of the sun’s rays at any particular spot at a specified date; but
nowadays it is employed to designate the average type of weather
experienced in a district. In this latter sense it comprises the
results of the combined effects of temperature, atmospheric pressure,
the degree of moisture in the air, the direction and force of the
wind, and the amount of rainfall; the study of climate constituting
the science of meteorology. Although the climate of the British Isles
is of an exceedingly changeable type, yet the average of the seasonal
changes is far from being the same in all parts of the country. Taking
temperature alone, we find, for instance, that while the average for
the whole year in Shetland is as low as 43° Fahrenheit, in the Scilly
Islands it rises to 53°. It is a very general idea that in our islands
the winter temperature of a place depends upon whether it is situated
in the north or the south. This, however, is a mistake, the temperature
having little relation to latitude, but growing colder as we pass from
the west to the eastern side of the country; the south of England, as
a whole, being milder than the north, not because it is the south,
but because it includes such a large extent of land in the west. The
degree of elevation above the sea-level has much to do with temperature
and the amount of moisture in the air; high lands being, as a rule,
colder and drier in winter than those lying at lower levels. On account
of the comparatively high elevation of a considerable proportion of
its area and its easterly position, coupled with the prevalence of
north-easterly and easterly winds in spring, Hertfordshire ought to
have, on the whole, a cold and bracing climate for the greater part of
the year; and, as a matter of fact, such is the case. Indeed, it is
commonly said that northern Hertfordshire is so cold and bracing, that
only strong and robust constitutions can stand it; but that for those
blessed with such constitutions it is one of the healthiest counties in
the kingdom.
Hertfordshire, however, like England on a small scale, has local
climates of its own, dependent upon differences in elevation above the
sea-level, in the amount of rainfall, in the nature of the geological
formation and soil, and also in aspect, especially as regards
protection from the east wind in spring. The slope of a hill facing
south or south-west receives for instance far more sun in winter than
one which looks in the opposite direction; while it also escapes the
full blast of the bitter east wind. Places situated on chalk, and above
all on gravel, are drier, and consequently--if on the same level and
with a similar aspect--also warmer than those on cold, heavy clay or
marl.
As if to confirm and perpetuate the above-mentioned popular error, it
happens that the northern and north-western districts of the county,
that is to say, those constituting the chalk area, are very much colder
and more bracing than those to the south and east, whose substratum
is clay. This difference depends, however, not on differences of
latitude, but on the lower elevation of the southern as compared with
the northern districts, coupled with the protection from cold winds
afforded to the low lands by the high ground. To those who are in the
habit of travelling by the Midland railway from the north-western
corner of the county to London, the differences between the climate
of the northern and the southern districts is made self-apparent in
early spring by the extraordinary difference in the condition of the
hedges and trees on the two sides of the Elstree tunnel. It is true
that on this particular route the district south of the tunnel is in
Middlesex, but to the eastward much of the lowland is in Herts. On the
northern side of the range of chalk-hills pierced by this tunnel the
hawthorn hedges may be seen at a certain period of the spring to be
absolutely devoid of a sign of green; while on the opposite side they
will be in full leaf. There is, in fact, about a fortnight’s difference
between the Elstree and the Mill Hill side of this range in regard to
the development of spring-vegetation; and while the northern side is
exposed to the full force of the east wind, the combes and valleys with
a south-westerly aspect near the summit of the opposite flank are so
warm and sheltered that hardy species of bamboo and palm will grow in
the open air almost as luxuriantly as in similar situations in Surrey
or Sussex.
We see, then, as has been well remarked, that the division of the
county, along the line indicated in the section on its geology, into
two very unequal portions--namely, a large north-western area with a
relatively dry soil and atmosphere, and a smaller south-eastern tract
with a comparatively moist soil and atmosphere--forms a sufficient
approach to an accurate climatic division.
Here we may mention that the daily temperature and the amount of
moisture in the air, together with the barometric pressure and a number
of other details, are recorded at the Meteorological Office in London
from reports received from a host of observing stations (either public
or private) scattered at intervals all over the country; and at the end
of each year the averages, or “means,” of these observations are worked
out for the British Isles and England generally, and likewise for the
various counties and other local districts. This enables comparisons
to be instituted between the climates of different places with much
greater accuracy than would otherwise be possible.
