The Sun.
London, England, 1844-09-13 00:00:00

CHANGES.

Lord and Lady Lurgan, at Brighton, from the Conti-
nent ; Sir John and Lady Shelley, from Lord Belhaven's
seat, Wilusw House, N. 8., on a visiting tour in the
forth ; Mr. J. Lefroy, M.P., and the Hon. Mrs. Lefroy,
on a visit to General Lord Lorton, at Rockingham Castle,
from a visit to Sir R. and Lady Gore Booth, at
Lipadel house, Sligo ; Lady Carbery and suite, from
Lord Carbery'a seat, Laxton Hall, Northampton, for
Lord Carbery 's seat, Castle Freko, near Cork; Mr. Mar-
Alan, M.P., and family, at Brighton, from Herts ; Lord
Ind Lady Aberdour, at New Sanghton, N. 8., from a
visit to the Earl and Countess of Morton, at Dalmahoy
House ; the Right Hon. G. L. 1). Dawson, from Buxton
Wells, on a visiting tour ; the Countess of Clare and
Miss Elliott, from Bath, on a tour ; Lieutenant-Colonel
Roller, from a visit to the Duke of Richmond, at Gordon
Castle, for the south ; Sir A. Hood, Bart., from his
seat, in Somerset, on a tour • Lord and Lady Dungarvon,
from Bath, for the Earl of dork's, Marston House, near
From° ; the Marquis of Kildare, from a visit to Lord
snd Lady Adare, at Dunraven Castle, on a tour.

DESCRIPTION OF REMARKABLE

FARMS.
BY ADAM BROWS.
No. ll.—Near Kelvedon, in Esser.

But let us return to the railway. 'We may take
another road back to it. We shall enter Chelmsford
at a part where several streets, crescents, and " places"
or "rows," are in process of being built. We can
hardly help remarking them. Are they to be in-
habited and paid for by protected agriculture ? or
are they reared for persons who are still in, or have
come out of, unprotected trade ? They are the last.
London—commercial, competing, intensely competi-
tive London—sends her tradespeople down to
Chelmsford now that the rail is so convenient;
And there they take lodgings and buy butter,
and milk, and vegetables, and poultry, and eggs, and
beef, and bread, protecting, while they do so, Mr.
Baker and others of his neighbours from having to eat
all those things themselves. We are again on the
rail, faces eastward, and dashing along 'as fast as the
wind that comes with us from the west. So much for
the enterprise of traders and the strength of commerce.
This railway was made to facilitate the transit of agri-
cultural produce, not by the growers but by the pur-
chasers of that produce, and yet the growers want to be
protected from those purchasers, one-third of whom
would treble the amount of what they now con-
sume, and one-half of whom would add a third to
what they now consume, even though they got
nothing more than barely three meals a day, if they
could afford to pay the price. Mr. Robert Baker
limits the supply to them, and he also advocates the
perpetuation of their limited ability to buy. That
vast community of London—who eat the produce of
almost every blade of grass and ear of corn grown in
EVISOIC, and who depend on the commerce of their
City for employment, and for the means of paying
for every blade of grass and ear of corn, and who
have neither enough of work to do, nor money to pay
—Mr. Baker speaks to us thus—if not in actual words
he does so in effect :

" You are the persons who pay for blades of grass
and ears of corn. lam the person who sells blades
of grass and ears of corn. You say you want more
than I hare to give you ; and you tell me you would
buy still more if you were allowed to add a little to
your ability by going elsewhere. That may be, but
you are not allowed to go elsewhere ; and so long as I
can prevent it, you never shall. What, although you
taunt me with not cultivating my land well, and
growing as much upon it as I might do, I defy you
to interfere with me, and make rue do otherwise than
I am doing."
But we have arrived at another station, at the dis-
tance of another twenty miles from London—forty
miles in all. This is Kelvedon. We here hire a gig,
and drive five miles north, to a farm called Tiptree
Hall.

Here we find a farm-yard, farm-house, barns, sta-
bles, sheds, and everything very complete and com-
pact. We find every fence running square and
parallel, and all clear and useful as fences should be.
We find the soil to be very inferior compared with
Mr. Baker's farm. Yet we find that while Mr. Baker
has been allowing his soil of best quality to run
out of cultivation into grass, allowing even his
grass to run into rushes and marshy bogs, this
cultivator has been bringing his poor soil into the
highest state of cultivation. lie has one hundred
and thirty acres, for which, just about the time that
the Anti-Corn-law League became a giant, he paid
3,2501. He is not one of the League ; but be is a
believer in the virtue of agricultural enterprise in
preference to agricultural protection ; and so far is
he from supposing that free trade would injure the
English farmers—and so far from having listened
to the forebodings of the alarmists, who are led
on by Mr. Baker to cry " Land must go out of
cultivation if free trade is carried"—that he has,
since January, 1843, expended in hard cash the
sum of 6,200/. in improving his farm, every penny
of which, he is sure, free trade or no free trade,
will be repaid him with a good profit. While Mr.
Baker has been laying the League prostrate and
slaying it, and receiving the great token of the age,
" a piece of plate," for having upset, and destroyed,
and utterly annihilated the League—for so the inscrip-
tion on the silver sets forth his services—this farmer has
been quietly cultivating his land, and employing at least
twenty times more labourers than ever Mr. Baker
employed on the same number of acres. He has thus
stated, in letters to a local newspaper, the nature
of his improvements :—" Ist. The perfect and per-
manent drainage of the land with stones and
pipes, 4 yards apart, and 32 inches deep—
between 80 and 90 miles of drains.-2d. To the
entire removal of all timber trees, which cannot
be profitably grown in cern fields.-3d. To the
removing all old, crooked, and unnecessary banks,
fences, and ditches.-4th. The cutting new parallel
ditches and fences, so as to avoid short lands.-sth.
The enclosure of waste, and conversion of useless
bogs into good soil. 6th. The economising
time and distance by new roads, arches, and more
direct communications with the extremities of the
farm.-7th. The erection of well-arranged farm-build-
ings, built of brick, iron, and slate, in a continuous range,
excluding all cold winds and currents of air, but open
to sunny warmth.-Bth. The building a substantial
and genteel residence, with all due requisites for do-
mestic comfort and economy. 9th. The erection of
an efficient threshing machine, and needful apparatus
for shaking the straw, dressing the corn, cutting chaff,
bruising oats, &c., so constructed as not to injure the
straw; avoiding,
byits perfect action, that immense
waste of grain visible in almost every truss of straw we
examine.-10th. The avoidance of thatching and risk
of weather, by ample barn room, with convenience for
in-door horse labour at threshing, &c., when not em-
ployable without, so as to have no idle days for man
or beast.-11th. The saving of every pound and pint
of manure by a tank (90 feet long, 6 feet deep, 8 feet
wide, with slated roof facing the north, and with well
and pump), into which is received the whole drainage
foam the farm-yard and stables.-12th. The convey-
ance by iron gutters and pipes of every drop of water
from the roofs of each building, so as in no manner to
dilute the manure in yards.-13th. The perfect drain-
age of the foundations of the barn, and every building
on the farin.-14th. A steam-house to prepare food
for cattle." He says he is thus particular to ',tate his
alterations, because—" It is from each of the above
branches of expenditure that some portion of remune-
ration is expected."
And again ha says--" During the progres;.4 of Ply