Tour through the Eastern Counties of England, 1722Defoe, Daniel
History
Tour through the Eastern Counties of England, 1722
Defoe, Daniel
England -- Description and travel -- Early works to 1800
Besides these methods of driving these creatures on foot, they have of
late also invented a new method of carriage, being carts formed on
purpose, with four stories or stages to put the creatures in one above
another, by which invention one cart will carry a very great number; and
for the smoother going they drive with two horses abreast, like a coach,
so quartering the road for the ease of the gentry that thus ride.
Changing horses, they travel night and day, so that they bring the fowls
seventy, eighty, or, one hundred miles in two days and one night. The
horses in this new-fashioned voiture go two abreast, as above, but no
perch below, as in a coach, but they are fastened together by a piece of
wood lying crosswise upon their necks, by which they are kept even and
together, and the driver sits on the top of the cart like as in the
public carriages for the army, etc.
In this manner they hurry away the creatures alive, and infinite numbers
are thus carried to London every year. This method is also particular
for the carrying young turkeys or turkey poults in their season, which
are valuable, and yield a good price at market; as also for live chickens
in the dear seasons, of all which a very great number are brought in this
manner to London, and more prodigiously out of this country than any
other part of England, which is the reason of my speaking of it here.
In this part, which we call High Suffolk, there are not so many families
of gentry or nobility placed as in the other side of the country. But it
is observed that though their seats are not so frequent here, their
estates are; and the pleasure of West Suffolk is much of it supported by
the wealth of High Suffolk, for the richness of the lands and application
of the people to all kinds of improvement is scarce credible; also the
farmers are so very considerable and their farms and dairies so large
that it is very frequent for a farmer to have £1,000 stock upon his farm
in cows only.
NORFOLK.
From High Suffolk I passed the Waveney into Norfolk, near Schole Inn. In
my passage I saw at Redgrave (the seat of the family) a most exquisite
monument of Sir John Holt, Knight, late Lord Chief Justice of the King’s
Bench several years, and one of the most eminent lawyers of his time.
One of the heirs of the family is now building a fine seat about a mile
on the south side of Ipswich, near the road.
The epitaph or inscription on this monument is as follows:—
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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