PEASANTRY.
distaff to the running-wheel the transition
is easy, as the latter is only the distaff set
in motion by a wheel. From the running-
wheel to the fly-wheel, which winds up the
thread as it is spun, the progress is greater;
but when this was once discovered, it only
required the substitution of rollers to supply
the action of the fingers, and we have
the principle of the most improved spinning
machines. The moving power of Arkwright’s
first mill was a horse. Our admiration of
these mechanical inventions, brought to their
present state of perfection, is shaded, however,
by a knowledge of the vice and misery
that have been created by them in various
parts of Fngland.
Almost every article of dress worn by the
peasants in Savoy is of domestic manufacture.
The wool of their little flocks is
dressed and spun by themselves, and wove
by the village weaver. Black sheep are
very general in Savoy ; and by mixing the
black and white wool together, a sort of
greyish brown cloth is produced, which
saves the expense of dying. The flax is
also dressed and spun by themselves, and
wove in the neighbourhood. Itinerant
tailors and shoemakers make the clothes
WALNUT HARVEST. 73
and shoes of the peasantry under their own
roofs, as was the case among the farmers
in Fngland half a century ago, when the
tailor was the travelling gazette of the
village, and brought to the good housewives
of those days all the important histories
and anecdotes that were known concerning
the king and the queen upon
the throne, or the vicar and the vicar’s
wife of the adjoining parish.
I have frequently mentioned the immense
number of large walnut-trees that grow
around the Lake of Annecy, and in the valleys
of this part of Savoy. The walnut is the
natural olive of this country, supplying the
inhabitants with oil for their own consumption,
and also a considerable quantity for
exportation to France and Geneva. The
walnut harvest a t Chateau Duing commences
in September : they are beaten off
the trees with long poles ; the green husks
are taken off as soon as they begin to decay
; the walnuts are then laid in a chamber
to dry, where they remain till November,
when the process of making the oil
commences. The first operation is to crack
the nuts, and take out the kernel: for this
purpose several of the neighbouring pea