Democratic Northwest and Henry County news. [volume] (Napoleon, O. [Ohio]) 1894-1905, 1897-01-14
ENGLISH HOP YARDS.
HARVEST SCENES DESCRIBED BY AN
AMERICAN VISITOR.

Work Thar Requires Apphcadoh D"s
long Days For Small Returns-Pictur-
esque Situations, but There Is Too Much
Poverty to Admit of Poetry.
Yesterday spent at Mailing, an an
Gent market town about 80 miles from
London, which is in the midst OF one of
the most fertile and extensive hop dis
tricts in the world, the soil being of the
rich quality that produces the famous
golden hop. / stood on an eminence
and surveyed in every direction the
plantations of tall hops, luxuriant ON
the straight, firmly set poles, the deep
green of the vine leaves beautifully
gemmed by the great punches of golden
flower. On a hillside a little distance
to the left were the uniform white tents
of the hop pickers, like the encampment
of an army-for you must know that
the hop pickers are not residents of the
neighborhood. They come from distances
by families. large proportion of them
| from London. And, be it known, the
majority of the hop pickers are wretch
edly poor. The pay for hop picking is
SO very little that only by the united
efforts of a family Of three or four
workers is the result of the days labor
worth the effort. Last year, for exam
pie, the pay for picking was a shilling
for seven bushels, SO that worker had
to complete seven bushels before the
shilling was earned. This year condi-
tions are little better, but at the best
hop picking is only profitable when the
family has six or eight pairs of expert
hands to strip the vines swiftly. Some
of the women have reduced this picking
to an art, the deft facility with which
they take four or five flowers at time
completely deceiving the novice, who
imagines skill to be nothing in this
business.
The poles in hopield are SO perfectly
set at right angles that you may lool
down a uniform avenue of overhangine
vines in whatever direction you turf
your eyes. But this exactitude is lesI
for beauty of appearance than for con
venience of arrangement of picking par
ties, for field is let out in small sec
tions, so many hills-two poles make
hill-to family, according as the fam
lily has agreed for half a bin or more
Therefore, as you walk down the patl
that intersects hopfeld, you see her
and there at fixed distances apart tn
different independent groups of pickers
their canvas bins, with wide, FARM
mouths, all of regular size, stretched o.
poles and set on crosspieces the lengt
of their section, and while the man cut
the vines third of the way up the pole
and pulls up the poles to carry to th
bin side the women and children inces
, sanity work from a. m. to p. IN.
save only for the half hour at noon fe
dinner. And what sight it isl At th
very edge of the field where sper
most time rears, rugged and tall, th
ivy draped tower Of st. Leonards, sal
to be the very first, and therefore tt
: oldest, of the Norman towers, the pit
turesque ruins of which 80 interest tt
intelligent visitor to rural England
: This tower was built by Gundulf, bisho
Of Rochester, somewhere about 1078-9'
= This abbey, by the way, has been r
stored and is once more home of nun
At the foot of this old tower yesterda
S rolled and tumbled score of grim
half naked, tatterdemalion children,
ages running from the infant that shou
n have been in arms to pair of 4-yea
old twins, in patched, dirty red dresse
d and with huge brass earrings hiding Il
lobes of their unolean little ears. Thl
y did half barbarous young modesty XII
up its slovenly little legs in contempt
that still grim though dismantled towe
n built eight centuries ago to repel Il
r. assaults Of those savages who were for
e runners of the present day Englishma
N And among the vines yonder were t
10 motley groups of persons to whom the
a. little human blots appertained. Not
any means as picturesque and fascinf
Is ing as Italian grape pickers; nothing
'i the rich, dark beauty of the southe
types. but different sort of interest {