eloquent than all else of the great cathedral.
The wall over and behind this, in an equal space, was broken
up by three of the triple windows, which, look at the cathedral
from any direction you will, you see every where repeated, until
the form becomes ugly. Not ugly in itself, but ugly and paltry,
by so much repetition, in an edifice of such grandeur. If all
these windows, with all their forms, proportion, color, and fashion
of carving, had been the work of one man, they were evidently
that man's one idea; if of many men, then they were servile imitations. One would be, perhaps, a worthy and beautiful design
-a hundred are paltry, ignominious, mechanical copies; they
might be iron-castings, for all the value the chisel has given them.
Should there not be, with sufficient regard to symmetrical uniformity, evidence of independent design in the details of every
part of an edifice of such magnitude?
From the little study that I was able to give Old-World architecture, my advice to all building-committee gentlemen of no more
cultivated taste than my own (that to such these crude thoughts
may give hints of value, is my apology for printing them), would
be, Stick to simplicity. The grand effect of architecture must
be from form and proportion. Favor designs, therefore, which,
in their grand outlines, are at once satisfactory; then beware of
enfeebling their strong features by childish ornaments and babyhouse appendages. Simplicity of outline is especially necessary




REIARKIS ON ARCUlITECTURE.             311
to any thing like dignity in an edifice of moderate size. The
smallest parish churches of the old Saxon architecture, with thick,
rude, unchiseled walls, strong enough to have needed no buttresses, and therefore having none-a low square tower or belfry, with
flat, lead roof, and a very few irregularly-placed, deep, roundarched windows and portals, I have found far more inspiring of
the solemnity of humility which should accompany the formal
worship of the Almighty, than most of the very large churches
that have been built with the greater wealth and more finical
taste of later generations.




312       AN A MERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XLV.
Salisbury Plvin- Strange Desert Character of the Scenery- The Agriculture - Sainfoin and Lucerne - Large Farms - Effect on Laborers -Paring and Burning- When Expedient- Expense — Sheep-Folding — Moveable Railways and Sheds.
June 17th.
-STANDING  across the downs: course E. by N., muggy
weather and light airs," — regularly at sea, without chart
or compass. A strange, weary waste of elevated land, undulating
like a prairie, sparsely greened over its gray surface with short
grass; uninhabited and treeless; only, at some miles asunder,
broken by charming vales of rich meadows and clusters of farmhouses and shepherds' cottages, darkly bowered about with the
concentrated foliage of the whole country.
For long intervals we were entirely out of sight of tree or
house or man, or even sign of man, more than an indistinct carttrack or trail. Had you any idea there was such a desert in
England?
The trails run crookedly, divide and cross frequently, and but
rarely is there a rude guide-post. Twice or thrice we were as
completely lost as Oregon emigrants might be in the wilderness,
and walked for miles with only the dim, yellowish spot that stood
for the sun in the misty firmament, to be guided by. Large
flocks, with shepherds and dogs, we sometimes saw, and here




LARGE FR4RMS.                    313
and there a square clump of beech or fir trees, intended probably
as an occasional retreat for the sheep. More rarely a great
farm-house, with stacks and stables and great sheep-yards, always so sheltered about by steep slopes and trees, close planted
upon some artificially-elevated soil, that we came by chance and
unexpectedly in near proximity before we saw them. Occasionally, even on the downs, and entirely unenclosed, there is cultivated land and very large breadths of some single crop, much of
good promise, too, but the wheat universally infested with charlock.
But the valleys are finely cultivated, and the crops, especially
of sainfoin and lucerne, which is extensively grown here, very
heavy.
Sainfoin and lucerne are both forage crops, somewhat of the
character of clover. Sainfoin only succeeds well, I believe, on
chalky soils or where there is much lime, and has not been found
of value in the United States. Lucerne has been extensively
cultivated in some parts, but not generally with us. I have heard
of its doing well in a cold, bleak exposure upon the Massachusetts coast, but it should have a warm, rich soil, deeply cultivated,
and be started well clean of weeds, when it may be depended
upon to yield three to five heavy cuttings of green fodder, equal
in value to clover, or three to seven tons of hay, of the value of
which I am not well informed.
The valley lands are sometimes miles wide, and cultivation is
extended often far up the hills. The farms are all very large,
often including a thousand acres of tillage land, and two, three or
four thousand of down. A farm of less than a thousand acres is
spoken of as small, and it often appears that one farmer, renting
all the land in the vicinity, gives employment to all the people
of a village. Whether it is owing to this (to me) most repugnant
state of things, or not, it is certainly just what I had expected to




314       AN AMERICAN FARMIER IN ENGLAND.
find in connection with it, that laborers' wages are lower probably
than anywhere else in England —seven, and sometimes six, shillings ($1.68 and $1.44) being all that a man usually receives for
a week's labor.
We saw seven plows at work together, and thirteen swarths
of lucerne falling together before thirteen mowers, thirteen women
following and shaking it out. It is not uncommon to have four
or five hundred acres of wheat or two or three hundred of turnips growing on one farm. One down farmer has eight hundred
in wheat annually. The prairie farmer would not despise such
crops.
As there is no chalk soil in America, I will not dwell long upon its peculiarities or the system of agriculture adopted upon it.
The manner in which the downs are brought into cultivation
may, however, afford some hints of value for the improvement
of other poor, thin soils. "The sheepfold and artificial manures
are looked upon as the mainstay of the Wiltshire down farmer.
When the downs are first broken up, the land is invariably pared
and burnt, and then sown with wheat. Barley is usually taken
after wheat, and this is followed by turnips eaten upon the ground,
and succeeded by wheat. It then falls into the usual four or fivefield course, a piece being laid out annually in sainfoin, to rest for
several years before being broken up again. The sheepfold is
shifted daily until the whole space required to be covered [i. e.
manured] is gone over. Turnips and other green crops are consumed where they grow, which saves the labor of taking home
the crop and fetching back the manure. The sheep are made
the manure carriers for any portion of the land on which it is
thought desirable to apply it. Much of the corn crop is stacked
in the distant fields, as it would be almost impossible to carry it
home so far, with the despatch necessary in harvest operations.
In many cases it is thrashed where stacked, a traveling steam



PARING AND BURNING.                    315
thrashing machine being hired for the purpose. The straw is
carried out and spread on the grass-lands from which clover hay
had been cut the previous year. Only a small proportion of the
root crop is carried home for consumption by the cattle, the number of which, in these large farms, is quite inconsiderable." *
Sheep-folding, and paring and burning, are both processes
nearly unknown in America, and which will probably be advantageously employed in some situations among us.
Paring and burning. —"All soils," says Sir Humphrey Davy,
"that contain too much dead vegetable fibre," (such as the sour
black soils of our reclaimed swamps,) "and all such as contain
their earthy constituents in an impalpable state of division, such
as stiff clays and marls, are improved by burning." It is therefore a common practice in the stiff-clay districts as well as upon
the downs of England, the effect being to render a heavy soil
light, friable, porous and highly absorbent. It increases the efficiency of drains (by letting water more rapidly into them), and,
being more friable, the land works better and at less expense.
It further promotes vegetation by converting into soluble matters
available to plants, vegetable remains; which, in consequence of
the usually wet, impervious nature of the soil, have become, as it
were, indigestible, and therefore inert and useless. It is also advocated as being destructive of the roots and seeds of weeds; of
insects, their larvae and eggs; and, as is pretty clearly demonstrated, it enables land to bear the same crop in quicker succession, by'its supposed effect upon the exudations left by former
crops.t  In executing the process, the surface, generally to the
depth of three inches, is plowed or pared up (there are instruments made on purpose for it) and allowed to dry. It is then
thoroughly harrowed and made fine; and in the downs the vege* caIRD.
t Report by practical farmers in Suffolk, 1846.




316       AN AMERICAi4N FARMER IN ENGLAND.
table matter is racked out so far as practicable, and thrown into
small heaps; a little earth is thrown over these and they are
fired, the grass forming the fuel. The remainder of the earth
which has been plowed up is shoveled on as soon, and to as
great a depth, as it can be without danger of extinguishing the
fire.
In the clay districts, and where there is much timber growing,
brushwood is laid in rows, and the pared soil heaped over it, the
sod being thrown as far as possible nearest the fuel, and the fine
earth thrown over all to prevent too quick a fire.
The burnt soil is spread again over the field and plowed in.
The first crop following is usually turnips. The cost of the operation is reckoned, in Suffolk (where it is called denturing), to be
only about four dollars an acre, of which one-third is for fuel.
Supposing the expense of labor to be doubled and that of fuel
halved for the United States, it may be expected to cost us six
dollars an acre. The effect, probably, is never lost to the land;
but in those parts of England where it is most practiced, I believe it is usual to repeat the operation once in about seven years.
By feeding turnips upon the ground the autumn following the
burning, it is sufficiently stocked with manure to require no
further application during the course. Caird mentions crossing a
field in which this had been repeated, burning every seven years,
and no other application of manure than what arose from the consumption of its own produce on the ground being made, without
any diminution of crops for fifty years.
On the downs, however, paring and burning is not usually resorted to, except at the first breaking up of the original soil, fertility being afterwards sustained by bones and guano, or by feeding off the crops of herbage at the end of every rotation by
sheep; of which operation, common in all parts of Great Britain,
I shall presently speak.




