Shepherds, too, sometimes visit the fold very early in the morning, and in the lambing season may be said to be about both day and night.  They come, however, under a different category to the rest of the men, because they have no regular hours, but are guided solely by the season and the work.  A shepherd often takes his ease when other men are busily labouring.  On the other hand, he is frequently anxiously engaged when they are sleeping.  His sheep rule his life, and he has little to do with the artificial divisions of time.

Hedgers and ditchers often work by the piece, and so take their own time for meals; the ash woods, which are cut in the winter, are also usually thrown by the piece.  Hedging and ditching, if done properly, is hard work, especially if there is any grubbing.  Though the arms get warm from swinging the grub-axe or billhook, or cleaning out the ditch and plastering and smoothing the side of the mound with the spade, yet feet and ankles are chilled by the water in the ditch.  This is often dammed up and so kept back partially, but it generally forces its way through.  The ditcher has a board to stand on; there is a hole through it, and a projecting stick attached, with which to drag it into position.  But the soft soil allows the board to sink, and he often throws it aside as more encumbrance than use.  He has some small perquisites:  he is allowed to carry home a bundle of wood or a log every night, and may gather up the remnants after the faggoting is finished.  On the other hand, he cannot work in bad weather.

Other men come to the farm buildings to commence work about the time the carter has got his horses fed, groomed, and harnessed, and after the fogger and milker have completed their early duties.  If it is a frosty morning and the ground firm, so as to bear up a cart without poaching the soil too much, the manure is carried out into the fields.  This is plain, straightforward labour, and cannot be looked upon as hard work.  If the cattle want no further attention, the foggers and milkers turn their hands after breakfast to whatever may be going on.  Some considerable time is taken up in slicing roots with the machine, or chaff-cutting—­monotonous work of a simple character, and chiefly consisting in turning a handle.

The general hands—­those who come on when the carter is ready, and who are usually young men, not yet settled down to any particular branch—­seem to get the best end of the stick.  They do not begin so early in the morning by some time as the fogger, milker, carter, or shepherd; consequently, if the cottage arrangements are tolerable, they can get a comfortable breakfast first.  They have no anxieties or trouble whatever; the work may be hard in itself, but there is no particular hurry (in their estimation) and they do not distress themselves.  They receive nearly the same wages as the others who have the care of valuable flocks, herds, and horses; the difference is but a shilling or two, and, to make