Nothing New on the Land (The Agricultural Lord Palfrey Book 3), page 30
Nothing New
on the Land
The Agricultural Lord Palfrey
- Book Three -
Andrew Wareham
Copyright © 2025 Andrew Wareham
KINDLE Edition
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portions thereof in any form. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored, in any form or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical without the express written permission of the author.
This is a work of fiction. Names and characters are the product of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.
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Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter One
“Welcome to Palfrey Hall, Mr Llewellyn, Mrs Llewellyn. Our best congratulations on your marriage! It is good to see you again, Mrs Llewellyn, so soon after the Season, particularly on a honeymoon journey. How long are you to stay with us?”
“Just the four days, if it pleases you, my lord. I believe my father arranged our itinerary, did he not?”
“He did, ma’am. Four days here and then a week at Weymouth, to be followed by your return to North Wales, necessarily a slow journey, I believe. Do come inside – you must be tired.”
“Three days on the road, my lord, for not so very great a distance, one might have thought. The turnpike, however, is a stranger to North Wales!”
They laughed and escorted the young couple into the Hall, Wrayford appearing with a tray of refreshments, smiling his kindest at the young lady who seemed to fit in so well with the Palfrey family. The mention of North Wales had triggered his encyclopaedic memory of the late lord’s doings during the many years he had served the family. He was happy indeed to welcome another of the old lord’s begetting, even at one remove, a granddaughter, in fact, although on the wrong side of the blanket.
My lord and lady took some pains to bring Mr Llewellyn forward. He was a son of the squirearchy, less at home in Society than his bride.
“I saw some fine animals in your fields, my lord. Great black and white cattle. Milkers, I believe.”
“German cattle, Friesians, recently brought in across the German Ocean, Mr Llewellyn. They provide twice as much milk as the local cattle, and certainly do not demand twice the amount of fodder over the winter. We have several towns within reach for butter and cream and cheese, and Blandford itself to purchase fresh milk, and it has made sense to encourage our tenants in part or in whole to turn to dairying.”
“Hardly practical in North Wales, my lord. The towns simply do not exist to make the purchase of milk in such quantities as I believe you are discussing. The slate mine on the Montgomerie lands employs some extra bodies, of course, and that might provide some purchasers of fresh milk… It must be considered, I believe, my lord. We cannot grow wheat and must always be looking for a profitable use of our fields.”
The Land provided an immediate topic of discussion, broke the ice and enabled the young gentleman to feel at ease.
“You will see over the next days that this is a dreadfully old-fashioned estate, Mr Llewellyn, and that I am busy trying to bring the farmers out of the Dark Ages, and not with a great deal of success yet. Wheat, barley, turnips – that is ‘proper’ for the land, and half of my people are unsure of the turnip and would much prefer a fallow instead, for that being the old ways since forever and so must be right.”
“Indeed, yes, my lord! Suggest the wickedness of ‘change’ to the tenants and the heads shake in unison. ‘My old granfer never did no such thing, Master. Can’t be right, like. Nothing new on the Land. Never has been!’ The closed minds of the farmers will welcome poverty as being the way of the Land, far better than full bellies for doing something different.”
“Welsh and English one and the same, it would seem, Mr Llewellyn! I suggest the Irish potato as a crop and the reply comes back instantly. ‘My lord, they ain’t no ways English’. I explained once they were in fact American, but that was too much – why were they masquerading as Irish if that be so?”
“Perhaps, my lord, education might be advantageous. Was the hinds to know a little more of the world, they might open their minds to novelty?”
Mr Llewellyn thought a few seconds, withdrew his words.
“No, my lord. It would serve only to prove to the old men they were right to avoid literacy – this here reading leading youngsters into error, better they should remain ignorant like their good parents.”
Nat laughed and agreed.
“I can imagine them saying just that, Mr Llewellyn. We must ride out around the estate in the next day or two. Come now, I see my butler scowling at me, demanding I should go up to change for dinner.”
The young couple were properly amazed by the offerings of the Palfrey chef. They had known only the offerings of mere English cooks previously, had expected overdone beef and soggy cabbage for dinner.
“Oh, but this is luxury, my lord!”
“I suspect it is, Mrs Llewellyn. Michel is a jewel of a chef and makes our dinners an unending source of pleasure. Not all of our guests approve, I should say. ‘The meals are certainly tasty’, I quote, ‘but, surely, my lord, not entirely English’! Honestly! Word for word from our retired Admiral who is Chairman of the Bench and must be brought into our company on frequent occasion.”
She could think of no sensible comment, the more for my lady’s mother seeming inclined to agree with the sentiment.
Lady Palfrey brought the females away from the table, leading them into the smaller drawing room, being the more comfortable for a family party.