SIIEEP-F OLDING.                  317
In land greatly infested with weeds, or grubs or wire-worm, in
black, peaty soils, and in many stiff-clay soils, particularly where
they are to be prepared for gardens or orchards, I have no doubt
paring and burning often might be profitably performed in the
United States. In thin, sandy soils it is likely to be injurious.
If the soil has not a pretty thick old sward, it will be best to sow
some grain crop upon it the year before burning, that the roots
and stubble may afford fuel. Old pasture will be most readily
burnt. In England, clay is sometimes charred in pits, and, after
being mashed fine, applied broadcast or drilled with seeds, as a
manure. It is sometimes found surprisingly effective, probably
owing to its absorbent quality; but it is an expensive operation,
and has not generally proved profitable.
Sheep-folding is the practice of enriching a portion of ground
by confining sheep upon it. Thus, in Wiltshire, the flocks are
pastured during the day upon the "beak-land," and kept at night
upon the comparatively small portion of ground which it is desired
to manure, and which thus receives the benefit of the fertilizing
waste of the food obtained from the pasture ground; or a portion
of a field of sainfoin, or clover, or turnips, is enclosed by a movable fence (either iron or wooden hurdles or strong hempen nets
fastened to stakes), and the sheep confined to it until they have
eaten the crop clean (they will eat the turnip in the ground),
and left upon it a large amount of excrement; the fence is then
moved on to a fresh spot, where the process is repeated, and so
on day after day until the required space has been traveled over.
Sometimes naked ground or stubble-land is thus served; turnips or sainfoin being brought from where they grow and fed
within the hurdles, which are daily moved on a bit. Latterly,
movable sheds with slatted floors, running upon plank railroads,
which are easily taken up and relayed across the turnip fields,
have been tried. The object is to avoid driving carts to take the




318       AN A MERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
crop off, or the treading of the sheep to feed it, on the ground,
upon heavy clay soils, in which the pressure of these operations
must be very objectionable. Twelve sheep are kept in each
shed-car, and the turnips pulled and thrown into them. The expense of drawing off the crop and returning the manure is avoided, and the sheep have shelter and a dry bed, while the ordinary
custom subjects them to danger of foot-rot and other diseases,
and also must be attended with some waste of the crop.




WALLOP.                        319
CHAPTER XLVI.
An Arcadian Hamlet- Out of the World, but not Beyond the Reach of the
Yankee Peddler- The Cottages of the Downs- Grout and Cobble-stones
- Character of.the Laboring Class of the Downs-Want of Curiosity -
Old Stockbridge, Winchester, William of Wykeham- His Legacy to
Wayfarers - The Cathedral - Some Remarks on Architectural Situation
- Search for Lodgings — Motherly Kindness - Railroad Mismanagement
-Waterloo Day at Portsmouth.
WALLOP, where we spend the night, is a most poetical hamlet, so hidden by trees that, as we came over the downs,
even when within a few moments' walk of it, we had to inquire
where it was. It consists of a double row of cottages some miles
long, on the bank of a cool, silvery brook, at which, when we first
saw it, we rushed to drink like camels in the desert; and the
water was indeed delicious. It is exceedingly quiet. As we sit
in our window at the " Lower George," we can hear nothing but
the rippling of the brook, which threads its way through the trees
and among the cottages across the street, the rustling of the trees
in the gentle air, the peeping of chickens, and the chirping of
small birds. There is a blacksmith's shop, but no smoke ascends
from it, and the anvil is silent. There is a grist-mill further
down; there is a little, square, heavy-roofed school-house, and
there is a church and graveyard. But there is no stage-coach,




320       AN AJMERICA1N FARMER IN ENGLAND.
no public conveyance, not even a carrier's cart by which we
might send on our packs, runs through or fiom the hamlet. Yet
this is a good inn, clean, and well provided; we have a large
room, comfortably furnished; the landlord seems to understand
what a tired traveler wants; and down stairs, in the parlor, there
is-what do you think?
"IMPROVED BRASS CLOCK,
MANUFACTURED BY
H. WELTON, TERRYVILLE, CONNECTICUT.
( Warranted, if well used.")
It cost twelve shillings, and was a capital time-piece, only lately
it had got a-going too fast, and the landlord wished Mr. Welton
would send his man and have it fixed according to contract. It
marked the hour rather behind our watches, but as it was the
liveliest thing in the village, we have set it back to the landlord's
notion, lengthened the pendulum, and oiled the "pallet," all to
save the reputation of Mr. Welton and the universal Yankee
nation.
The cottages here are generally built of a chalk grout, sometimes with lines of flint stones for ornament. In others, flint
pebbles are laid regularly in courses set in grout, like the " cobble-stone houses" in western New York; in others, grout, and
stones set in grout, alternately; or brick and stone in grout, in
alternate tiers a foot thick. The village fences and the stockyard walls about here are also made of white grout, very thick,
and with a coping of thatch. The thatch on the cottages is very
heavy, sometimes two feet deep.




STOCKBRIDGE- WINCHESTER.               321
The laboring class upon the downs have generally a quiet,
sleepy, stupid expression, with less evident viciousness and licentious coarseness of character, and with more simplicity, frankness,
and good-nature than those we have previously been among.
The utter want of curiosity and intelligent observation, among a
people living so retired from the busy world, is remarkable. We
have met but two to-day whose minds showed any inclination to
move of their own accord: one of them was a pensioned soldier
who had served at Halifax, and who made inquiries about several
old comrades who had deserted and escaped to "the States," and
whom he seemed to suppose we must have seen,. as we were
Yankees; the other, an old woman in Newtown-Tawney, at
whose cottage we stopped to get water; she had at first taken us,
as we came one after the other over the stile, for a " detachment
of the Rifles," and on discovering her error was quite anxious to
know what we were after, what we carried in our knapsacks, etc.
June 18th.
In the morning we walked from Wallop through Stockbridge
to Winchester. A down-land district still, as yesterday, but a
well-traveled road, with houses, inns, and guide-boards; more
frequent plantations of trees and more cultivated land, yet but
little of it fenced, and the sheep restrained from crops by shepherds and dogs. Since we left Salisbury we have seen but three
cows, each of which was tethered or led by a woman or child.
We have seen no donkeys for the last hundred miles.
Stockbridge is a small village of one wide street, with two clear
streams and a canal crossing it, the surface of the ground a dead
flat; all as unlike its Massachusetts namesake as it is to a Pawnee village. We saw some fine horses near here.
Winchester-a name we remember as that of the school-place
of many a good man-is an interesting old town in a cleft of the
21




322       AN AMERICAIN FARMER 1N ELVGLAND.
downs. Those who have heard Mr. Emerson's lecture upon
England will remember it also as the town of "William of
Wykeham."
We visited the cathedral, the college, and other notable institutions and monuments, and demanded and received our share of
the legacy bequeathed by William of Wykeham, five hundred
years ago, to all wayfarers passing by-a generous slice of good
bread, and a draught of ale, served in an ancient horn. There is
certainly no humbug about it, and the good bishop's hospitable
will, in this particular, is yet as sincerely executed as if by servants under his own eye. Mr. Emerson was, nevertheless, unfortunate in his eloquent use of this circumstance to illustrate the
simple honesty of English character, and the permanence and
trustworthiness of English institutions; for it appears that, notwithstanding substantial bread and unadulterated beer, this is but
the cleanliness of the cup and platter, and that in the real and
worthy legacy which the far-reaching piety of the good prelate
left to the future of England, there is much rottenness. Generally, the means which the piety of Englishmen of former generations bequeathed, for furnishing to the poor aliment of mind,
have been notoriously diverted to the emolument and support, in
luxurious sinecures, of a few individuals, whom, but for the
association of their titles with religion, loyalty, law, and order, and
the poor conscience-salve that it is the system and not they who
are wrong, every man would know for hypocrites, liars, swindlers;
more detestable than American repudiators, French sycophants,
or Irish demagogues.
The cathedral is low and heavy, covering much ground; and
exhibits, curiously interworked, the styles of Saxon, Norman, and
early and later English architects. I again wrote in my notebook, "unimpressive;" but now, after two years, I find that my
mind was strongly impressed by it; for there returns to me, as I




RAILROAD MISMANAGEMENT.                323
very vividly remember its appearance, a feeling of quiet, wholly
uncritical veneration, of which I believe a part must be due to
the breadth of green turf of the graveyard, and deep shade of the
old trees in which it is upreared. There were scarcely any
edifices that I saw in Europe which produced in me the slightest
thrill of such emotion from sublimity as I have often had in contemplation of the ocean, or of mountains, that it was not plainly
due less to the architectural style, than to the connection and
harmony of the mass with the ground upon which it was placed.
The only church that stopped me suddenly with a sensation of
deep solemnity, as I came unexpectedly under it, as it were, in
turning the corner of a street, was one that stood upon a bold,
natural terrace, and in which the lines of the angles of a heavy
tower were continuous and unbroken from base to summit.
At half-past six we took seats in the second-class cars for
Portsmouth, and were favored with a specimen of a corporation's
disregard for the convenience of the public, and the accomplishment of their own promises, that a New Jerseyman would almost
have growled at. There was a full hour's unnecessary detention
at the way-stations, and after having arrived near the terminus
that much behind the time-tables, the tickets were collected and
the doors locked upon us, and we were kept waiting a long time
within a few rods of the station-house. Some one at length got
out at the windows, but was sent back by the guard. When we
requested to know what was the objection to our leaving, we were
answered it was against the rules of the company for any passengers to be allowed upon the ground without the station. After
waiting some time longer, we rose in numbers too strong for the
guards, who, however, promised that we should be prosecuted for
trespass, and made our escape. I may say, in passing, that the
speed upon the English roads is, on an average, not better than
on ours. It is commonly only from fifteen to twenty miles an




324       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
hour. The express trains, however, upon the main lines, run
usually as fast as fifty miles an hour, sometimes sixty. For the
accommodation, comfort, and advantage of all but those who
choose and can afford to pay well, their railroad system is inferior
to ours.
It was "Waterloo Day," and there had been a review of the
forces at Portsmouth, before the Duke of Wellington and Prince
Albert; the Queen had been off the harbor in her yacht, and
received a salute; there had been a balloon ascension, and a
carousal with long speeches. There was to be an illumination
yet, and the town was full-some of the streets packed with soldiers and sailors and women. We spent several hours trying to
get lodgings; every hotel, inn, tavern, and lodging-house, high
and low, was full. The best thing that kindness or covetousness
could be induced to offer, was room to lay upon a carpet on the
floor, and this nowhere that we thought it likely we should be
allowed to sleep. We got supper at a small inn, and the landlady
informed us frankly that she charged us twice as much for it as
she usually would, because it was " holiday."
It was late at night when, by advice of policemen and favor of
sentinels, we had passed out through a series of ramparts, and
were going up a broad street of the adjoining town of Portsea.
1" Good-night, my dear," we heard a kindly-toned voice; and a
woman closed a door, and, after walking on a moment, ascended
the steps to another. " Could you be good enough, madam," one
of us took the liberty of inquiring, "to tell us of any house in
this vicinity where we should be likely to obtain lodging for the
night?"
"No-dear me!-who are you?"
"We are strangers in the town; travelers, who reached here
this evening, and we have been looking for several hours to find
some place where we could sleep, but all the inns are full."




