between the trees in
Devonshire in young orchards was first planted with cabbage plants,
next year with potatoes, next with beans, and so on until the heads of
the trees became large enough, when the land was allowed to return to
pasture, a proceeding which was quite contrary to their previously
quoted assertion that tillage was best for fruit trees. The
cider-makers were quite convinced, as many are to-day, that rotten
apples were invaluable for cider, and the lady who was famous for the
best cider in the county never allowed one to be thrown away. A
generation later than this Marshall[436] noted that in Herefordshire
the management of orchards and their produce was far from being well
understood, though 'it has ever borne the name of the first cider
county'. All the old fruits were lost or declining in quality, the
famous Red Streak Apple was given up and the Squash Pear no longer
made to flourish.

As for prices, in 1707 apples were selling at Liverpool for 2s. 6d. a
bushel,[437] a very good price if we allow for the difference in the
value of money, but prices then were entirely dependent on the English
seasons; no foreign apples were imported, and a night's frost would
treble prices in a day. In 1742 at Aspall Hall, Suffolk, apples,
apparently for cider, were 10d. a bushel, in 1745 1s. a bushel, in
1746 only 4d., and in 1747 cider there was worth 6d. a gallon.[438] At
the end of the century, in 'the great hit' of 1784, common apples were
less than 6d. a bushel, the best about 2s. in 1786 the price was twice
as high, owing to a short crop. Incidentally there is mentioned in the
_Compleat Cyderman_ a novel implement, 'a most profitable new invented
five-hoe plough, that after the ground has been once ploughed with a
common plough will plough four or five acres in one day with only four
horses, and by a little alteration is fitted to hoe turnips or rape
crops as it is now practised by the ordinary farmers'; much too
favourable an estimate of the ordinary farmer, as Young found
horse-hoeing rare.

An acre of good orchard land at this time was let at L2 an acre; and
this is a fair balance sheet for an acre[439]:--

DR. L s. d.

Rent of one acre 2 0 0
Tithe on 10 hogsheads, @ 6d. 5 0
Gathering, making, and carriage to and
from the pound, @ 3s. 6d. a hogshead 1 15 0
Rackin