In the year 1905 the mean temperature for the whole of England
was 48·7°, while that of Hertfordshire was 48·9°, as deduced from
observations taken at four stations, of which Bennington showed
the lowest mean of 48·4°, and New Barnet the highest of 50·2°. The
aforesaid county mean of 48·9° was, however, 0·6° above the average;
the average mean for a series of years thus being 47·8°, or about 1°
lower than that for England generally.
If we turn to the map here given we notice that, speaking generally,
the rainfall of England decreases steadily as we pass from west to
east. The moisture-laden clouds, driven by the prevalent winds across
the Atlantic, precipitate their contents on reaching the land, more
especially if the land be high, and in consequence the country beyond
is less wet. Hertfordshire occupies a middle position between the heavy
averages of Wales and S.W. England and the minimum of Essex and the
neighbourhood of the Wash, as we should expect. The difference between
the average of the various stations in our country is remarkable. In
the year 1905, which is taken throughout as the basis of comparison,
the highest rainfall in England and Wales occurred at Glas Lyn, near
Snowdon, and was no less than 176·6 inches; whereas the lowest was
registered at Shoeburyness, in Essex, this being only 14·57 inches;
while the average rainfall for Great Britain was 27·17 inches. In
Hertfordshire, as we shall see, the average in that year for the whole
county was 23·47 inches, but this is 1·5 inches below the general
average for a series of years, which is 24·52 inches. In the same year
the average for the four chief observing stations in the county was,
however, 24·22 inches, with a maximum of 25·88 inches at New Barnet and
a minimum of 22·51 inches at Bennington. These extremes were exceeded
by a maximum of 28·29 inches at Pendley Manor, Tring, and a minimum of
19·31 inches (or rather more than 5 inches above the Essex minimum) at
Hillside, Buntingford.
[Illustration: ENGLAND & WALES
ANNUAL RAINFALL
GEORGE PHILIP & SON LTD.
(_The figures show the annual rainfall in inches._)]
For a succession of years it has, however, been observed that the
rainfall of Hertfordshire is in excess of that of all the adjacent
counties to the west and south. This is shown by the following
comparative average rainfalls for 1905; viz.: Bedfordshire (23
stations), 20·47 ins.; Buckinghamshire (32 stations), 22·06 ins.;
Middlesex, exclusive of London (49 stations), 22·26 ins.; and
Hertfordshire (51 stations), 23·47 ins. Of the 104 stations exclusive
of Hertfordshire, the combined mean rainfall is 21·6 inches;
Hertfordshire thus showing an excess over the average rainfall in the
adjoining counties of nearly two inches in actual amount.
As a whole, and in spite of the excess over its neighbour in the
matter of rainfall, Hertford may be reckoned among the relatively dry
counties; its average in 1905 being nearly four inches below that for
England generally in the same year.
At Bennington there were recorded 1523 hours of bright sunshine during
the year, and 54 absolutely sunless days. Throughout Great Britain as a
whole there were 186 days in the same year on which a minimum of 0·005
inch of rain fell; all such days with that or a greater quantity of
rain being officially known as rain-days. At Greenwich, where the total
amount of rainfall was 23·024 inches, the rain-days numbered 161, and
the wettest month was June when 4·323 inches of rain were registered.
June was also the wettest month of the year in Hertfordshire, but the
amount of rain was much less than at Greenwich, being only 3·46 inches.
As regards bright sunshine, the number of hours in England as a whole
amounted to 1535, while in Kent the number reached 1667·8, and at
Tunbridge Wells 1712·4 hours.
In respect to the number of wet days during the year in question
Hertfordshire therefore occupied a very creditable position, although
its record for sunshine was less satisfactory.
