Lowestoft, Oulton, Gunton, and Flixton, are principally sand, with an occasional mixture of clay and brick earth, in many parts wet and full of springs. Ashby, Herringfleet, and the remaining parishes, are also chiefly sand, but accounted good turnip and barley lands. These soils were formerly farmed upon the five-course shift, viz. turnips, barley, layer, wheat, and barley sown upon the wheat stubble; but within the last twenty years, this system of driving the land has been justly exploded, and the rotation, termed the Norfolk husbandry, or fourcourse shift, very generally introduced, viz. turnips, barley, layer, and wheat, turnips being every where made the preparation for corn, for there is no land so light that it will not yield, by means of dung or fold, this crop. In the turnip husbandry, about fifteen years ago, the Swedish turnip was introduced, a valuable bulb, greatly superior to the common turnip, from its firm texture, and little liability to rot from the effects of frost, and it is consequently increasing in the estimation of the agriculturist.

Ten years ago, the first cultivation of mangel wurzel, for cattle, took place; but the trouble of preparing the land (which should be ready by the latter end of May) in time to sow it, is a bar to its being cultivated to any extent.

The farms of this district cannot, in general, be reckoned large; they however vary, from 50 to 200 acres of arable land; a few have 400, and those in the neighbourhood of the marshes, have from 50 to

200 acres of marsh land attached. The operations of tillage are conducted in a similar way to those in the other parts of Suffolk. Ploughing is every where performed by a small wheel-plough, peculiar to the county, with a pair of horses and reins, and the quantity of land usually turned in a day, (of ten hours) is an acre and a quarter upon the stiff soils, and from one and a half to one and threequarters on the light lands. The corn is deposited chiefly by the drill, (a machine unknown in the hundred thirty years ago,) with the exception of wheat, the greater part of which is dibbled, an excellent practice, in every point of view, and has a great tendency to become general. To effect this operation, the land is first rolled with a heavy roller; a man or woman then, with a dibber of iron in each hand, the handle of which is about three feet long, walks backwards upon the flag, (as the furrow slice is termed) and strikes two rows of holes on each flag, about four inches from one row to the other, and is followed by two or three children, who drop the grains, four or five in each hole, and a bush-harrow is then used to cover them. In this way the seed is laid into the flag itself, at a proper and equal depth, without being dropped into the seams, as is frequently the case in drilling, and there is consequently some saving of seed. There is every reason to denominate this practice excellent, for the treading so equally upon light soils is very beneficial to some, and in dry weather hurtful to none. crops upon the lands thus dibbled are generally superior to the common, and the sample is more

The

equal. Besides, the vast system of well-paid employment which this practice carries with it for numbers of poor women and children, who are occupied about two months in the performance, is a point of immense importance to the country. In the operations of rolling and harrowing, there is in general nothing which demands particular attention.

The major part of the farmers hire marshes at a distance for forwarding their straw-fed beasts, which are taken up about Michaelmas, and placed in warm enclosed yards, or confined in sheds, and fattened on turnips and hay for the London markets. During the last season, however, in consequence of the total failure of the turnips, the farmers were compelled to resort to oil cake,* which they procured, at an enormous expence, from Holland and Hamburgh, and latterly from France. The stock usually purchased by the graziers are Scots and short-horned oxen, vast numbers of which are constantly on sale at the different fairs in the county, but more particularly at the great mart on Norwich Hill, now considered the largest cattle fair in the kingdom. The cows are universally polled, or without horns, of a small size, and few of them, when fattened, exceed fifty stone (of 14 lbs.) in weight-they have long been celebrated for yielding a great quantity of milk, which much exceeds, on an average, that of any other breed in the county, if the quantity of food and size * The demand for oil cake last season was quite unprece→ dented, for between the 18th of January, 1825, and the 6th of March, 1826, upwards of 7000 tons of foreign cake were imported and entered at the Custom-House, in Yarmouth.

of the animal be taken into account. The sheep of this district, where sheep are kept, which is by no means general, are usually a cross between the South-down and Norfolk breeds, and the Down and Leicester: their wool is fine, and for the quality of the mutton, and their activity in bearing hard folding, particularly the former, they are much esteemed.

Though the horses of Suffolk are in general excellent, yet the farmers of this district are certainly not celebrated for their cart horses: they are now however improving, and more attention is paid to breeding them than formerly. The carriages used are four-inch wheel waggons, and a very heavy six-inch wheel cart; but on many farms they have substituted a smaller carriage, named a tumbril, which will ultimately be brought into general use. The greater part of the corn is thrashed by machines of four-horse power, which will each thrash from thirty to sixty coombs of wheat per day; there are also small tread-mill machines, worked by men, capable of thrashing from fifteen to thirty coombs per day. The use of the flail, however, is not wholly discontinued by a certain class of the agriculturists, and wherever this is practised, it is constantly task-work.

The hours of labour for servants throughout the half-hundred, are from six till eleven in the morning, and from two till seven in the evening, during the summer; and in the winter half-year, from day-light till half-past eleven, and from half

past one till dark. The day labourers receive from 15d. to 18d. per day, in the winter season, and from 20d. to 2s. during the summer, except in the months of July, August, and September, when they are chiefly at task-work in hay-making, turnip-hoeing, and harvest. The yearly servants, of both sexes, are frequently hired at petty sessions, held by the chief constables of the villages, on Old Michaelmas day: the wages of the men are from £5. to £12. per annum, and the females have from 50s. to £6. 6s. with their board and lodging.

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