is Eastern in 1770. The subject he specially
illuminated in these epoch-making books was the rotation of crops,
though he occasionally diverged upon deep-ploughing and kindred
themes. The tours excited, for the first time, the agricultural spirit
of Great Britain, and their author almost at once became a celebrated
man.

In 1765 Young married the wrong woman, and started upon a career of
profound matrimonial discomfort, and even misery; a blunt, truthful
writer, he makes no bones about it. It was an unhappy marriage from
its beginning in 1765 to its end in 1815. Young himself, though by no
means vivacious in this autobiography, where he frankly complains of
himself as having no more wit than a fig, was a very popular person
with all classes and both sexes. He was an enormous diner-out, and his
authority as an agriculturist, united to his undeniable charm as a
companion, threw open to him all the great places in the country. But
his finances were a perpetual trouble. On carrot seeds and cabbages he
was an authority, but from 1766-1775 his income never exceeded L300 a
year. He had an excellent mother, whom he dearly loved, and who with
the characteristic bluntness of the family bade him think less about
carrots and more about his Creator. 'You may call all this rubbish if
you please, but a time will come when you will be convinced whose
notions are rubbish, yours or mine.' And the old lady was quite right,
as mothers so frequently turn out to be. In 1778 Young went over to
Ireland as agent to Lord Kingsborough. He got L500 down, and was to
have an annual salary of L500 and a house. Young soon got to work, and
became anxious to persuade his employer to let his lands direct to the
occupying cottar, and so get rid of the middlemen. This did not suit a
certain Major Thornhill, a relative and leaseholder, and thereupon a
pretty plot was hatched. Lady K. had a Catholic governess, a Miss
Crosby, upon whom it was thought my lord occasionally cast the eye of
partiality, whilst Arthur himself got on very well with her ladyship,
who was heard to pronounce him to be, as he was, 'one of the most
lively, agreeable fellows.' Out of these materials the Major and his
helpmeet concocted a double plot--namely, to make the lord jealous of
the steward, and the lady jealous of the governess, and to cause both
lord and lady respectively to believe that the steward was deeply
engaged both in abetting the amour of the lord and the governess, and