Page:EB1911 - Volume 09.djvu/453

Rh Oversea Communications.—The chief ports for continental passenger traffic are as follows:—

Harwich to Amsterdam, Antwerp, Hamburg, Hook of Holland, Rotterdam (Great Eastern railway); to Copenhagen and Esbjerg (Royal Danish mail route).

Queenborough to Flushing; (Zeeland Steamship company).

Dover to Calais (South-Eastern & Chatham railway); to Ostend (Belgian Royal mail steamers).

Folkestone to Boulogne (South Eastern & Chatham railway).

Newhaven to Dieppe (London, Brighton & South Coast railway).

Southampton to Cherbourg, Havre, St Malo (South-Western railway).

The chief ports for trans-Atlantic traffic are Liverpool and Southampton, and special trains are worked in connexion with the steamers to and from London. The great development of harbour accommodation at Dover early in the 20th century brought trans-Atlantic traffic to this port also. Southampton and Liverpool are the two greatest English ports for all oceanic passenger traffic; but London has also a large traffic, both to European and to foreign ports. The passenger traffic to the Norwegian ports, always very heavy in summer, is carried on chiefly from Hull and Newcastle.

Agriculture.—In the agricultural returns for Great Britain, issued annually by the government, the area of England (apart from Wales) has been divided into two sections, “arable” and “grass,” corresponding with a former division into “corn counties” and “grazing counties,” except that Leicestershire is included not in the “grass” but in the “arable” section. Most of the eastern part of England is “arable,” while the western and northern part is “grass,” the boundary between the sections being the western limit of Hampshire, Berkshire, Oxfordshire, Warwickshire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire, and of the East Riding of Yorkshire.

The division is thus as follows:—

The average area under cultivation of all the counties is about .76 of the whole area. The counties having the greatest area under cultivation (ranging up to about nine-tenths of the whole) may be taken to be—Leicestershire, the East Riding of Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, Huntingdonshire, Rutland, Northamptonshire, Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire. Those with the smallest proportional cultivated area are Westmorland, Middlesex, Northumberland, Surrey, Cumberland, the North and West Ridings of Yorkshire, Lancashire, Durham and Cornwall. Geographical considerations govern these conditions to a very great extent; thus the counties first indicated lie almost entirely within the area of the low-lying and fertile Eastern Plain, while the smallest areas of cultivation are found in the counties covering the Pennine hill-system, with its high-lying uncultivated moors. In the case of Cornwall and Cumberland the physical conditions are similar to these; but in that of Middlesex and Surrey the existence of large urban areas belonging or adjacent to London must be taken into account. These also affect the proportion of cultivated areas in the other home counties. The presence of a widespread urban population must also be remembered in the case of Lancashire and the West Riding of Yorkshire.

The geographical distribution of the principal crops, &c., may now be followed. The grain crops grown in England consist almost exclusively of wheat, barley and oats. Lincolnshire, Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, Cambridgeshire and the East Riding of Yorkshire are especially productive in all

