CO1TAGE HUSBANDRY.*
MR. LOUDON is the well-known author of a work on Gardening, which is one of the most singular specimens of learning and dili- gence, and almost superhuman labour, that the book-manufactory of the age supplies. The present work is of much humbler preten- sions, but we are disposed to rate its value very high. In the first place, we may state that Mr. LounoN is no friend to what is com- monly called " the cottage system," or we should hardly have been found recommending his views. He means, indeed, to furnish the labourer or mechanic, in favourable situations, with a house and garden ; but it is in supplement of his other business, not as a busi- ness of itself—as an amusement of his leisure, not an occupation of his day. The objects to the supply of which a small piece of land may be profitably devoted by the cottager, are thus enumerated in the preliminary essay in Mr. LOUDON'S book— "I. To supply the cottager's family, including pigs and poultry, with ve- getables and potatoes.
• A Manual of Cottage Gardening, Husbandry, and Architecture; with Plans, Bleva-
tions, and Sections of three Model Cottages. By J. C. Loudon. 1830.
" 2. To supply the cottager's family, including pigs and poultry, with ve- getables, potatoes, and faggots for his oven.
" 3. With vegetables, potatoes, fuel, and barley for his malt.
" 4. With vegetables, potatoes, fuel, barley for his malt, and the keep of a cow.
" 5. With vegetables, potatoes, fuel, barley for his malt, the keep of a cow, and bread corn.
"t. With vegetables, malt, a cow, and bread corn.
" 7. With vegetables, malt, a cow, bread corn, and mangold wurzel for his sugar and spirits: fruit-trees and vines for his cyder, perry, and wine ; tea and coffee, or substitutes for these articles ; tobacco, opium, and the ordi- nary family medicines.
"8. All these objects, with flax or hemp for his linen, and wool for stock- ings, flannel, and upper clothing.
For the first purpose, one rood is deemed sufficient. The second would require a much greater surface, and the surface necessary would vary considerably according to the climate. If the cottager raise all the fuel he makes use of, an acre or an acre and a quarter of middling land will be required. This raising of fuel, it ought to be observed, is a new and most important feature in the present plan. If barley be added for malt, about one quarter of an acre more will be requisite. The keep of a cow will require about three acres; and if the cottager grow his own bread corn, five acres at least will be re- quired. We do not think it necessary to enter minutely into any of the rest of the above cases ; they are well enough in their way, but they are set down as possible rather than practicable. The growing of fuel is, as we said, a new feature in Mr. LOUDON'S plans ; and the moral reasons for its adoption are stated with much simplicity and force.
"Every person who lives in the country, or even looks at a newspaper, is aware that the sufferings of the poor from cold, during the winter season, are fully as great as from want of food; and that pilfering from woods, hedges, or fences, is one of the commonest of crimes. In former times the cottager's fuel was obtained from the bushes which grew upon the commons and waste lands ; but, since these have been enclosed, the poor man has no resource but those of purchasing, stealing, or begging. In the coal districts, or in those where turf is used as fuel, or where wood is very abundant, a common day-labourer may perhaps be able to procure his fuel by purchase : but these districts are few ; and in by far the greater number, the labourer of necessity procures his fuel by pulling the hedges, cutting here and there a branch of such trees as come in his way, breaking gates and other wooden fences, and pilfering from the coal heaps or faggot stacks of his richer neighbours. " Where there are children, the task of catering for fire-wood is generally committed to them. The mother sends them out, as soon as they can walk, to bring in sticks; and they may be seen gathering them in the nearest plan- tations or woods, and pulling them from the hedges along the roads and lanes,—in short, wherever they can get them. This is the commencement of the modern education of the peasant. In this way the first lessons of thieving are taught to both sexes !"
The heating of an apartment by means of spray of wood, is very difficult, by reason of the rapid combustion, and other causes. Mr. LOUDON gives a method by which this difficulty may be easily got over, and by which, in point of warmth—that great essential during our long wet winters—the hovel of the poor man may be rendered more comfortable than the lordly mansion of his master commonly is: this is by flues, like common hothouse flues, or by a stove formed of bricks and paving-tiles, where flues are inadmissible. He shows, also, that the acre set apart for fuel would, under proper management, supply all that the cottager requires. The cottage which Mr. LOUDON recommends is of a character superior to such as are in common use ; and he gives, we think, a very good reason for the dif- ference. We have not space, however, to enter on a discussion of this, or of the other numerous and interesting topics of his valuable work. We recommend it warmly to noblemen and gentlemen, who are from interest, if not from higher motives, desirous to contribute to the comforts of their labourers. They will find it replete with plain, practical matter, bottomed on accurate and attentive observation. Mr. LOUDON has directed the work to be sold without profit, in order to render its general distribution as inexpensive as possible. We sin- cerely hope he may reap, in the adoption of his plans, the merited re- ward of the benevolence that suggested them.
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