Kalm's account of his visit to England : on his way to America in 1748 / translated by Joseph Lucas ; with two maps and several illustrations.

  • Pehr Kalm
Date:
1892
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Kalm's account of his visit to England : on his way to America in 1748 / translated by Joseph Lucas ; with two maps and several illustrations. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    unusually heavy snow that had fallen a fortnight before. All the cattle went out on the field to pasture, without the farmers having to take thought for their food. Indeed horses, cows, sheep, swine, geese, fowls, &c., often go out by themselves and seek their food in the fields the whole winter. For the cows they have also houses to put them in sometimes at night during bad weather, and a haystack close by in case of need ; the sheep are not allowed any house at all, but they go constantly under the open sky, summer and winter, night and day. It is only on account of the small lambs, of which they take a little care, that they are sometimes kept under cover, Ullder tak. During the last-fallen heavy snow, which lay a long time, the sheep were kept quartered only by a haystack, there to have their food as long as the ground lay covered with snow. There is also in this district no difficulty in keeping a large number of cattle. A farmer also escapes the dis- advantage of giving himself much trouble and unrest in collecting fodder for the cattle during the winter [as in Sweden]. In the houses where the folk dwell the fire burns on the hearth all day, and a spjäll is an entirely unknown thing, as has already been said. Therefore, when it is cold the folk sit round the fire, when often the one side is hot while the other side freezes. The earth and the ground, Jorden och Marken, takes here so little harm from cold and frost that one can plough the whole winter through, and there is hardly a month in the year in which [T. I. p. 152] some kind of seed is not sown. Spring-rye, barley, and pease, were already sown in the fields. Beans, pease, and other kitchen-garden fruits, were already sown for the most part by the close of February, and even by the middle and the beginning of that month.
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