“I do not recall if you enjoy the pianoforte, Mrs Llewellyn?”
“Not at all, my lady! I rather fear that when I should have been at practice, I was far more inclined to slip away to the stables and take a horse out for an hour.”
“I do not blame you for that, my dear. I believe your country is more handsome than most, is it not?”
Genteel accomplishments were all very well, but there was much to be said for a horse on a mountainside.
“Yours is lower land than ours, my lady, yet much is similar by way of heaths and heather.”
“Due to the neglect of previous lords, I fear, Mrs Llewellyn. My lord is busy with a clearance of the gorse and a slow return of the acres to pasture, in some cases eventually to arable. The soil is weak, I fear. Thus we are shipping great mounds of guano from the islands off the shores of South America, not less than two thousand tons a year, eventually to improve the fertility of the land. Cattle also do good to the soil, of course. Yet it is a long, long process – improvement to be measured over generations rather than years. I cannot see great profit in it, yet the people cannot be left to wallow in poverty.”
“My father, Lord Montgomerie, has said the same to me, my lady. At some length, I would add. My young brother has been taught the same.”
Conversation drifted to families and to Lady Palfrey’s evident expansion of hers within a few months.
The men joined them after a bare half hour, neither being in the habit of imbibing great quantities of port and brandy.
Daffyd Llewellyn sat back with his cup of tea, looking from face to face around the room and showing just the least puzzled.
“A problem, Mr Llewellyn?”
“Perhaps one I should not raise, my lord… There does seem to be a degree of, shall we say resemblance, between the faces gathered here…”
Nat grinned. The comment had been inevitable and he had prepared his answer – had decided that absolute candour was the sole practical response.
“My grandfather, Baron Palfrey before me, met your lady’s grandmother when she was relatively newly wed. Her husband, the Lord Montgomerie of his day, had recently been found wholly mad – violently, dangerously insane. He had been locked away, and stayed in guarded seclusion until his death and the accession to the title of the current Lord Montgomerie. It goes without saying that the madman was in no position to sire children, yet three were born to the marriage, and were recorded as his. His younger brother married and was eventually discovered to be equally insane, but not until he had actually fathered a son. That boy is also ill, as much physically weak as mentally unbalanced, and must soon die.”
Mr Llewellyn was quick in his intellects and was able to pursue the facts to their conclusion.
“Thus, strictly speaking, the current Lord Montgomerie is a usurper to title and
“I understand so, husband.”
“So… One can hardly blame your grandmother in the circumstances. A known but wholly unmentioned circumstance. It would appear that we are directly related to Lord Palfrey, my love. A cousinship, very probably.”
“So it would seem, sir. That of course is why we begged to stay here on honeymoon. It does seem that the relationship should be acknowledged, discreetly. We are sufficiently similar in looks that it would be foolish to attempt to deny it. We have no intention of appearing during the Season, or so I believe, husband?”
“Not unless you demand it so, my love. Of a consequence, we shall rarely be publicly seen together, Montgomeries and Palfreys, and there need be no concern about the matter. It does have its amusing side, I must admit.”
“The Palfrey line does seem to breed true for looks, Mr Llewellyn. Fortunately, perhaps, its spendthrift habits are not equally hereditary.”
The young couple remained their four days, showing happy and discussing all at length. Agatha was most entertained as she talked over the visit after they had left.
“The dear girl’s Mama had told her very little about the wedded state, Nathaniel. She had any number of questions when we were safely secluded from male ears, most of which I was able to answer. I think she will feel far more comfortable in her husband’s presence henceforth. Fortunately, he loves her dearly and had caused her very little concern.”
“I thought him a most pleasant young gentleman. Sheltered - but without my military experience, I suspect any youngster will seem so. I think we will see more of both over the years. He certainly intends to assist his father to bring their estate into the modern age. I do hope his father wishes to be assisted.”
“They have a wing of the big house to be theirs, I understand. I suspect they will do well together, so deep an affection between them. Did you suggest that he might wish to become a Member?”
Nat had not done so, would wish that particular indignity on no man he liked.
“Then I much suspect his lady love may have done so. The Llewellyns and Montgomeries have a constituency between them and the present member is becoming aged and has never had much between his ears. Young Daffyd is considering taking the burden upon himself.”
“Rural and not very clever – one presumes the current Member is a Tory?”
“Naturally so. He could hardly be anything else. Daffyd will follow that inclination.”
“I do not doubt the pair will flourish in London. He will be seen to be young and bright, but not too offputtingly clever, and he will have two peers to vote at his behest, which will give him some slight value in the Party. Twenty years will see him a member of the government and able to put his name down for a peerage before he is fifty. An excellent notion that he should go to Westminster.”