9. People--Race, Dialect, Settlements, Population.
Previous to the Roman occupation of Britain Hertfordshire was inhabited
by two British tribes,--the Cattyeuchlani, whose capital appears to
have been Verulam or St Albans, and the Trinobantes. To what extent
these original British inhabitants of the county survived the Roman
and Saxon invasions is unknown; but it may be taken as certain that at
an early date Anglo-Saxon was the language spoken in this part of the
country. Forty years ago Anglo-Saxon idioms and words still lingered
among the labouring rural population in the Harpenden district (and
probably elsewhere), which have apparently now disappeared completely.
Instead of _houses_, the Anglo-Saxon plural _housen_ was, for instance,
always used by the old people; while when a log of timber was cut the
wrong way of the grain they would say that it would be sure to _spalt_
(equivalent to the German _spalten_), instead of to split.
Of the Anglo-Saxon language there were originally two chief dialects,
a northern and a southern; but after the Norman conquest the number
of such dialects was increased to half-a-dozen. According to Dr A. J.
Ellis’s _English Dialects_, southern Hertfordshire comes within the
domain of the south-eastern dialect, which also prevailed in Middlesex,
south-eastern Buckinghamshire, and south-western Essex. Throughout
this area there is, however, an underlying basis of the middle eastern
dialect, which is still to be detected in northern Hertfordshire, as
well as in Essex, Bedfordshire, Huntingdonshire, and Northamptonshire.
It accordingly appears that if the East Anglian counties of
Cambridgeshire, Suffolk, and Norfolk be eliminated, the whole of the
country lying to the eastward of the Chiltern Hills, as well as the
high grounds of Northamptonshire, had one dialect in common, which was
the speech of the early Teuton settlers of this part of England. This
dialect, during the course of fourteen centuries, has been gradually
modified and altered by the speech of London till it has resulted in
the modern English of this part of south-eastern England.
According to Mr R. A. Smith, writing in the _Victoria History of
the Counties of England_, “The grouping of dialects in this part
of the country would thus unite Hertfordshire with Essex, and lead
us to expect from archæology some indications of Saxon rather
than of Anglian influence in the county. The few results already
obtained in Hertfordshire certainly show a marked absence of Anglian
characteristics, but many discoveries must be made before the
peculiarities of East Saxon remains can be demonstrated. To the west
of the Chilterns enough has been recovered from graves to show that
the settlers in the upper Thames valley, presumably the Saxons of the
West, were homogeneous [uniform in characteristics] and distinguishable
from their neighbours; but at present nothing has been found to link
them with the people of Essex, who probably reached the eastern slopes
of the Chilterns at one time, but were mainly confined to the north of
Essex and the neighbourhood of London. In fact, the few discoveries in
this district point rather to a connection with Kent [the country of
the British tribe of Cantii] than with Wessex.”
Whatever may be the precise state of the case with regard to these
details, it may be taken as certain that the present population of
Hertfordshire is mainly descended from the Saxons who came to Britain
in the fifth and sixth centuries. There must have been, however,
a certain mixture of ancient British blood; while later, and more
especially among the higher classes, this was followed by the infusion
of a Norman strain. Otherwise the population of the county does not
appear to have been much influenced by foreign immigration, although
there was a settlement of Huguenots in St Albans, who have left
their mark in the name of one of the streets--French Row--near the
market-place.
[Illustration: French Row, St Albans]
Passing on to the present day, we have the somewhat curious anomaly
that the population of the administrative county is somewhat larger
than that of the original county; this being due to the inclusion in
the former of some thickly populated areas. The population of the
administrative county in the census of 1901 was given as 258,423; ten
years previously it was 226,587, thus showing a very marked increase;
that of the ancient county was 250,152 persons. The number of persons
to a square mile in Hertfordshire, on the latter basis at the former
date, was thus about 398, against 558 for England and Wales generally.
During the last twenty-five years the increase of the population
has mainly taken place on the three great lines of railways, the
Great Northern, the Midland, and the North-Western, at such places
as Barnet, Hitchin, St Albans, Harpenden, and Watford. St Albans has
indeed altogether outstripped the county town in point of numbers;
its population being 16,019 in 1901 against the 9,322 of Hertford. In
common with England generally, there has of late years been a marked
tendency for the rural population to migrate to the larger villages and
towns; and this dominance of the urban population has been accentuated
by the transference to St Albans and elsewhere of large manufacturing
and printing establishments from the metropolis. The urban districts
on the lines of railway likewise constitute the residence of a large
population of men having daily business in London.
