FIFTY YEARS OF ENGLISH FARMING.

Bruce Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 143, 12 June 1903, Page 7

FIFTY YEARS OF ENGLISH FARMING.

The thrifty English farmer of fifty years .igo has reoently been described by R. D. Blackinore as a happy farmer, able still to find a shilling in his Sunday clothes, and to t' ink of Vae guineas in a nest beneath hi? roof For wheat was golden then in England, and the good ox owned his silver hide. The fair outlook over hill and valley, rustling field and quiet meadow, was not yet a forlorn view, a sight that is out short in sights, a prospect narrowing into a lane that plods down hill to the workhouse. Of all the tasks of the world, the one that can never be long in arrears is eating ; and of all British victuals, -next to bread, the potato claims the foremost place. ' Where the soil was light in those day, potatoes could be dug by the ton, but in these epidemic, times it is hard to find a good potato. Then it was no mockery to cast the fat grain among the clods, or trickle it into the glistening drill, to clear the sleek blade from the noisome weed, to watch the soft waves of silky tassels dimple and darken to the breeze of Jnne and then the lush heads with their own weight bowing to the stillness of the August sun, thrilling the eyes » ith innumerable throng.s glowing with impenetrable depth of gold. He grieves that this beauty should be of the past, and ground . into gritty foreign Bour. "But fifty years ago, these good sons of Great Britain had no dream of the oom merce whioh should sell their homes and landscapes to the snearing foreigner. Their trouble, though heavy, was not of their own making, but inflicted from without. Therefore it could be mot and cured by men of strong purpose and generous act, but to-day the competition of foreign farmers is a crush* ing force.