A HOLIDA Y NIGHT.                 325
"Come here; let me look at you. You are young men, are
you not? come up to me, you need not be afraid -yes, I see;
youths" (we had caps on, which is unusual in England except
for school-boys). "Why, poor youths, I am  sorry for you -
strangers - you wait here, and I will call my servant and see if
she does not think she can find where you can get a bed."
She then went in, and in a few minutes returned with a maid
whom she called Susan, to whom she repeated what we had said;
and then inquired further what was our business, were we " traveling with the consent of our parents," etc., and remarked —
"Your parents are reputable people, I think: - yes-yes-dear
me!-yes-poor youths. Yes, I will find beds for you. You
are good youths, and Susan shall-but come in: you will sit in
the parlor, and my servant, Susan, shall sit with you a few minutes, and I will see. Come in, come in, good youths."
While we remained in the parlor, it was infinitely droll to hear
the kind old woman talking with another in the next room about
the safety and propriety of lodging us. "I have known the
world, and I cannot be deceived: these are good youths."
It was at length concluded that if we would each of us pay a
shilling (" and then we could give whatever we liked besides to
Susan"), and if we would be willing to have our doors locked on
the outside, we should be provided then and there with beds.
The old woman then came in again to see us, and with great
severity reixamined us, and finally informed us that we were to
spend the night in her house. She then became exceedingly
kind again, asked much about our parents and America, and at
length asked us, with a whimpering laugh, as if she feared how
we would take it, but begged that it might be considered a joke"We wouldn't be offended if our doors should be locked on the
outside?"




326       AN A MERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XLVII.
The Deceit of Descriptions of Scenery —The Soul of a Landscape - The
Isle of Wight, its Characteristics -Appropriate Domestic ArchitectureGenial Climate- Tropical Verdure - The Cliffs of Albion- Osborne -
The Royal Villa- Country Life of the Royal Family- Agricultural Inclination and Rural Tastes —The Royal Tenantry
T HERE is always a strong temptation upon the traveler to endeavor to so describe fine scenery, and the feelings which it
has occasioned him, that they may be reproduced to the imagination of his friends. Judging from my own experience, this purpose always fails. I have never yet seen anything celebrated in
scenery, of which I had previously obtained a correct conception.
Certain striking, prominent points, that the power of language
has been most directed to the painting of, almost invariably disappoint, and seem little and commonplace, after the exaggerated
forms which have been brought before the mind's eye. Beauty,
grandeur, impressiveness in any way, from scenery, is not often
to be found in a few prominent, distinguishable features, but in
the manner and the unobserved materials with which these are
connected and combined. Clouds, lights, states of the atmosphere, and circumstances that we cannot always detect, affect all
landscapes, and especially landscapes in which the vicinity of a




TIlE ISLE OF WIGHT.                 327
body of water is an element, much more than we are often aware.
So it is that the impatient first glance of the young traveler, or
the impertinent critical stare of the old tourist, is almost never
satisfied, if the honest truth be admitted, in what it has been led
to previously imagine. I have heard "Niagra is a mill-dam,"
"Rome is a humbug."
The deep sentiments of Nature that we sometimes seem to
have been made confident of, when among the mountains, or on
the moors or the ocean-even those of man wrought out in architecture and sculpture and painting, or of man working in unison
with Nature, as sometimes in the English parks, on the Rhine,
and here on the Isle of Wight-such revealings are beyond
words; they never could be transcribed into note-books and diaries, and so descriptions of them become caricatures, and when
we see them, we at first say we are disappointed that we find
not the monsters we were told of.
The greater part of the Isle of Wight is more dreary, desolate,
bare and monotonous, than any equal extent of land you probably ever saw in America-would be, rather, if it were not that
you are rarely out of sight of the sea; and no landscape, of which
that is a part, ever can be without variety and ever-changing interest. It is, in fact, down-land, in the interior, exactly like that
I described in Wiltshire, and sometimes breaking down into
such bright dells as I there told of. But on the south shore it is
rocky, craggy; and after you have walked through a rather dull
country, though pleasing on the whole, for hours after landing,
you come gradually to where the majesty of vastness, peculiar to
the downs and the ocean, alternates or mingles with dark, picturesque, rugged ravines, chasms and water-gaps, grand rocks,
and soft, warm, smiling, inviting dells and dingles; and, withal,
there is a strange and fascinating enrichment of foliage, more
deep, graceful and luxuriant, than I ever saw before. All this




328       AN A1MER RICA4 N F AR MER IN _ENG L AND.
district is thickly inhabited, and yet so well covered with verdure,
or often so tastefully appropriate-quiet, cosy, ungenteel, yet
elegant —are'the cottages, that they often add to, rather than insult and destroy, the natural charm~ of their neighborhood. I
am sorry to say, that among the later erections there are a number of strong exceptions to this remark.
In this paradise the climate, by favor of its shelter of hills on
the north, and the equalizing influence of the ocean on the south,
is, perhaps, the most equable and genial in the northern temperate zone. The mercury does not fall as low in winter as at
Rome; deciduous trees lose their verdure but for a brief interval; greensward is evergreen; tender-roses, fuschias, and the
dark, glossy shrubs of Canaan and of' Florida, feel themselves at
home, and flourish through the winter.
Where the chalky downs reach the shore without an intervening barrier of rock, or a gradual sloping descent, they are
broken off abruptly and precipitously; and thus are formed the
"white cliffs of Albion," and a coast scenery with which, for
grandeur, there is nothing on our Atlantic shore that will in the
least compare: notwithstanding which, and although they really
are often higher than our church-steeples and monuments-the
familiar standards with which we compare their number of feet
-they have not the stupendous effect upon the mind that I had
always imagined that they must have.
We were rambling for the greater part of two days upon the
island, spending a night near Black-Gang-Chine. Returning,
we passed near Osborne, a private estate purchased some years
since by the Queen, upon which she has had erected a villa, said
to be an adaptation of the Grecian style to modern tastes and
habits, but of which nothing is to be seen from without the
grounds but the top of a lofty campanile, from which is now displayed the banner with the royal arms, which always indicates




TIlE PRINA2CE TURNS FARMER.              329
the presence of the reigning sovereign of Great Britain. It is
the custom of the royal family, when here, to live in as retired
and unstately a way as they can ever be permitted to. The
Prince himself turns farmer,- and engages with much ardor in
improving the agricultural capabilities of the soil, much of which
was not originally of a fertile character, but by thorough drainage,
and judicious tillage and manuring, is now producing greatly enlarged crops. The Prince is well known as a successful breeder
and stock-farmer, having taken several prizes for fat cattle, etc.,
at the great annual shows. Her Majesty personally interests
herself in the embellishment of the grounds and the extensive
oak plantations which are being made, and is in the habit of driving herself a pair of ponies, unattended, through the estate, studying the comfort of her little cottage tenantry, and in every way
she can trying to seem to herself the good-wife of a respectable
country gentleman.




330       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XLVIII.
The Queen's Yacht - Yachts of tile R. Y. Club, their Build and Rig - Comparison with American Yachts and Pilot-Boats - Seamanship -Cut of
Sails - The Navy-Yard at Portsmouth — Gun-Boats — Steamers - Evening at Portsea- Curiosity — About Boasting and some English Characteristics- Conversation with a Shopkeeper on the " Glory of England."
IN crossing the Solent, on our return to Portsmouth, we saw
the Queen's yacht, and passed through a squadron of the Royal Yacht-Club yachts. The former was a large, heavily hampered, brig-rigged steamer, with great plate-glass ports, and a
large oak-colored house on deck, less seaman-like in appearance
and more in the American style than most English steam-vessels.
The yachts were as sweet craft as I can imagine, most of them
over two hundred tons in burden and schooner-rigged; but,
whether one or two-masted, spreading more canvas for the length
of  their hulls than I ever saw before. They were all painted
black, and their ornaments and deck-arrangements struck me as
being more simple, snug and seaman-like than those of most of
our Union Clubs' yachts. The reverse is the case aloft. lMy
guess was that they would be more than a match for anything on
our side in light winds, but that in bad weather, particularly if
working to windward, they would do nothing against a New
York pilot-boat.  Like all the English small craft, when going




CO MPARISON OF YACFITS.               331
before the wind, the cutters and schooners always hauled up the
tack of the mainsail, that the wind might draw under it to fill the
foresail and jib. Another reason given for it is, that the wind,
drawing downward from the belly of the sail, tends to make the
vessel bury, and by lifting the tack she is made more buoyant.
It is never done in America.
This was before the race in which the "America" beat the
English yachts. I suspect that her superior sailing qualities
were more owing to her peculiarities of rig, the cut and material
of her sails, and to seamanship, than to the model of her hull. I
have no doubt we can still build and rig a vessel that will be her
superior. While the English stick to flax canvas, long gaffs,
heavy top-sails and graceful curves, I do not think there is any
danger that they will. When the Englishman is close-hauled
with his boom as near amidships as he can get it, his long gaff
will swing off so far that there must always be a considerable
part of his canvas in the peak that actually retards more than
it assists him. The Englishman thinks much of beauty of form
in his sails, but his standard of beauty is arbitrary-a fashion.
To my eye, without regard to the primary beauty of utility, the
simplicity of the cut of our sails is much more agreeable.
On the deck of the flag-schooner, we saw the commodore of the
Club (an Earl), a gray-haired old gentleman, who sat in an armchair, reading from a newspaper to some ladies.
On reaching Portsmouth we took a boat to visit the navy-yard,
within the walls of which, being foreigners, not having a pass,
we could not enter. Our boatmen told us that if we chose to
enter we should not be challenged, as no one would suspect us
as being other than Englishmen, and that the prohibition was a
silly old form that prevented no one from seeing the yard who
wished to enough to lie for it.




