Mesa free press., 1898-12-30
THROUGH RURAL ENGLAND.

Fields Crossed by Foot Paths-Thorne
to Interfere with Poacher's Work.
During harvest English agricultural
laborers are at work in the fields until
darkness comes. The last load is often
carried by moonlight. For both farm
ers and laborers the harvest time is
good time. For the laborers 1t meals
prices, and from June to September
hundreds of thousands Of English la
borers nearly double their wages aud
put together the savings which are TO
carry them and their families with
comfort through the winter, when the
working days are short and wages not
as high as when fa3m labor is in greet
demand.
Journeying through rural England
Juse when the crops are being carried
one cannot fail to notice two features
about English fields that are missing in
American fields. One Of these is the
extent to which English fields are cut
up by public footpaths. The other is
the studding Of the fields which have
been cleared of hay with stiff thorn
brushes cut from the hedges. The
footpaths date back to centuries when
farming land was not so valuable nor
SO closely cultivated as it is to-day.
Farmers do not like these footpaths.
Nor do landlords like them either. For
q Held with footpath across it COM
mandS less rent than one that is COM
pletely inclosed. But in England once
footpath always q footpath. Even
the railways have had to accept this
usage, as any one can see by the fire.
quency of foot bridges across the lines
In rural England AS regards the stud
ding Of newly mown hay with stiff
thorns, that, too, for American readers
has an explanation which is not with
out interest. tits done only in game
countries, and the object Of the thorns
set up with great frequency In the
fields is to prevent poachers from drag
ging them at night with nets. Wher-
ever this studding of the fields with
hawthorn stakes occurs it is proof that
game preserving is carried on in the
neighborhood, and that the gamekeep-
ers expect trouble from their iinveter-
ate enemies, the poachers.
AS one nears the larger towns es-
pecially the towns which are great rail-
way centers, 1t Is easy to see how fond
the English town workman Of the Mid
lands Is Of bit of land, and how in
the twilight Of the summer evening he
busies himself with his allotment. He
Is usually at work in his allotment by
half-past six. After leaving work he
allows himself about an hour to get
home, take supper and smoke a pipe.
and then off he goes to his garden
patch. Oftentimes his wife and chill
dren go with him, and there they stay,
all more or less at work, until darkness
drives them home. The work is not es-
pecially hard. 1t is done in leisurely
way, varied with a little gossip with
the proprietors Of neighboring patches;
and where field of fifteen or twenty
acres is divided into these garden lots
hhe scene on summer evening is about
as pleasing as any scene which pre-
sents itself in journey through the
Midlands.
It.is curious that these garden patch
scenes are more common in the Mid
lands than in the north of England.
They are seldom seen on the outskirts
OF the wooden and cotton factory towns
Of Yorkshire and Lancashire. They in
variably occur, however, IN the neigh
borhood of a railway center in the Mid
lands, where a great railway company
has established Its railway locomotive
works or its car factories think this
Is due to the fact that railway artisans
and workmen are recruited mostly in
the rural districts and transplanted, az
it were, to the towns, while the factory
operatives Of Yorkshire and Lanca,
shire are town7bred men, with no
strong attachment to the land. The
English socialists sometimes condemn
the allotment system. They argue that
If man adds to his earnings by work.
ing in an allotment in his spare time
his employer will note his added pros
perlty and soon offer him less wages
But whatever there may be in this So
cialistic argument, the allotment sys-
tenn thrives in the outskirts of the large
towns in the Midlands, and it certainly
adds to the picturesqueness and charm
of twilight journey across England
New York Observer.
Tomatoes.
A correspondent of the Ohio Farmer
writes that he finds tomatoes grow bet
ter when set for several years in sue
cession upon the same soil. Having Sc.
lected a suitable location he begins by