As in the country generally, the females in 1901 largely exceeded the
male population in numbers; the total for the former being 18,176, and
for the latter 16,723. The great majority of these lived in houses,
of which 54,963 were inhabited at the date in question. In addition
to these, 71 were living in military barracks; something like another
5,200 were maintained in workhouses, hospitals, asylums, industrial
schools, etc., while barges on the canals accounted for about another
147. It should be added that the county contains several large London
asylums; it would therefore give a very exaggerated proportion, as
compared with the true state of the case, if the number of lunatics
resident in the county were quoted.
[Illustration: Ancient House at Welwyn, now the Police Station]
10. Agriculture--Main Cultivations, Woodlands, Stock.
As already mentioned, the greater portion of Hertfordshire, that is
to say, most of the chalk area, exclusive of the downs, commons,
woods, and private parks, was in former years devoted to corn, for the
cultivation of which its soil is particularly well suited. Indeed the
county had the reputation of growing not only the best barley for
malting, but likewise the best wheat-straw (that is to say, the hardest
and whitest) for plaiting. The wheat itself was also of specially good
quality and hardness, and there was likewise an abundance of mills
in which it could be converted into flour. A noteworthy feature of
Hertfordshire agriculture is the practice of mixing chalk with the
soils, especially where they are clayey; this resulting in a decided
increase in fertility.
A century and a half ago wheat, barley, and oats formed the chief
cereal crops; beans being better suited to the Vale of Aylesbury, while
peas are profitable only on the very light chalky grounds. Clover,
lucerne, trefoil, turnips, and (in later times) swedes and mangold
are also extensively grown. In this connection it is interesting to
note that the first crops of red clover and of swede turnips ever
grown in this country were sown at Broadby Farm, near Berkhampstead;
a spot celebrated in literature as having been the home of Peter the
Wild Boy in 1725. A certain amount of grass land was intermingled with
that under cereal and root cultivation; while, as mentioned in earlier
sections, most of the heavy land in the south and south-east of the
county is under grass.
“Hertfordshire farming,” observes a recent writer, “has undergone
little material change since Ellis’s description of it in 1732; the
hay-crop has become a more prominent feature perhaps, potatoes on the
lighter soils have gained a leading place in the rotation, and the
standard of fertility has been raised all round; otherwise a farm on
the high chalk-plateau was farmed in 1732 pretty much on the same lines
as it is to-day. Ellis gives a list of the chief weeds, ‘crow-garlick,
wild oat, carlock, poppy, mayweed, bindweed, dock, crow-needle, black
bent’: they are not less troublesome nor any nearer extinction at the
present time, the last grass in particular being very characteristic of
corn-land on the ‘clay with flints’.”
[Illustration: A Hertfordshire Farm near Rickmansworth]
Every year the Board of Agriculture publishes a return in which the
number of acres in each county devoted to each particular kind of
crop is duly recorded, the classification adopted being as follows,
viz.: corn crops; green crops; clover, sainfoin, and grasses for hay;
grass not for hay; flax; hops; small fruits; and orchards. Such land
as produces none of these crops is classed as bare fallow, of which
Hertfordshire in 1905 possessed 14,275 acres.
Of the total of 402,856[2] acres in the county, 329,641 were
under cultivation in that year; 1917 were orchards, 26,568 were
woodland, while 1657 acres consisted of heaths and commons used as
grazing-grounds. At the same date there were 116,700 acres under
corn-cultivation; that is to say, something approaching one-fourth the
total acreage, against about one-seventh in Kent. Green crops accounted
for 32,702 acres, while of the remainder there were 36,831 under
clover, sainfoin, and grasses, 3315 under lucerne, meadows claimed
54,589 acres, pasture 70,678, and small fruits 544. Of the corn-grazing
area, wheat occupied 51,691, oats 36,946, and barley 27,960 acres.
[2] See page 8 and footnote.