332       AN A.MERICA N FAR MER IN ENGLAND.
The number of vessels (of the navy) in port was much less
than I had anticipated seeing, and most of these were hulks, or
"advance ships" (with guns and water-tanks on board.)  Those
we went on board of (one of them ready for sea), seemed to me,
compared with ours of the same class, inferior in all respects,
except it might be in some novelties in their rigging, of the efficiency of which I could not judge. The extent to which wirerigging was employed in some surprised me. We saw four gunboats (large barges with a swivel-gun in the bow), manned by
the workmen of the yard, whose awkward evolutions were very
amusing. The landsmen working in the yard are divided into
two squads, one of which alternately with the other, is drilled in
the Jefferson plan of harbor defense two evenings in each week.
They are dressed in a simple uniform, and armed as boarders.
There were more steamers in the harbor than in all our navy.
In the evening we called at the old lady's in Portsea, and received from Susan some clothes, which she had undertaken to
get washed for us, and a watch which my brother had accidentally left in his bed-room. The kind old woman received us cordially, apologized again for the prudence which had led her to
lock us in, and introduced us to some friends. Of their simplicity
and curiosity, as shown in their questioning of us, I might, if I
chose to report our conversations, give as amusing a picture as
English travelers enjoy to do, of that of those they meet in American boarding-houses. Of fidgety anxiety lest we should not discover that everybody and everything in the country is superior
to anybody and anything anywhere else in the world, which so
annoys visitors to the United States, I must confess that we have
seen but little in England. With the poorer class of Englishmen, patriotism seems to have been starved out. If they ever




ENGLISH CHARACTERISTICS.               333
speak of their country's greatness and prosperity, it is as a servant speaks of his master's wealth; they would see it become a
dependency of France or Russia with entire indifference, certainly with exultation if it were promised them that wages should
be higher and bread cheaper for it. Again, the Radicals and
men of earnest religious faith, with the strongest affection to their
country, are in the habit of looking much at what is wrong and
shameful in her institutions and qualities, and of comparing them
with what is better in other lands.
Cultivated and large-minded people of all classes, of course, in
England as everywhere else, rise above prejudice and vanity,
and think and speak fairly and frankly equally of their own or
foreign states; of such eminently, we recognize the Earl of Carlisle and Sir Charles Lyell, and of such are, I believe, a great
number of the higher rank of commercial men. The traditional
self-complacency of an Englishman, as an Englishman, is more
often to be detected, at the present day, by some unnecessary
pains he will take to point out to you deficiencies and defects of
a trivial character in the article or institution or custom you are
considering, he having entire confidence that in contrast with that
of any other country it will but be exalted by any such faint disparagement of it as is possible. Among the lower class in towns,
or in the country, those who have been servants, or in some way
connected with or dependent on wealthy old families, there is
sometimes to be found the most ludicrously absurd old Tory ideas
and prejudices, quite in character with John Bull of the farce;
but the best specimens of it that I have seen were among the
smaller sort of shopkeepers, particularly those who advertise
tkemseves to be under the patronage of some noble lady. I remember one that we encountered, soom after we resumed our
walks in England after we had been on the Continent, that
amused us very much —a little, fat, florid, bald-headed John




334  AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
Gilpin of a man. He was wrapping the article we had purchased in a paper, and, while we waited, asked,
"Travelers, gentlemen?"
"Yes, sir."
"On foot it appears?"
" Yes, sir."
"Traveled far so, might I ask?"
"Oh, yes —a number of hundred miles."
"Indeed -you must have seen a good bit of Old England.
Ever was on the Continent, gentlemen?"
" Yes."
" In France, it might be?"
" Yes."
"Anywhere else but France?"
" Yes-in Holland, Germany and Belgium."
I"Ah! Gentlemen, I should like to ask you now, if I might
be so bold, I should like to ask you a question, just one question.
I haven't been myself, you see, to France nor to Holland nor to
those other countries, but I have read of them, and according to
the best sources of information I could reach, I have informed
my mind about them and formed my own independent opinion,
you see, in which I may be right, of course, and I may be wrong,
but I think I'm right. And I have had a coming in here a
many of traveling gentlemen like you, who had seen all those
foreign countries, and had also in course seen England. Well, I
always asks these gentlemen one question when they does me the
honor, and they have always been so good as to answer me, and
now I should be pleased to ask you the same question, if I may
be so bold. Though, to be sure, I can imagine what you'll
answer, but then to confirm the independent conclusion which I
had arrived at from my own reflections, you see, and for edification-thank you. Now then, gentlemen."




CON VERSATION WITH A SHOPKEEPER.           335
He laid the parcel on the counter, and, holding it firmly with
his left hand, continued to tap it lightly with the fore-finger of
the other:
" So it appears, gentlemen (if I might be so bold), that you
have wandered far and near over the face of the inhabited world,
and have seen many foreign parts and lands, and cast your lot
among other peoples and nations, that all thought as their inheritances was very fine, doubtless: but now, gentlemen! can you
say on candid reflection-now have you ever seen any where's
else, for instance, any castle as was comparable compared to
Winsor Castle?"
"No, sir.!'
"Or any park like unto Winsor Park, in foreign parts?"
"No, sir."
"Nor any country of them all, what, on the whole, take her
altogether, taking her castles and parks, also her towns and her
rail'ays and station-houses, her forests and her manufactures, and
her coal and iron; her church and her constitution, her people
and her horses, and such like —did you ever, in all your wanderings-taking her altogether so-did you ever now, gentlemenever see any place exactly like your own country after all?"
" No, indeed, sir."
"'No, indeed, sir!' I know you didn't-you hear that?'No,
indeed, sir'-and so say you all, gentlemen? and so say you all.
Well, then, I am satisfied, and much obliged to you, gentlemen.
There isn't none of the foreign principalities that is like this
blessed land; and that's what I am always telling them, and only
goes to confirm the independent conviction which I had previously arrived to of my own preliminaries. Thank you, gentlemen;"
(handing us the parcel;) "'good-morning. I wish you a pleasant
continuance of your promenade in our glorious old land."




336       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
CHAPTER XLIX.
Rural Police —The "Anchor" Inn —The Garden-" Old Coaching
Times" —Heath Land —A Dreary Landscape —Murder and a Highway Adventure -Human Vanity.
Liphook, June 20th.
WALKED hither from Portsmouth to-day. For twenty miles
the road is through a hilly chalk country, much of it unenclosed downs, generally interesting, and the walk at this season
agreeable.
We had, for a short distance, the company of a rural policeman. He had his quarters, with several others, in a small cottage in a village, was paid $4.70 a-week, and furnished with
three suits of clothes every year-one for winter, one for summer
and one for Sundays, besides gloves, etc. The uniform is of
blue cloth, of a simple, semi-military fashion. He said no one
was employed in the force who was less than six feet high, and
that they were exercised in the use of small-arms. Of duties
he seemed to have no definite idea himself, but was ready to do
anything he could in the way of fighting roguery, when he should
be called upon by his officers. The only crime which he seemed
to apprehend in the neighborhood was rick-burning-laborers
who were discontented and envious, or who had for any reason




"OLD COACHINIG TliIES."               337
become angry with the farmers who employed them, setting fire
to their stacks of grain. This was common.
We spent the night at the "Anchor," a good, large, old inn,
with a finely-shaven plot of turf and well-kept graveled walks,
and a good vegetable and fruit garden, with famous gooseberry
and apple bushes (apples on dwarf stocks), in the rear. The
landlord, a bluff, stout, old man, a little while ago brought u~ in
samples of five different sorts of malt liquor that he had in his
cellar. They vary in strength in the proportions from 8 to 32,
and somewhat more in price.
Before the railways, thirty-two four-horse coaches stopped at
this house daily, besides post-coaches, which, when the fleet was
about to sail from Portsmouth, passed through the village "like
a procession." He then kept one hundred horses, and had usually ten postboys to breakfast, who had been left during the night.
Now, but one coach and one van passed through the town.
June 21st.
Near Liphook, instead of the broad, bleak chalk-downs, with
their even surface of spare green grass, we find extensive tracts
of a most sterile, brown, dry, sandy land, sometimes boggy
(moory), producing even more scanty pasturage than the downs,
but with scattered tufts of heath or ling. Most of this is in commons, and a few lean sheep, donkeys, and starveling ponies are
earnestly occupied in seeking for something to eat upon it. Very
little of it, for miles that we have passed over, is enclosed or
improved, except that there are extensive plantations of trees.
Timber grows slowly upon it; but the shade of the foliage and
the decay of leaves so improves the soil that it is worth cultivating after its removal. It is also improved so as to bear tolerable
crops, by paring-and-burning and sheep-folding-as described on
the downs of Wiltshire.
22




338       AN AMIERICAIN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
We had walked half-a-dozen miles this morning, when I discovered I had lost my watch, and turned back. When about
three miles from Liphook, I met our landlord of "The Anchor."
He had found the watch in my room, and immediately mounted
a horse, and rode hard to overtake us. He refused any compensation, unless it were "a glass of grog to drink my health."  I
had happened to show him one of those villainous Spanish quarters that so successfully hold their place against our legitimate
currency, which I had had left in my pocket on leaving New
York, and he said, if I didn't value it, he would be glad to take
it as a keepsake of us. I have no doubt he will always remember
us as the three gentlemen who had the good taste not to go from
Portsmouth to London by "the infernal railways."
It was a day of thick, rapidly-passing clouds, and in a part of
my walk, which was through a well-wooded, rolling country, with
very steep hill-sides and deep, narrow valleys, I saw some most
charming effects of broad shadows, chasing over waving foliage,
with angel-flights of sunshine, often disclosing long, narrow
vistas of distant, deep glens, or glances of still water, becalmed
and warm under high, dark, quivering, leafy bluffs. But the
greater part of this country (but a day's walk from London) is
the most dreary, desolate, God-forsaken-looking land that I ever
saw or imagined. Hills and dales, picturesque enough in form,
high, deep, and broad; all brown, gray, and black; sterile, parched, uninhabited-dead: the only sign of life or vegetation a little
crisp moss, or singed, prostrate, despairing ling-seeming exactly
as if an intense fire had not long since swept over it.
Such was the whole dreary landscape, far and near — only
"blasted heath." A great black squall-cloud had for some time
thrown additional gloom - a new intensity of gloom - over it;
and I was walking slowly, in bereavement of all sympathizing
life in this sepulchral ground of Nature, when my eye fell upon