“Good. I suggested that you would be seen as a follower if need arose.”
It made good sense. The Palfrey family was wealthy now and should play some part in the government of the land, even if at a remove.
“A most satisfactory visit, I think, and with the great advantage of being brief. I expect the next guests will wish to remain for two months, which will be a fraction less desirable, possibly. Is the whole family to come or only the eldest son and his wife and children?”
“The most recent plan was for Aunt Jane to come as well, in company with the Major, but the elder pair to remain only for two weeks. Son, wife and three children will remain for the early summer. They will curtail their visit this year, because of my needs. The hope may well be for us to go to them next year. I gather their family house partakes of the nature of a seat. There are hopes for a baronetcy in the none-too-distant future for the elder Higginbotham. You, of course, may contribute influence there, Nathaniel.”
“Much will depend on just how uncouth the Major may be, Agatha. If he is too much of the wrong sort, I shall not wish to be associated with him in Westminster. I will stand by young Daffyd with no hesitation – I like the lad and his little Montgomerie lady is a darling – but a Lancashire cotton gentleman may be a fraction too much for me to swallow.”
“Equally, he has the rank of major. He cannot be too uncouth, surely.”
“I would have thought not, Agatha, but I must admit there were some peculiar types ended up with the Army in Spain and I believe the same had happened previously in the American War. During the last couple of years in Spain particularly, there was an influx of Militia and Fencible officers who had been allowed to join respectable regiments by dint of raising the necessary men. I know for sure that some had wealthy parents who sent agents into the poorest parts of Ireland to buy volunteers there. They would bring them back to England, tuck them away secluded on a backwoods farm and set an old sergeant to bring them to discipline and give them the basics of drill, then off they would march to be regular soldiers.”
“Were they of any use to the Army?”
“Generally, yes. They would find themselves well-fed, comparatively speaking, and wholly willing to stand in a rank with their muskets in exchange for continuing in the life. That is all we demanded of them. They would give their lives happily in exchange for a pound of salt beef and all the biscuit they could eat, with an onion quite often and pease or beans besides. An issue of rum as well and they were in Paradise.”
“Was not the salt beef full of bone and gristle, Nat?”
“Yes, and tough as old boots as well, but they could get more than half a pound of edible meat from a day’s ration and the broth to soak biscuit in, and that was good to them. These are men who subsisted on boiled potatoes – and never quite enough of them – and a rasher of bacon split six ways once a month for meat. Half a pint of buttermilk on a good day and a sip of poteen on Sunday and anything else they could lay their hands on – dandelion leaves for the lucky, if they saw them first, a tasty extra, so my people told me. A hot meal and meat four days of the week, maybe cheese and pease for the other three – that was the best they had ever eaten, probably the high point of their poor lives if they had to return to Ireland.”
“Poor souls! Can we do no better for the Irish?”
“Read your Malthus, my love! England would be the same was it not for coal and iron and the ships to import cotton. The Irish breed like rabbits, my love, and as a result, live like rats. In a poverty-stricken country, starvation is inevitable. A few hundred more years and the whole world may be the same. Population is growing inexorably. The number of fields to produce food is constant. It is no more than a matter of time.”
It was a bleak, mathematical philosophy and yet seemed indisputable. In the end, there must be an absolute limit to the amount of land on Earth. When all of that land had been put to use, then the production of food must peak, would increase no further. After that, starvation became inevitable for the excess of population.
“Not in our lifetime, Nat.”
“No. The Great Plains of the United States and Canada will feed Europe this century, and Botany Bay may do the same next. We do not know how big the Terra Australis may actually be, but it seems to be enormous. Add to that, the Russian Steppes – wheatland again – and there is food for perhaps half a millenium. After that? Population will still continue to grow, and there will be no more continents to discover and bring into production. In time, the world must starve. In the short term, those countries which have no resources with which to buy in food will go hungry first. Ireland lacks coal and iron and cannot therefore indulge in industry, such as England is building in the North Country. No industry; every field in production; next generation must see famine which will push the bulk of the Irish population to emigrate. It is inevitable. Be thankful we are not Irish, thee and me – and be sure I shall put none of our money into Ireland.”
“There is peace in Europe now, Nat. No country will wish to send a fleet to the Cove of Cork, thus to close the Atlantic to our traders.”
He agreed that to be so, rapidly followed her argument.
“We dared not grant independence to Ireland while an enemy might take over her harbours. In the absence of such an enemy, then freedom – as they insist on calling it – is a safe gift. We should support the Irish in their demand to be an independent country. It will be of profit to England to do so. Should I stand in the House of Lords to say so, Agatha?”