It is thus apparent that out of the 329,641 acres of cultivated
land no less than 200,000, or more than half the whole area of the
county, and about 60 per cent. of the total farming land, was still
under the plough; this large proportion being at the time exceeded
only in six English counties. The increase in permanent pasture has,
however, been steadily progressing since the great fall in the price
of cereals in the seventies; this being aided by the improvements in
the means of communication throughout the country, which have tended
to rob Hertfordshire of its original special advantage (owing to its
proximity) in the matter of supplying the metropolis with corn and
straw.
The subject of Hertfordshire agriculture cannot be dismissed without
mention of the fact that the world-renowned agricultural station at
Rothamsted, in Harpenden parish, founded and endowed by the late Sir J.
B. Lawes, is included within its limits. This includes a laboratory,
under a Director, situated on the west side of Harpenden common, and
certain plots of land in the park at Rothamsted where agricultural
experiments have been carried on for more than sixty years. The whole
station is administered by a committee, mainly appointed by the Royal
Society.
Fruit is grown only to a comparatively small extent in Hertfordshire.
Very characteristic of the county are, however, the orchards (now for
the most part more or less neglected) of small black cherries, known
as Hertfordshire blacks, and also as “mazzards,” which are situated
near the homesteads of most of the older farms. These are probably a
cultivated variety of the wild black cherry of the neighbouring woods.
On the rich-soiled, low-lying lands of the Lea valley on the
south-eastern side of the county are situated numerous market-gardens
and nurseries. The growing of tomatos (at Harpenden), cucumbers, and
grapes under glass is carried on in several parts of the county on a
more or less extensive scale.
Elm, oak, beech, and ash form the most common timber-trees of the
county, but the predominance of each kind in particular districts
depends, as already mentioned, on the nature of the geological
formation. The undergrowth in the woods, which should be cut every 12
or 13 years, consists mainly of hazel.
As regards the number of the larger and commoner kinds of domesticated
animals, sheep in 1905 reached a total of 94,461, or about 234 to every
1000 acres; the average for England generally being 445 per 1000 acres.
The prevailing breeds are the Hampshire Down, the South Down, and the
Dorset; the latter being favoured on account of their early lambing.
Hertfordshire is not a great horse-breeding county, and in 1905 the
number of these animals was only 15,070. Cattle numbered 38,636, and
pigs 25,338. Shorthorns are the favourite breed of cattle among the
farmers; and although in the chalk districts the soil is not specially
well suited for dairy purposes, farms near the main railways despatch a
considerable amount of milk to London. The number of horses was nearly
the same as in 1901, but cattle showed an increase of nearly 2000 head.
Sheep, however, had decreased by over 2000 and pigs by more than 6000.
11. Special Cultivations.
The most important special cultivation in Hertfordshire is undoubtedly
watercress, which is very extensively grown in the river-valleys over
a broad belt of country extending from the Welwyn district, through
the parishes of Harpenden, Wheathampstead and Redbourn, and thence to
Amersham and Rickmansworth, as well as to the Vale of Aylesbury in
Buckinghamshire; this district being reported to be the best in England
for this particular crop. The cress is grown in beds cut through the
low-ground from one bend of the river to another, so that a constant,
but regulated stream of water is continually flowing through. The seed
is sown in special beds, and the young cress carefully planted out in
regular rows in the mud of the permanent beds during the autumn. Much
care has to be exercised in tending and weeding the crop, from which
two prolonged cuttings are obtained annually; the spring cutting being,
however, much larger and better than the autumn one.
After cutting, the watercress is tied up in bundles and packed in
flat, oblong, osier hampers, or baskets; of which, during the spring
season, huge stacks may be seen at the local railway stations awaiting
despatch, either to the metropolis, or to the great manufacturing towns
of the Midlands. For ordinary purposes the land on which watercress
is grown is almost valueless; but the watercress beds yield a big
rental. To furnish material for the aforesaid watercress hampers, as
well as for basket-work generally, osiers are cultivated in some of the
river-valleys, as in the Lea a mile or so above Wheathampstead, where
there are extensive beds.