these; the North and West Ridings of Yorkshire produce a notable quantity of barley and oats; and the oat-crops in the following counties deserve mention—Devonshire, Hampshire, Lancashire, Cumberland, Cornwall, Cheshire and Sussex. There is no county, however, in which the single crop of wheat or barley stands pre-eminently above others, and in the case of the upland counties of Cumberland, Westmorland and Derbyshire, the metropolitan county of Middlesex, and Monmouthshire, these crops are quite insignificant. In proportion to their area, the counties specially productive of wheat are Cambridgeshire, Huntingdonshire, Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire and Essex; and of barley, Norfolk, Suffolk and the East Riding of Yorkshire. In fruit-growing, Kent takes the first place, but a good quantity is grown in Cambridgeshire, Norfolk and Essex, in Worcestershire and other western counties, where, as in Herefordshire, Somerset and Devon, the apple is especially cultivated and cider is largely produced. Kent is again pre-eminent in the growth of hops; indeed this practice and that of fruit-growing give the scenery of the county a strongly individual character. Hop-growing extends from Kent into the neighbouring parts of Sussex and Surrey, where, however, it is much less important; it is also practised to a considerable degree in a group of counties of the midlands and west—Herefordshire, Worcestershire, Gloucestershire and Shropshire. Market-gardening is carried on most extensively on suitable lands in the neighbourhood of the great areas of urban population; thus the open land remaining in Middlesex is largely devoted to this industry. From the Channel and Scilly Islands, vegetables, especially seasonable vegetables, and also flowers which, owing to the peculiar climatic conditions of these islands, come early to perfection, are imported to the London market. Considering the crops not hitherto specified, it may be indicated that turnips and swedes form the chief green crops in most districts; potatoes, mangels, beans and peas are also commonly grown, Beyond the three chief grain crops, only a little rye is grown. The cultivation of flax is almost extinct, but it is practised in a few districts, such as the East and West Ridings of Yorkshire.

The counties in which the greatest proportion of the land is devoted to permanent pasture may be judged roughly from the list of “grass counties” already given. Derbyshire, Leicestershire, the midland counties generally, and Somersetshire, have the highest proportion, and the counties of the East Anglian

seaboard the lowest. But with lands thus classified heath, moor and hill pastures are not included; and the greatest areas of these are naturally found in the counties of the Pennines and the Lake District, especially in Northumberland, Cumberland, Westmorland and the North and West Ridings of Yorkshire. There is also plenty of hill-pasture in the south-western counties (from Hampshire and Berkshire westward), especially in Devonshire, Cornwall and Somersetshire, and also in Monmouthshire and along the Welsh marches, on the Cotteswold Hills, &c. In all these localities sheep are extensively reared, especially in Northumberland, but on the other hand in Lincolnshire the numbers of sheep are roughly equal to those in the northern county. Other counties in which the numbers are especially large are Devonshire, Kent, Cumberland and the North and West Ridings of Yorkshire. Cattle are reared in great numbers in Lincolnshire, Lancashire and the West Riding of Yorkshire, Devonshire, Somersetshire and Cornwall; but the numbers of both cattle and sheep are in no English county (save Middlesex) to be regarded as insignificant. Pigs are bred most extensively in Suffolk, Norfolk and Lincolnshire and in Somersetshire.

It is often asserted that the scenery of rural England is of its kind unrivalled. Except in open lands like the Fens, the peculiarly rich appearance of the country is due to the closely-divided fields with their high, luxuriant hedges, and especially to the profuse growth of trees. There is not, however,

any large continuous forested tract. Certain areas still bear the name of forest where there is now none; the term here possesses an historical significance, in many cases indicating former royal game-preserves. Great areas of England were once under forest. The clearing of land for agricultural purposes, the use of wood for the prosecution of the industries of an increasing population, and other causes, have led to the gradual disforesting of large tracts. There are still, however, some small well-defined woodland areas. The New Forest in Hampshire, the Forest of Dean in Gloucestershire, and Epping Forest, which is preserved as a public recreation-ground by the City of London, are the most notable instances. The counties comprising the greatest proportional amount of woodland fall into two distinct groups—Hampshire, Surrey, Sussex and Kent, with Berkshire and Buckinghamshire; Monmouth, Herefordshire and Gloucestershire. Cambridgeshire, lying almost wholly within the area of the Fens, has the smallest proportional area of woodland of any English county.

The number of persons engaged in agriculture in England and Wales was found by the census of 1901 to be 1,192,167; the total showing a steady decrease (e.g. from 1,352,389 in 1881), which is especially marked in the case of females. But the decrease lies mainly in the number of agricultural labourers; the number of farmers is not notably affected, and the increasing substitution of machinery for manual labour must be taken into consideration. The average size of holdings in England may be taken approximately as 66 acres, the average in 1903 being 66.1, whereas in 1895 it was 65.3.

(See also the article .)