A IIIGHWA Y AD VENTURE.               339
a block of stone, bearing inscription -"In detestation of the
murder of a sailor on this spot, by [three persons whose names
are given], who were hung near here.'Whoso sheddeth man's
blood, by man shall his blood be shed.' Look on the other side."
I was still half kneeling and musing before this monument,
when I heard myself gruffly addressed, "Wull tell me what's the
time o' day?"
Without rising, I turned my head and saw over my shoulder a
tall, heavily-whiskered, ruffianly-faced fellow, half sportsman, half
sailor in dress, carrying a stout stick and a bundle in a handkerchief. How did he get there?  I must have seen him before if
he had come either way by the road; he must have approached
from over the hill behind me, and that cautiously; apparently he
had been concealed there. I confess that I wished for a moment
that I had in "my interior reservoirs a sufficient Birminham
horse-pistol," wherewith to make myself alike tall with him if he
should give me need; but, still bending over the memorial of
murder, I drew my watch and answered him civily, whereupon,
without even a "growl," he "sidled off," and soon passed from
my sight.  My friends had seen the same man, in company with
another, near the same place, an hour and a-half before.
On " the other side"- oh, human vanity! -was the name of
the man who had caused the stone to be placed there. Posterity
is requested to remember the murderers and the murdered, and
especially not to forget the detester.




340       AN AMI~ERICA N   FARIMER IN ENVGLA ND.
CHAPTER L.
London Lads - Railway Ride - Observations in Natural History.
AT half-past five, having overtaken my friends and dined at
Godalming, I took seat with them in the third-class carriages
of a train bound to London, intending, however, only to take a
lift so that we might walk in before dark.
The carriages were nearly empty, till, stopping at a waystation, they were suddenly and with boisterous merry haste
taken possession of, filled full and over-filled with a class of
people differing in their countenances, manners, language, and
tone of voice from any we had before seen in England. They
were more like New York b'hoys, a little less rowdy and a shade
more vulgar. "London lads," one of them very civily told me
they were, employed in a factory out here in the country, and
having just received their week's wages were going in to spend
them. They were pale, and many effeminate in features, rather
oily and grimy, probably from their employment; talked loudly
and rapidly, using many cant words, and often addressing those
at a distance by familiar, abbreviated names; lively, keen, quickeyed, with a peculiarly fearless, straightforward, uneducated way
of making original remarks, that showed considerable wit and




TIlE LONDON B'IIO YS.               341
powers of observation; rough, turbulent, and profane, yet using
a good many polite forms, and courteous enough in action.
Two or three men, as soon as the train was in motion, held up
each a brace or two of rabbits, at which there was cheering and
laughter from the rest. All, indeed, were in the greatest possible
good humor, joking and bantering and making engagements, or
telling of their plans for dining together, or meeting for some
degrading excitement on Sunday. Of us and others in the car,
when they entered, they took little notice, though treating us with
respect in not jostling or crowding us; but as soon as they were
well settled in their places they began to make game of one another; to tell stories, evidently inventing comic anecdotes of their
employers and other common acquaintances, both absent and present. A dignified person, who stood upon the platform, was made
very uncomfortable, and reduced considerably in height and
stiffness, by urgent invitations to join them. The "guard," too,
as he passed, was an especial butt, and several illustrations were
given of the ignorant character of railway-people in general.
" There vas von o' them Mefodis wisitin-coves, you know, wot'awks tracs and suchlike, in here a Vensdy wen we come up;
and ven the guard come along he arks him did he know the
Lord's prayer?' Lorspraer?' says he,' vot is he?' says he;' is
he a stoker or a driver?' says he, ha! ha! ha! I'm blowed'f'e
didn't."
" I saw one of them same fellows other night," continued another, "wot'ad'old of another on'em. He treats'im to a go o'
gin first, you see, to make him sharp like, and then he axes him
did he know any think about the eternal world. "Turnulwool?'
says he —''Turnulwool?-no such place in the Farnham branch,
sir-hadn't you best enkvire of the station-master, sir?' says he."
"'Ternal world's the place where they hadn't got the rails
down to yet-last adwices; aren't it?-and they carries the nobs




342       AN AMERICAN FARMER ILN ENGLAND.
on there with lays o' busses wot runs erry day in the year oney
Sunneys and her Majestee's birth-day."
" No, no; I'll tell you where'tis - it's the kentry what the
coves in Astraly cuts to wen the kangarwoos gets short and the
gin-trees gives out and they's'ard up."
"Kangurerhoos-what's them?"
"Kind of fish as is covered with feathers'stead o' scales."
" I know it - I see a sailor as'ad a vestcoat made on't; short
vethers like spangled welwet, black and goold-stunnenest thing
you ever see."
"What's a gin-tree?"
" I know-there is-a big tree wot runs gin wen yer tap her
-and there's a bread-tree, too-"
"What bears fresh kortern loavs erry morning."
" Hurray for Polytechny! Ain't they all sliced and buttered?'
"In course they is, and yen you shakes'em off, the skin cracks
open, and they all valls buttered side up —coz vy? Yy the trees
is werry'igh and the buttered side's the lightest to be sure."
"That's the place for this chile-I'm bound to go there-only
waitin' for an act of Parliament; and wen I get there-Buffalo
"When he gets there you know what he'll do? When he
comes to the gin-trees he'll treat all'round. First time in his
life. Ha! ha!"
And with such constantly-combining streams a flood of original
information and entertainment was poured out to us until we
reached the little station about nine miles out of London, to which
we had taken tickets.




WALK TO LONDON.                    343
CHAPTER LI.
Rural Laborers near London - Our Mother Tongue - Cockneys - Provincialists- On the Naturalization of Foreign Words —Authorities- Suburban London - London - The Thames-" Saint Paul's from Blackfriar's
Bridge."
UPON our asking directions, a gentleman who left the firstclass carriage offered to be our guide for a little way. He
led us between fields in which men were hay-making. We spoke
of the "London lads" we had been riding with, and the gentleman agreed with us that, bad as they might appear, they were
less degraded than the mass of agricultural laborers.
"We could not stop to rest here on the stile," said he, "but
that every single man in that field, in the course of five minutes,
would come to us to ask something for drink; and the worst of
it is, it is not an excuse to obtain money by indirect begging for
the support of their families, but they would actually spend it
immediately at the public-house."
We told him that we had never been in London, and after a
little conversation he said that he had been trying to discover
where we came from, as from our accent he should have thought
us Londoners. He bad thought that he could always tell from
what part of England any stranger in London came, but be could
not detect any of the provincial accents or idioms in our language.




344       AiN AMERICAN FARMER IiV ENGLANlD.
We told him that we had supposed the cockney dialect was quite
distinct, but certainly never imagined it at all like our own. On
the contrary, he said, except among the vulgar classes, the Londoner alone has no dialect, but, much more than the native of any
other part of England, speaks our language from infancy in its
purity, and with the accent generally approved by our most elegant orators and generally-acknowledged authorities.
"But a liberal education must remove provincialisms, both of
idiom and accent."
" In a degree only. A boy will generally retain a good deal
of his provincial accent through the public school and university.
At least, I have paid considerable attention to the matter, and I
think I am always able to detect it, and say with confidence in
which quarter of the kingdom a man spent his youth. You
would yourself probably have no difficulty in detecting a Scotchman."
"I have noticed that Scotchmen who have resided long in
England, and who had in a considerable degree lost their original
peculiarities, usually spoke in a disagreeably high key and with
great exactness and distinctness of utterance."
" That is the result of the original effort which it was necessary
for them to use to speak correctly. They speak from the book,
as it were, and the same is more or less noticeable in all provincialists who do not habitually speak with the accent of their
youth."
WVe then informed him that we were Americans, which surprised him. I somewhat doubt myself the correctness of his
observation. I am aware of habitually using many Yankeeisms
myself, and have no desire to avoid them. The New England
accent of words, except such as are not very commonly used, I
should think might be generally agreeable to the most approved
standards in England. The educated English certainly speak




WORDS AND TEI1IR A UTORITIES.           345
with much greater distinctness and more elegance than we commonly do; perhaps they generally err in being too precise and
methodical, and it may be that the Londoners converse with more
rapidity and ease, or carelessness, than others. That what are
shown to us as peculiarities of cockney dialect, are mere vulgarisms and slang, not altogether peculiar to the metropolis, is very
true.
Agreeably to Walker, the educated English often give the
sound of a to e, pronouncing Derby, Darby; clerk, clark, etc.
This at first seemed very odd; but when I returned home, our
own way had become foreign to me. With us, except in society
which has a more than ordinary European element, foreign words
in common use, are more generally Anglicized than in England;
and though when one is accustomed to the more polite sound
there may seem an affectation of simplicity in this, I cannot but
wish that our custom was more general. The French almost
universally adapt foreign words of which they have need for
common use to the requirements of their habitual tongue, changing not only the pronunciation but the orthography: they write
rosbif, for English roast beef; biftek, for beefsteak. So we write
and pronounce cotelette, cutlet; why need we say "angtremay,"
for entremets? or if we choose that sound, and like it also better
than " side-dishes," why not print it "angtremay?"  We write
Cologne, for Kdln; why not Leeong, for Lyons? or if Lyons, let
us also speak it Lyons, and consider Leeong an affectation except
when we speak it in connection with other plainly French words.
The rule with regard to such matters is, to follow custom. Singularity is impertinent where it can be gracefully avoided; but
as there is more tendency to Anglicize foreign words that are in
general use in America than in England, and this is a good and
sensible tendency, let us not look for our rules to English custom.
Let us read Venus de.l3edicis, Venus de Medicis, rather than




