We have, in our days, the Royal Agricultural Society of England, which also awards prizes;[V] and through such institutions all information can be obtained on the successive progresses made in that indispensable art, which may be said to have arrived to such a degree of perfection, that future generations may find some difficulty in improving upon it. One great evidence of which is, the immense number of samples of agricultural produce, machines, and implements of husbandry, which great and the glorious Exhibition of 1851 has ushered to the world.
DESCRIPTION OF [PLATE No. III.]
No. 1. Is the plain sickle. No. 2. Another, with teeth.
No. 3. A scythe, very similar to those now in use.
No. 4. A spade; its handle is supplied with a double crossbar, fixed at a little distance off the spade, to support the foot; it is still so used in Italy and the southern parts of France.
No. 5. A pickaxe, as it was found engraved on the various sarcophagi; the pick end was sometimes flattened, and then called pick-axe.
Nos. 6 and 7. The mattocks; the first was drawn from an engraved stone in the “Monuments Antiq.” of Winckelmann.
No. 2 A. Represents a plough, composed according to the “Georgics” of Virgil.
Previous to the arrival of the Romans, the ancient Britons paid but little attention to agriculture. Their intestine discords left them scarcely any leisure to cultivate their fields, or apply themselves to the improvement of an art which flourishes only in peaceful times. They reared a great number of cattle; but their chief corn was barley, of which they made their favourite drink. They put the grain in the ear into barns, and beat it out as they wanted it. Those inhabitants of the island who were the least civilized subsisted solely on milk and the flesh of animals,