THE HARVEST.

All this day I have been strolling about the fields, watching the getting in of the harvest. The crops of oats, rye, and wheat (principally bearded) are much heavier than any one would expect from such light and apparently poor land; but the heavy dews which characterize the summer climate of this high country impart a nourishment which, in richer lands, often lies dormant from drought. In Nassau, the corn is cut principally by women, who use a sickle so very small and light, that it seems but little labour to wield it. They begin early in the morning, and with short intervals of rest continue till eleven o'clock, when the various village bells suddenly strike up a merry peal, which is a signal to the labourers to come home to their dinners. It is a very interesting scene to observe, over the undulating surface of the whole country, groups of peasants, brothers, sisters, parents, &c., all bending to their sickles—to see children playing round infants lying fast asleep on blue smock-frocks placed under the shade of the corn sheaves. It is pleasing to remark the rapid progress which the several parties are making; how each little family, attacking its own patch or property, works its way into the standing corn, leaving the crop prostrate behind them; and then, in the middle of this simple, rural, busy scene, it is delightful indeed to hear from the belfry of their much-revered churches a peal of cheerful notes, which peacefully sound “lullaby” to them all. In a very few seconds the square fields and little oblong plots are deserted, and then the various roads and paths of the country suddenly burst in lines upon the attention, each being delineated by a string of peasants, who are straggling one behind the other, until paths in all directions are seen converging towards the parental village churches, which seem to be attracting them all.

As soon as each field of corn is cut, it is bound into sheaves, about the size they are in England: seven of these are then made to lean towards each other, and upon them all is placed a large sheaf reversed, the ears of which hanging downwards form a sort of thatch, which keeps this little stack dry until its owner has time to carry it to his home. It generally remains many days in this state, and after the harvest has been all cut, the country covered with these stacks resembles a vast encampment.

The carts and waggons used for carrying the corn are exceedingly well adapted to the country. Their particular characteristic is excessive lightness, and, indeed, were they heavy, it would be quite impossible for any cattle to draw them up and down the hills. Occasionally they are drawn by horses—often by small active oxen; but cows more generally perform this duty, and with quite as much patience as their mistresses, at the same moment, are labouring before them at the sickle. The yoke, or beam, by which these cows are connected, is placed immediately behind their horns; a little leathern pillow is then laid upon their brow, over which passes a strap that firmly lashes their heads to the beam, and it is, therefore, against such soft cushions that the animals push to advance: and thus linked together for life, by this sort of Siamese band, it is curious to observe them eating together, then by agreement raising their heads to swallow, then again standing motionless chewing the cud, which is seen passing and repassing from the stomach to the mouth.

At first, when, standing near them, I smelt from their breath the sweet fresh milk, it seemed hard that they should thus be, as it were, domestic candles, lighted at both ends: however, verily do I believe that all animals prefer exercise, or even hard work, to any sort of confinement, and if so, they are certainly happier than our stall-fed cows, many of which, in certain parts of Britain, may be seen with their heads fixed economically for months between two vertical beams of wood. The Nassau cows certainly do not seem to suffer while working in their light carts; as soon as their mistress advances, they follow her, and if she turns and whips them, then they seem to hurry after her more eagerly than ever.

It is true, hard labour has the effect of impoverishing their milk, and the calf at home is consequently (so far as it is concerned) a loser by the bargain: however, there is no child in the peasant’s family who has not had cause to make the same complaint; and, therefore, so long as the labourer’s wife carries her infant to the harvest, the milch cow may very fairly be required to draw to the hovel what has been cut by her hands.

Nothing can be better adapted to the features of the country, nothing can better accord with the feeble resources of its inhabitants, than the equipment of these economical waggons and carts: the cows and oxen can ascend any of the hills, or descend into any of the valleys; they can, without slipping, go sideways along the face of the hills, and in crossing the green, swampy, grassy-ravines, I particularly remarked the advantage of the light waggon drawn by animals with cloven feet; for had one of our heavy teams attempted the passage, like a set of flies walking across a plate of treacle, they would soon have become unable to extricate even themselves. But in making the comparison between the horse and the cow (as far as regards Nassau husbandry), I may further observe, that the former has a very expensive appetite, and wears very expensive shoes; as soon as he becomes lame he is useless, and as soon as he is dead he is carrion. Now a placid, patient Langen-Schwalbach cow, in the bloom of her youth, costs only two or three pounds; she requires neither corn nor shoeing: the leaves of the forest, drawn by herself to the village, form her bed, which in due time she carries out to the field as manure: there is nothing a light cart can carry which she is not ready to fetch, and from her work she cheerfully returns to her home to give milk, cream, butter and cheese to the establishment: at her death she is still worth eleven kreuzers a pound as beef; and when her flesh has disappeared, her bones, after being ground at the mill, once again appear upon her master’s fields, to cheer, manure, and enrich them.

As, quite in love with cows, I was returning from the harvest, I met the Nassau letter-cart, one of the cheapest carriages for its purpose that can well be conceived. It consists of a pair of high wheels connected by a short axle, upon which are riveted a few boards framed together in the form of a small shallow box; in this little coffin the letter-bag is buried, and upon it, like a monument, sits a light boy dressed in the uniform of a Nassau postillion, who with a trumpet in one hand, a long whip in the other, and the reins sporting loose under his feet, starts as if he deliberately meant mischief, intending to get well over his ground; and there being scarcely any weight to carry, the horse really might proceed as a mail-coach horse ought to go; but that horrible Punch and Judy trumpet upsets the whole arrangement, for as the thing is very heavy, the child soon takes two hands to it instead of one, when down goes the whip, and from that moment the picture, which promised to be a good one, is spoiled.

The letter-bag crawls, like a reptile, along the road; while the boy, amusing himself with his plaything, reminds one of those “nursery rhymes” which say,

It is quite provoking to see a government carriage in its theory so simply imagined, and so cleverly adapted to its purpose, thus completely ruined in its practice. Music may be, and indeed is, very delightful in its way; but a tune is one thing—speed another; and it always seems to me a pity that the Duke of Nassau should allow these two substantives to be so completely confounded in his dominions.

How admirably does the long tin horn of the guard of one of our mail-coaches perform its blunt duty!—a single blast is sufficient to remove the obstruction of an old gentleman in his gig—two are generally enough for a heavy cart—three for a waggon—and half-a-dozen slowly and sternly applied, are always sufficient to awaken the snoring keeper of a turnpike-gate—in short, to

The gala turn-out of our mail-coaches on the King’s birth-day, I always think must strike foreigners more than anything else in our country with the sterling solid integrity of the English character. To see so many well-bred horses in such magnificent condition—so many well-built carriages—so many excellent drivers, and such a corps of steady, quiet, resolute-looking men as guards, each wearing, as well as every coachman, the King’s own livery—all this must silently point out, even to our most jealous enemies, not only the wealth of the country, but the firm basis on which it stands; in short, it must prove to them most undeniably, that there is no one thing in England which, throughout the land, is treated with so much universal attention and respect, as the honest, speedy, and safe delivery of the letters and commercial correspondence of the country. Nevertheless, if our English coachmen were to be allowed, instead of attending to their horses, to play on trumpets as they proceeded, we should, as in the Duchy of Nassau, soon pay very dearly for their music.