346       AN A.MERICAN FAR MER IN ENGLA ND.
stammer and blush over it because we are not perfect in Italian.
I once heard a clergyman call it "Venu-de-AMedisy:" two-thirds
of his congregation understood what he meant as well as if he
had given it the true Italian pronunciation; but if he had read it
with the sound they would naturally attach in English reading to
that connection of letters, nearly all would have known what he
meant, and no one would have had a reasonable occasion to laugh
at him. But why is not our own language fit to speak of it inthe Medicean Venus?  Why should the French word envelope
be used by us when we have the English envelop?  Why the
Italian chiaro-oscuro, when there is the English clare-obscure
expressing the same?  I am  glad to see some of our railroad
companies accepting the word station, which is good old English,
in place of the word depot, which, as we pronounce it, is neither
French nor English.* In England, the designation station is
invariable. Depot is only used as a military technicality, with
the French pronunciation, dapo. If we really want a foreign
word or phrase to express ourselves, it shows a deficiency in our
language. Supply this by making your foreigner English: we in
America must not be chary of admitting strangers. Naturalize
it as soon as possible.
Neither let us think it of great consequence whether we say
-Rush-an or Ru-shan, for Russian; trawf or truf (as usual in
England), for trough; def or deef, for deaf; or whether we spell
according to Johnson, or Walker, or Webster, (or Webster modified); the custom varies, not only between England and America,
but between elegant scholars of each country in itself.
Half-a-mile's walk brought us to a village of plain, low, detached, paltry shops, where our guide, having given us a very
simple direction, took leave of us. We followed up the broad
* Station is the word now used in the laws of New York.




SUBURBAN LONVDON.                   347
street; the shops, a large number of which were ale-houses, soon
were displaced in a great measure by plain, small villas of stone,
or stuccoed brick, standing two or three rods back from the street,
with dense shrubbery, enclosed by high brick walls before them.
Gradually the houses ran together and became blocks; omnibuses, market-carts, heavy "vans" (covered luggage wagons),
and pleasure-carriages, constantly met and passed, and when we
had walked about three miles, the village had become a compact,
busy town-strangely interrupted once by a large, wild, wholly
rustic common. Then the town again: the side-walk encroached
upon by the grocers and hucksters; monster signs of " entire"
ales and ready-made coffins, and " great sacrifices" of haberdashery and ladies' goods; the street wide and admirably paved, and
crossed at short but irregular intervals by other narrower streets,
and growing more busy every moment. Still it is nothing remarkable; a wide street, plain brick houses, a smell of gas now
and then, and a crowd. I would hardly have known, from any
thing to be seen, that I was not entering some large town in our
own country, which I had never visited before. Indeed, it's quite
like coming down the Bowery.
People werelooking up; following the direction of their eyes,
we saw a balloon ascending. The air was calm, and it rose to a
great height -greater, says the Times this morning, than any
ever reached before.
A shrill cry in the distance, rising faintly above the rumble of
the wheels and hum and patter of the side-walks, grows rapidly
more distinct, until we distinguish, sung in a high key, "Strawberrie-Sixpenny-pottle. Who'll buy?" The first of "London cries."
We have been walking steadily, in a nearly straight line, for
two hours, and now the crowd thickens rapidly until it is for a
moment at the fullest Broadway density. There is a long break
in the brick-house fronts, and we turn aside out of the crowd and




348       AN AMERICAN FARMER 1N ENGLAND.
halt to take an observation. We are leaning over the parapet of
Blackfriar's Bridge. The Thames looks much as I had supposed; something wider than our travelers usually represent it,
hardly an "insignificant stream" even to an eye accustomed to
American rivers, but wide enough and deep enough and strong
enough to make bridges of magnificence necessary to cross it, and
answering all the requirements needed in a ship-canal passing
through the midst of a vast town. A strong current setting upward from the sea gurgles under the arches; heavy coal-barges
slowly sweep along with it; dancing, needle-like wherries shoot
lightly across it, and numerous small, narrow steamboats, crowded
with passengers, plow white furrows up and down its dark
surface.
Upon the bank opposite -almost upon the bank, and not distant in an artist's haze -stand blackened walls and a noble old
dome, familiar to us from childhood. It is only nearer, blacker,
and smaller-wofully smaller-than it has always been. We do
not even think of telling each other it is SAINT PAUL'S.
There is a low darkness, and the houses and all are sooty in
streaks, but there is a pure —so far as our lungs and noses know
-pure, fresh, cool breeze sweeping up the river, and overhead a
cloudless sky; and in the clear ether, clear as Cincinnati's, there
is a new satellite -beautiful as the moon's daughter. It is the
balloon, now so high that the car is invisible; and without any
perceptible motion it blushes in golden sunlight, while we have
been some time since left to evening's dusk.
The crowd tramps behind us. We turn and are sucked into
the channel, which soon throws us out from the bridge upon a
very broad street; up this, in a slackening tide, we are still unresistingly carried, for it is London, and that was what we were
looking for; and for awhile we allow ourselves to be absorbed in
it without asking what is to become of us next.




A PILGRIMAGE.                    349
CHAPTER LII.
A Pilgrimage.
WHILE in London, I was one day visiting a library, when
the friend who conducted me called my attention to a series
of shelves, saying, "here are topographical and genealogical
records, arranged under the head of counties-is yours an English name? I have never seen it in England."
"Yes, I believe it is-at least our family came to America
from England."
" From what part-do you know?"
" Essex, I've heard it said."
" WVhen," said he, taking down a book.
" 1630 to 40."
"Yes, here it is —Manor of Olmsted, in Bumpstead Helens,
Thaxstead; passed out of the family near the end of sixteenth
century. Maurice de, married, and-so-forth. A moated grange,
now belongs to       College, Cambridge. Where's the Ordnance map of Essex?  Here.  Let's see-Thaxstead- Olmsted Hall; yes, here it is-only about six miles from a station.
Better go out there and see it, hadn't you? You can do it in
half a day easily enough."
The next day I went; traveling half an hour by rail, and then




350       AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND.
taking a chaise, by which a drive of six miles brought me to a
small hamlet with a small and ruinous church in a very ancient
graveyard. I inquired for the parish clerk and found him, a
cobbler, at his work. The records were locked up at the curate's
and the curate was away. Did any one live hereabouts of the
name of Olmsted?  No. Did he ever know any one of that
name? No; no man-there was the old hall farm. What
hall?  Olmsted Hall they called it. Why?  He did not know.
I asked to be directed to it and found it difficult of access, by
narrow parish roads and farm lanes.
It proved to be a large, low and very common-place sort of
farm-house of stone, in the midst of a level wheat farm of 200
acres. It belonged to one of the Cambridge colleges, and the
family of the present tenant had occupied it for several generations. They received me kindly, and when I told them my
name, with some little excitement and manifestation of respect,
as if I had rights in the house. "Come into the old hall, sir,"
they said, taking me to the largest room-a low room, about 20
feet by 20, with a single low window nearly occupying one side,
and a monstrous old fire-place, now bricked up for a coal grate,
another.
"This is the old hall."
" Why do you call it the hall?"
"It always was called so. I suppose it's because they used to
hold courts here, sir. The house used to be moated all around,
but they filled up the moat in front when that lane was built;
that was in my father's time."
The moat still remained around the garden, a deep ditch with
a low earth wall, on which grew an old hedge. At one corner
of the house was a yew tree, certainly several hundred years old.
This house, as is a matter of record, was occupied by the Olmsteds for more than two hundred years before the Puritan emi



A PILGRIMAGE.                   351
gration. After that period I could find nothing of them in
England.
I have given this account, because the incident is so characteristic of an American's visit to England, as well as because it shows
what an historic interest may attach to any old farm-house in
England. I once afterwards entered a cottage in Lincolnshire
where a child was playing with what appeared to be an old iron
pot, but which proved, upon examination, to be a helmet. The
father, a clod-hopping yeoman, said it had been worn in France
by some one of his forefathers. He had a horse-rug that came
down to him with it. This he brought upon my asking to see ita quilted horse cover, once elaborately embroidered. Since these
things came back from some war in France, hundreds of years
ago, they had always remained in this house, which, with some
forty acres of land around it, he had inherited. He did not live
very well, but his land was yet unincumbered, and he hoped his
son might be a "yeoman-farmer" after him.
But it is a melancholy thing that there are so few yeoman
now in England; that is, farmers owning the land they till, and
independent of landlords.








A PPENDIX.
[A.]
Information and Advice for those wishing to make a Pedestrian Tour in
England, at the least practicable expense.
A YOUNG man with small means, and who is willing to
N "rough it," wishes to know with how little money it would
be practicable for him to undertake a trip to England. I have
no doubt there are many such who would visit the Old WVorld if
they were aware how cheaply and pleasantly they could do so.
I have heretofore expressed my own obligation to Bavard Taylor, and it is probable that what I shall have to say will be, to
some extent, a repetition of the instructions given in a chapter
upon the subject in the later editions of the "Views a-Foot."  It
will, however, have more especial reference to traveling on foot
in England.
The Passage.-There are no regular arrangements made in
the packet-ships for those who wish to go to England decently
and in tolerable comfort at a moderate price. It will be with
more or less difficulty, according as freights are active or dull,
that you may obtain a proper "second cabin passage and found."
You stand the best chance to do so in the London lines. A
special arrangement with the Captain is necessary. A party of
three or four may at almost any time, by application to the Captain shortly before a ship sails, engage a state-room, provide
themselves with stores, and hire their cooking done, etc.; so
23              (353)




