being, according to his account, nine times as many as they were in 1664. Dr. King, in his manuscript description of Chelsea, written about the year 1717, says that the parish then contained about three hundred and fifty houses, and that they were continually increasing.

The increase of buildings has been very rapid during the last ten or twelve years; and when all the projected improvements are carried into effect, very little pasture or arable land will remain. The number of houses amounted in the year 1809 to about two thousand three hundred, and are daily increasing.

The following is the return of the number of inhabitants in the year 1801, made agreeably to the Act of Parliament, exclusive of four hundred and seventy-five invalids in the Royal Hospital :

POOR'S RATE.

Upon a rack rental the poor's rate amounts to about two shillings in the pound.

LAND TAX.

Chelsea is assessed in the sum of one thousand and seventy-nine pounds nineteen shillings and eight pence for the land tax, which in the year 1809 was at the rate of sevenpence-halfpenny in the pound, upon houses, and eleven pence in the pound upon the land.

CHAPTER II.

Soil, Agriculture, Common, Apothecaries' Garden, Botanic Gardens and Nurseries, Manufactories, and Water Works.

SOIL AND AGRICULTURE.

THE soil of this parish varies from a strong to a tender or sandy loam, and from a black and fertile soil to a white sand and gravel; and it is remarkable, that the gravel lies within two feet of the surface. The land is in a small proportion devoted to the plough, but is chiefly employed in raising plants, vegetables, and flowers for the London markets.

In

The kitchen gardener spares neither labour nor expense to procure manure; it consists of new horsedung, brought in hot from the stables, and thrown lightly in a heap, so as to afford an opportunity for the air to penetrate from the surface to the centre. this situation it is prevented from drying, by being constantly kept watered, and turned every two or three days, until it becomes quite black, and all its smell is evaporated. When this process is completed, which -usually occupies the space of fourteen or sixteen days, the dung is made into a hot bed in the form of a ridge, a square, or an oblong, according to the nature of the seeds or plants intended to be raised thereon. This manure having thus performed its first office, and

thereby become quite rotten, is spread thickly over the ground, and made to mature the plants which, in its former state, it contributed to raise. The quantity of manure laid on is very great. The gardener, it is said, has no known period for the sowing of any particular kind of seeds, except in a very few instances.

The most perfect, and best cultivated culinary grounds, are in this parish and its vicinity; and here, in general, the characters of farmer and gardener are united in the same person, as the grounds are successively filled with grain and vegetables.

In the months of January and February they crop with early pease, to be gathered in the month of June. In a few days afterwards the ground is cleared, the pease-haulm stacked up for future fodder, and the plough being set to work, the land is sown with turnips, which are sold off in the autumn, when the ground is again ploughed, and filled with coleworts for the spring Where the first crop of pease is of the marrowfat kind, it is generally succeeded by a crop of savoys or late cabbages.

use.

Every gardener has a favourite and particular system in the succession of his crops, but they all unanimously agree in the maxim, that, to dung well, to dig well, and to seed well, is the only practice upon which the reasonable expectation of a good crop can be founded.

The little wheat that is sown in this parish, is generally put in about Old Michaelmas, or at Christmas ; but, when the season and all circumstances will admit, the month of October is preferred for wheat. Pease and beans of various sorts, are sown from Christmas to

Lady Day; summer vetches, from Lady Day to Michaelmas, for late seed; oats and barley, with rye, grass, and clover, from February till May; but oats succeed best, in general, if sown before the month of March is expired. The hay harvest is generally about Midsummer, and the corn harvest about the month of August. The barley grown in the parishes of Chelsea, Fulham, and Chiswick, has been for many years distinguished for its good quality, and is much sought after for seed.

But of late years very little corn has been sown in this parish, as the gardeners find it much more advantageous to apply their grounds exclusively to the rearing of vegetables and flowers for the London markets; and it is computed, that one-half of the vegetables sold in Covent Garden market, are raised in Chelsea and the adjoining parishes of Fulham, Kensington, and Chiswick.

CHELSEA COMMON.

This common was attached to certain ancient houses, farms, and cottages, for the pasturage of forty cows and twenty heifers. To keep these there was always a cow-keeper, whose business it was to mark the cattle, to drive home the cows at night to the several owners, and to impound all cattle unmarked, or any horses which broke into the said common, or were found there. He was usually put in by the lord of the manor's bailiff, and paid by the commoners for his pains and care.