Commonplace book of Thomas Metcalfe, Doncaster

Includes entries relating to farming and gardening, entitled: 'Tracts on Practical Agriculture and Gardening' by R. Weston; the yearly expense of a stove forty feet long will be as followes; grasses proper for deer and sheep; method of cultivating those herbs which cannot readily be propagated by seed; a useful cart; a small artificial warren to keep rabbits in a lawn or garden without their doing damage to the trees etc.; to make potato starch; a method of feeding calves with a mixture of hay, water and a little milk; a table of the specific gravity of seasonal sorts of wood; stock of a grass farm of the first class; the number of arable acres in a farm of the second class; the stock of a grass farm of the second class; a recipe to prevent the blight on fruit trees; observations relative to the pruning of orchards and extracts from 'The Farmer's Letters' by Arthur Young. Other entries include: Dr Stonehouses' recipe for making a cheap food, without bread or beer; recipes to make potato bread, beer, yeast and 'soup for the soldiers'; and 'Thoughts of Mr Pascal upon religion and some other subjects'. There are also several pages of handwriting practice.

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