354                  A P t END IX.
that the passage shall cost them but from twenty to thirty dollars.
With good messmates, good catering, a liberal gratuity to the
cook, steward or ship's servant that waits upon you, and in a clean
ship, you may make the passage in this way more agreeably than
in any other; more so than in the first cabin at four times the
expense. The price of the regular first-cabin passage out is $90.
In the steerage, you pay $10 to $12 for a mere sleeping place,
provide yourself with stores, cook for yourself, or hire some fellow-passenger, who does not suffer equally from sea-sickness, to
cook for you. You must provide yourself with bedding, cooking
utensils, etc. It will cost you about $20. Secure, if possible,
an upper berth, near the hatchway; be provided with an abundance of old clothes; look out for pilferers; spend an hour each
morning in sweeping and keeping clean the steerage; nurse the
sick; take care of the women and children; and keep the deck
all the time that you otherwise can. You will probably be very
miserable, but it will be over after a while; you will have seen
a peculiar exhibition of human nature, and will go ashore with a
pleasure not to be imagined. You can go to Liverpool or Glasgow by the screw-steamers (second cabin and found), decently
and quickly, for from $50 to $75. The same by the mail-steamers, not so comfortably but more quickly. Most disagreeably,
but soon over with, in the steerage of some of the steamers for
$40.
Returning.-You have the same (and rather increased second
cabin accommodations by the London packets), at about 10 per
cent. higher prices. You can live comfortably for two months,
and see "the lions" in Paris or London, for the difference between the first and second cabin fare out and home.
Our Expenses for board and bed, while in the country in England, averaged seventy-five cents a-day. Expenses of short conveyance by rail, coach and boat; fees to showmen and guides;
washing, postage and incidentals (properly included as traveling
expenses), added to this, made our average expenses about one
dollar a-day each. How we fared, and with what degree of comfort or luxury we were content, the reader should have already
been informed. I have, however, dwelt more upon the agreeable
than the disagreeable side of such traveling. We often, on entering a town, looked from one inn to another, in doubt which to
select, desiring to avoid unnecessary expense, while we secured
quiet and cleanliness. Sometimes we would enter a house and
usk to see the rooms and know the charges. No offense was




APPEND IX.                        355
ever taken at this, though once or twice, where we were going
to spend a Sunday, and the rooms were not agreeable, or convenient to write in, we proceeded further. We soon, however,
were able to guess very well the character of a house by its outside appearance, and could regulate our disbursements with great
exactness.
Inns.-The great difference between thlze large "first-class"
inns and the second and third class is, that in the latter the
lodgers are so few that one or two servants can take the place of
three or four at the former. Frequently the landlord may be
porter and Boots, (and will act as guide commissionaire or cicerone;) the mistress, cook; and their daughter, waiter and chambermaid. In such cases, generally, no servant's fees at all are
expected, and at most a third or half of what is honestly due the
servants of the stylish inn will be satisfactory. The small inns
are really often more comfortable to the pedestrian than the large
ones; because he can be more at his ease; need not care how he
appears; can wheel the sofa up to the fire or open all the windows; dine in his slippers, and smoke, if he likes, in the parlor:
take command of the house, in short: see for himself that his
shoes are greased and his linen washed and drying, his knapsackstraps repaired, lost buttons replaced, and all his rig a-taunto for
an early start without delays in the morning.
If you call for anything for your table that the house is not
provided with, it will be at once procured from the shops; the
cooking is generally good, and the bread always fine. We
usually contented ourselves with one hot meal in a day. Two of
us were without the habit of drinking tea or coffee, and would
often make our breakfast of bread and milk; lunch on bread and
cheese and beer, and take a substantial meal at the end of our
day's walk. We thought we walked better with this arrangement than any other.
For less than seventy cents a-day it is possible to travel in England without hardship or injury to health. For how much less I
cannot say. I once stopped alone at a house where I dined with
the family on boiled bacon and potatoes and a bag-pudding, for
which I was charged six-pence; breakfasted on scalded milk and
bread for twopence; and was asked sixpence in advance for
lodging. I had a good, clean bed and washing conveniences in
my room. Add to this twopence for tea, and the day's living is
33 cents. This was in the north of England, and was extraordinary. The usual charge for lodging is a shilling, sometimes




.356                 APPENDIX.
ninepence, and sometimes only sixpence. At the first-class inns
they will make you pay well in one way or another. Where we
did not dine we have been charged thrcepence each for the use
of the public room, that is to say, for sitting in it instead of outof-doors or in our rooms, while waiting for tea to be prepared.
With regard to servants, the best way is to ask the landlord to
pay them and charge it in the bill. It relieves you of a great
annoyance, and in such cases we never found the charge added
extravagant.
-Equipment.-Shoes can be obtained much cheaper in England
than America, and, indeed, first-rate shoes are hardly to be had
in America; but English shoes, that you would have to buy at
the shops, always have a seam across the instep that is very hard
upon a foot unaccustomed to it; and for this reason, and to insure
a shape to suit you, you had best get them made at home. The
leather should be well-tanned and dressed thick kip or cowhide,
the best than can be procured; the soles of "English bend;"
three-eights of an inch in thickness; double this in the heel,
which should come so far forward that the break will be perpendicular with the point of the ankle. Give your order, if possible,
six months beforehand (I never have known a shoemaker who
would get his work done when he promised for any consideration), and go to the workman yourself to make sure that he understands what you want, otherwise you will probably receive,
just as you are going on board ship, a parcel by express containing a pair of butterfly pumps. Have a distinct agreement that,they shall be returned if they do not come in time, and if they
do not answer to your order. They should be high enough (64
inches, including heel, commonly) to well cover the ankle, and
lace up with but two crossings over the instep. The laces must
be made of the best leather, and you should carry half-a-dozen
spare ones.
If, finally, the shoes are not large enough to go easily over
two woolen socks on your foot, reject them. Get shaker woolen
socks of an exact fit to your foot, or as large as they may be without danger of folding or rubbing into welts under your shoes.
Wear them with the "wrong side" outward. You do not want
to wear them double, but your feet will swell so in a long hot
day's walk, that you will want that there should have been room
enough in your shoes for them to be double before you started.
]Break your shoes in on the passage.
Gaiters are worn to protect the feet from dust and gravel com



APPENDIX.                        357
ing over the top of the shoe. They increase the heat of the feet
to that degree that they are best dispensed with. Bathe your
feet at every convenient opportunity on the road, and always as
soon as you stop for the night, and change your socks and put on
slippers.
I took all these precautions and yet suffered a thousand times
more, and was delayed more, from foot-soreness than from fatigue.
English pedestrians and sportsmen often wear much heavier and
clumsier shoes than I have advised.
Knapsack.-We had the India-rubber army knapsack, made
at Naugatuck, Connecticut. If you get them well "seasoned,"
so that they will not stick or smell, and with a good harness, they
will probably be the best that you can procure. Ours were so,
and we found them convenient and to wear well.
Clothing you can get in England better than at home. You
must dispense with everything not absolutely essential to your
comfort; for every ounce is felt in a hot day. We carried in our
knapsacks each about as follows:
Four shirts, one pair cloth pantaloons, two pair socks; slippers,
handkerchiefs, mending materials, toilet articles, towel, napkin,
leather drinking-cup, cap, oil-silk cape, portfolio with writing and
sketching materials, knife and fork, candle of tallow (that it may
be used to grease shoes with upon occasion), matches, a book,
map, pocket-compass, adhesive plaster, cord, shoe-lacings.
Everything selected with care for lightness and compactness,
and the whole weighing ten pounds and a-half, including knapsack
and straps. We wore upon the road light cloth coats and waistcoats, and linen dusters or blouses, and light cassimere pantaloons.
We each carried a strong, hooked hickory-stick, and it will be
found best to do so. We usually wore broad-brimmed, pliable
felt hats of the best quality; they were excellent both in sun and
rain. We also had light linen caps.
For rainy weather a cape of the best black oiled silk, 22 inches
long before, and 16 inches behind, with a low collar, and buttoning in front, weighing half-a-pound, and folding so small that it
could be carried in a coat pocket — a capital and serviceable
article. With a loop and a tape it may be gathered tight at the
waist under the knapsack, so as not to be lifted by the wind.
A flask for drink is hardly worth its carriage in England. A
man every way in health should be able to walk a dozen miles
or more without wanting to drink. Where good water is constantly to be had, it is refreshing to taste it very frequently, and




358                  APPEND IX.
there are no ill effects to be apprehended from doing so. You
will perspire more freely, and I think stand the heat better; but
cold water will not quench thirst, except momentarily; on the
contrary, I believe it increases it. Malt liquors and spirituous
liquors have different effects upon different individuals. Both
are disagreeable to me. Most English pedestrians drink very
fireely of malt liquors, and find them wholesome. On the Continent I would carry a flask for light wine, such as every peasant
has to his dinner. Its cost is trifling, and there is nothing which
will quench thirst like it. It is not very palatable at first, but
exceedingly refreshing, and I believe every way heathful. It
has no intoxicating, and very slight stimulating, qualities. I
think it would have an excellent effect on the public health, if it
could be produced cheaply, and used as freely as tea and coffee
now are in the United States.
When you feel very much jaded with a long walk, and hardly
able to go any further, if you can swallow a cup of tea and a bit
of toast or biscuit, and pour a wine-glass of spirits into your
shoes, keeping yourself warm during the necessary short halt, you
will find yourself good for another hour or two of hard tramping.
Routes and Distances.-Unless you are considerably familiar
with the language and history of a Continental nation, I would
advise you to spend most of your time in England. It is better
to study thoroughly the character of one people, and remain so
long, if possible, in their country, that you may feel as if you
had lived in it, and made yourself a part of it, than to run superficially over a dozen. It is, however, much cheaper, and in many
respects more agreeable to walk in Germany than in England;
and a true American, mingling with the peasant people, can hardly fail to do them good, and have his own heart enlightened and
expanded by their spirit longing for liberty and universal affection for his country. It is of walking in England, however, that
I wish especially to speak.
Your route should be determined by your tastes and objects.
If they are as general as ours, and you design to employ the
same time in England that we did, I could advise but very slight
variation from our route.
With a week's more time, you should see more of North
Wales, (though, in general, mountain and lake country is not
England, and you can get what tourists go to those districts for
better nearer at home;) extend your walk into Devonshire, and
keep along the south coast to Portsmouth. After visiting the




