ground is better levelled, the seed more evenly
covered, and therefore more early ripened,
and is not disturbed by horses' feet; weeds
are better extirpated by being effectually
buried or pulled up; and for thorough
pulverisation, 'what is equal to a slap with the
back of a spade?'"

Experience, however, teaches better than
theory; and we learn, from various agricultural
reports, and from the parliamentary
evidence on the Allotment System, enough to
show the value of spade husbandry, and its
superiority over the plough, for, of course,
small holdings.

"Mr. Falla, of Gateshead, obtained, by the
plough, thirty-eight bushels of wheat per
acre; by the spade, sixty-eight bushels and a
half. At Sherborne, in Warwickshire, Frederick
Harris, a farm labourer, produced, by
the spade, sixteen bushels and a half of
wheat, in 1834, on one quarter of an acre,
being at the rate of sixty-six bushels per acre.
Mr. Gedney, of Redenhall, near Harleston,
holder of three hundred acres, beginning with
eighteen acres, increased his spade cultivation
to fifty acres, encouraged by the luxuriant
crops of all kinds of which it is the result;
at a cost, for thorough digging, twelve inches
deep, and pulverising the subsoil, and ridging
it, of only two pounds per acre."

These authorities show that John Sillets
are by no means agricultural phenomena.
Sir Henry Vavasour instances a cottier
tenant of his who rented three acres of
land; his stock consisted of two cows and
two pigs; he cultivated his land with the
assistance of his wife and daughter, twelve
years old, at their over hours. They
subsisted on their daily wages at other labour;
paid their rent by the sale of their butter
only; and were in the habit of saving thirty
pounds a year out of the produce of the sale
of their crops. Mr. Howard, of Melbourne
Farm, had a tenant, who, at his over hours,
aided by his family, cultivated one acre and a
quarter, including the site of his cottage and
fences. The land was at first so poor that it
was not considered worth five shillings an
acre rent; in a few years, however, care and
industry had improved it so much that it
yielded a crop worth ten pounds seventeen
shillings. This poor man, before he had any
land, had the greatest difficulty in maintaining
his wife and three children. His family now
increased to seven children, and even his
health became indifferent; yet with his acre
and a quarter of, originally, the poorest land,
a cow, and a pig—and a spade—he maintained
and brought up his increased family in
comfort, without requiring parish relief.

The evidence of Mr. John Way of Hasketon,
Suffolk, introduces a female farmer—a vigorous
spade's-woman:—"In 1799, a tenant of mine
died, leaving a widow and fourteen children,
the eldest a girl under fourteen. He had
held under me fourteen acres of pasture land
at thirteen pounds a year, and had kept two
cows, which, with a very little furniture and
clothing, was all the property. The directors
of the house of industry immediately agreed
to take her seven youngest children into the
house. She said she would rather die in
working to maintain them; and that if I, her
landlord, would continue her in the farm, as
she called it, she would undertake to maintain
and bring up all her fourteen children without
any parochial assistance. She persisted in
her resolution; and being a strong woman
about forty-five years old, I told her she
should continue tenant, and hold it the first
year rent-free. At the same time, though
without her knowledge, I directed my receiver
not to call upon her at all for her rent,
conceiving that it would be a great thing if she
could support so large a family, even with
that indulgence." Mr. John Way was as wise
as good; fifteen of a family, perennially in the
workhouse, at three shillings a head, per
week, is one hundred and seventeen pounds
per annum, and your share would probably
come to something over the rent. "The result,
however, was, that with the benefit of her
two cows, and of the land, she exerted herself
so as to bring up all her children, twelve of
whom she placed out to service, continuing to
pay her rent regularly of her own accord.
She carried part of the milk of her two cows,
together with the cream and butter, every
day to sell at Woodbridge, two miles off, and
with her skim and butter-milk, &c., supported
her family. The eldest girls took care of the
rest; and, by degrees, as they grew up, the
children went into the service of the
neighbouring farmers."

The moral and social elevation of the poor,
to be accomplished by the spade when
employed on allotments, has resulted in every
instance in which it has been diligently and
industriously tried. Mr. Blacker, the Irish agent
for the Earl of Gosford, a strong advocate for
the spade and for small holdings, draws the
following graphic picture:—"I have gone,"
he says, "to see a poor man, the tenant of less
than four acres of land, whose name and
residence I can give, if required, who was
threatened with an ejectment, being, as well
as I recollect, two and a half years in arrear.
I found him sitting with his feet in the ashes
of a half-extinguished fire, his wife and five
children nearly naked; want and misery
surrounding him on every side—his house and
farm neglected—the fear of expulsion, preying
upon his mind and spirits, having destroyed
his health; and there he was awaiting the
beggary and starvation impending over himself
and family, in a kind of listless insensibility
—in short, the whole scene was one of actual
despair, and the man was evidently in such a
state, that he was incapable of any exertion
whatever. As I explained to him the plan
I had in view for his benefit, it was easy
to see the feelings with which he was
agitated; with tears in his eyes he promised
to do everything I required, and I left