APPEND IX.                       359
Isle of Wight, the old road to London, running, I believe, through
Guildford, is said to be much pleasanter than the more direct
way we came. After spending some weeks in and about London, follow up the Thames by Henley, and as near the south
bank as you can, to Oxford — then by Stratford-on-Avon, Warwick and Kenilworth to Birmingham; thence, according to your
interest, through the manufacturing districts, and by Chatsworth
and the Derbyshire moors to York; thence by Fountain's Abbey,
through the curious hill-country of West Yorkshire and Lancashire, into Westmoreland; thence either north to Scotland, or by
Liverpool to Ireland, crossing afterwards to Scotland from Belfast. Guide-books can be obtained in New York, by the aid of
which and a good map, you may, before you leave home, judge
how much time you will want to spend in examining various objects of interest, and ascertain distances, etc. You can thus plot
off your route and calculate the time at which you will arrive at
any particular point. Guide-books are expensive and heavy, and
this is their principal use; further, you are liable to pass through
a town and neglect to see something for which it is peculiarly
distinguished, without you have something to remind you of it.
We traveled at first at the rate of one hundred miles in six
days, at last at the rate of about two hundred; sometimes going
forty miles, and ordinarily thirty, in a day. We usually did
thirty miles in eleven hours, one of which might be spent under
a hedge or in a wayside inn, and about one mile an hour lost in
loitering, looking at things on the wayside or talking to people
that we met; our actual pace was just about four miles an hour.
You can start with twelve miles in a day, and calculate to
average twenty-five after the first fortnight.
If you can make anything like a harmonious noise upon any
instrument for that purpose, I would advise you to strap it on.
You will understand its value by reading the life of Goldsmith.
It will make you welcome in many a peasant circle, where you
might otherwise have been only a damper upon all naturalness
and geniality.




360                    APPENDIX.
[ B,
Principles of the Mark System, framed to mix Persuasion with Punishment,
and make their effect improving, yet their operation severe. By CAPTAIN
MACHooNOCHIE, R. N., K. H., late Superintendent of the British Penal Settlement at Norfolk Island.: Our present punishments resemble everything that is most deteriorating in ordinary
life: and they deteriorate accordingly. If we would infuse into them those impulses
which, under Providential guidance, make other forms of adversity improving, we would
make them improving also."
THE  constituent elements in secondary punishment are labor
and time. MIen are sentenced to hard labor for a given time:
-but the time is here made to measure the labor-and the first
proposal of the Mark System is, that instead of this the labor be
made to measure the time. This idea is not peculiar to it. In
his letter to Earl Grey the Archbishop of Dublin uses these
words: "The best plan, as it appears to me, would be, instead of
sentencing men to imprisonment for a certain time, to sentence
them to render a certain amount of labor. A fixed daily task
may be imposed on them, but with power to exceed this at their
own discretion, thereby shortening their period of detention.
The effect would be, not only that criminals would thus acquire
habits of labor, but of attaching an agreeable idea to labor. By
each additional step they took on the tread-wheel they would
be walking out of prison-by each additional cut of the spade
they would be cutting a way to return to society."
It would be difficult to express the direct primary effect of the
system in happier or terser terms; and even when thus stated,
the improvement contemplated on existing practice appears immense.  But much more when the ulterior consequences are also
considered. By substituting a powerful internal stimulus to exertion for that physical coercion which must ever be at best an
imperfect external one, while all necessary bondage and suffering
as the consequences of crime would be retained, direct "slavery"
would be banished from among our secondary punishments. The
tendencies of our management would be to good, whereas those




A PPEN 1DIX.                      361
of the existing system are "to evil continually."  Men would improve under it, instead of becoming worse. And the administration of public justice would acquire a place among the Christian
agencies of our land: it is painful to think how far it is at present
removed in operation from any such character.
But another view may be also taken of the question thus involved, not less interesting. If we look abroad into ordinary life,
we cannot but be struck with the resemblance which our present
forms of secondary punishment bear to everything that is in this
most enfeebling and deteriorating, and how directly opposed they
are to those forms of adversity which, under the influence of
Providential wisdom, reform character and invigorate it. Slavery deteriorates — long seclusion deteriorates-every condition, in
a word, more or less deteriorates, which leaves no choice of action,
requires no virtue but obedience, affords no stimulus to exertion
beyond this, supplies the want of nature without effort with a
view to them, and restores to prosperity, through lapse of time,
without evidence that such restoration is deserved. Yet this is
our present system of secondary punishment. What improves,
on the contrary, is a condition of adversity from which there is
no escape but by continuous effort-which leaves the degree of
that effort much in the individual's own power, but if he relaxes,
his suffering is deepened and prolonged, and it is only alleviated
and shortened if he struggles manfully-which makes exertion
necessary even to earn daily bread-and something more, prudence, self-command, voluntary economy and the like, to recover
prosperity. To this, as yet, secondary punishment bears no resemblance; but were our sentences measured by labor instead of
time-were they to the performance of certain tasks, not to the
occupation of a certain time in evading any-the approximation
might be made indefinitely close.
Labor being a vague term the system next proposes that it be
represented by marks-the earning of so many thousands of
which, in a prison or penal settlement, as the case may be, to be
made the punishment of all offenses according to their degree.
A proportion of these marks to be credited to individuals daily,
according to the exertion made in whatever labor is allotted
them-all supplies of food and clothing to be charged in themall misconduct to be punished by fines in them-and only the
clear balance to be carried to account towards liberation. By
this means both wages and savings' banks would be introduced
into prisons-wages to stimulate labor, and give an interest in it,




362                  APPEN DIX.
and savings' banks to give a similar interest to habits of economy
and self-command. To make the resemblance to ordinary life
still closer, and at the same time to promote kindly and social, as
opposed to selfish, feeling, it is further proposed that during a
portion of their entire period of detention criminals be distributed
into parties or families of six, with common interests and accounts,
rising or falling together, and thus all interested in the good conduct of each. By this means a strong physical check would be
laid on crime in prisons, with a yet stronger moral one; and an
apparatus would be gained by which good conduct and exertion
would be made popular, and offense unpopular, in the community,
and all would be interested in promoting the one and keeping
down the other. Mly experience on Norfolk Island-which
was imperfect, because my views were not then sustained, as I
trust they yet will be, at home, my powers and apparatus were
consequently imperfect, and my results rather indicated tendencies than gave precise conclusions-yet leads me to attach great
value to this, as to several other details explained in other papers.
But I regard them all only as they seem to me to carry out the
principles laid down. If these are right, when once established,
the best details to found on them will soon become of themselves
apparent. With a near tangible end, like individual reform, in
view, no mistakes, however at first great, can be long persisted
in.
Severity, then, with a directly benevolent purpose-modeled
with a view to recover criminals as well as punish them-controlled and guided by the enlightened pursuit of this noble end,
made as great, for the benefit both of the individual and the community, as is compatible with it, but neither greater nor other
than strictly subordinate to it-this is the guide here sought to
be introduced into secondary punishment: and unless it is attentively considered, it will be found difficult to believe the number
of new views that it will open up of interest and promise. It
will adjust the controversy between harshness and lenity which
has long divided reasoners on the subject —the one impulse having authorized the most distressing cruelties, while the other has
occasionally led to indulgences scarcely less injurious in their
ultimate consequences to both the criminal and society, enfeebling
the one, and leading the honest laborer, in the other, painfully to
contrast his own position with that of the convicted felon. It
will thus solve many preliminary difficulties, and conduct to
many important conclusions. It will give a new spirit to punish



A  P PEND IX.                      363
ment by giving it a new direction. By raising its object it will
raise its administration. It will be difficult to be either cruel or
careless with such an object as individual reform in view, and
while wielding an agency offering a reasonable probability of attaining it.  (The last is of great importance: we become indifferent, in spite of ourselves, when engaged in a hopeless task.)
It will assimilate this branch of our administration to those ways
of Providence to men which must always be our surest guides
when we seek to influence them. It will thus imitate the highest wisdom, and thereby enable us to obey the highest precept.
We may love while we chasten, and be substantially kind even
when enforcing the strictest commands of punitive law. It will
succeed with little effort, because it will study the human nature
implanted in us, instead of trampling its impulses under foot. It
will further conduct to great economy as well as efficiency, partly
through this cause, partly because the virtues of industry and
self-command which it will be its great aim to foster will equally
bring about both results.  The practical change may be thought
a small one on which to found such anticipations — the change
from measuring labor by time to that of measuring time by labor
-or, in other words, from giving our criminals time-sentences to
allotting them tasks: —but the one course is the direct reverse
of the other, and the difference may be thus the whole difference
between right and wrong, success and failure. It seems, indeed,
even impossible to follow out the chain of reasoning suggested
without coming to this conclusion. When men are smitten with
adversity in ordinary life, and thus punished for previous follies
or misconduct, they are not condemned to this adversity for a
certain time, but until they can retrieve their position. They
suffer under this task; they sorrow over it (but without resentment); they struggle with it: their characters improve under the
various efforts and emotions called out by it; (both deepened if
they have others to care for as well as themselves;) frequently
they rise even higher than before; —and society is instructed by
such examples in every way-it shrinks from the preliminary
sufferings exhibited in them, and emulates, in due proportion as
its own case may require, the manly struggle that has at length
overcome them. And so it might be with our punishments, if
we would model them on the same type. They are now for the
most part barbarous in every sense, in their want of skill and
adaptation to high purpose, and in the crime and misery they
thus gratuitously produce. We might make them beneficent in




364                  APP ENDIX.
every sense, merely by copying the wisdom that is around us;and when this is fully understood, it is not to be imagined but
that every lover of his kind will take even an eager interest in
bringing about the change. The real difficulty is to influence to
the inquiry.
I must add, that in this condensed statement of the principles
of his system, Captain Machonochie has made no allusion to a
very important part of it-the ante-criminal part, if I may so
express it. He proposes, as a preventive measure, the establishr.ent of Industrial Schools, to which the children of the poorer
classes or vagrants should be encouraged to come and give their
cheerful and active labor, by receiving marks exchangeable for a
good, substantial, but coarse, meal in the middle of the day, and
some other food to carry home at night. The employments to
be as much as possible rural and agricultural, and in every case
at least laborious, fitting those subjected to them to face hard
work in after life.
THE END.