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This is a passage from "The Mowing of a Field" by Hilaire Belloc. In the essay, he describes in detail the right way to make hay.

Many think that hay is best made when the grass is thickest; and so they delay until it is rank and in flower, and has already heavily pulled the ground. And there is another false reason for delay, which is wet weather. For very few will understand (though it comes year after year) that we have rain always in South England between the sickle and the scythe, or say just after the weeks of east wind are over.

1) has ... pulled the ground

Does this mean that the grass roots are deep in the soil strongly grasping?

2) between the sickle and the scythe

My best guess is that each of them symbolizes a time when certain crops should be harvested. In the essay, a scythe is used to cut the grass to make hay. So I assume the scythe may mean the appropriate time for grass to be cut, but I'm not sure.

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  • I'd agree with both of your interpretations, though perhaps a farmer would be more knowledgeable.
    – Teacher KSHuang
    Jan 17, 2017 at 8:27
  • In the UK the stalks of corn ( wheat,barely, maize etc.) that are cut after harvesting are called straw. They are used as animal bedding, but not as animal feed. Hay refers to dried cut grass that is used for animal feed.
    – Sarriesfan
    Jan 17, 2017 at 9:27

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Speaking purely from a farming background here, rather then being able to cite anything to back my claims up...

Many think that hay is best made when the grass is thickest; and so they delay until it is rank and in flower, and has already heavily pulled the ground.

The weather in the UK and Ireland can be quite sporadic at best - it leaves very few windows of opportunity to harvest crops or hay. Hay in particular has to be cut, then turned and dried while laying on the ground in the sun (usually for a few days), before being baled (or in the days of Belloc, stacked into cocks of hay). The thicker the hay, the more fodder it provides for winter, hence farmers being reluctant to harvest too early. However, if left too long (particularly if it rains), the hay starts flowering and producing seed, gets heavy and soft, and sags toward the ground, making it very difficult to cut, particularly by hand. It's an educated guess here, but I imagine that he's talking about a situation such as this, where the hay is sagging, or pulling (towards) the ground.

The sickle and the scythe, as you've alluded to, would traditionally have been used for harvesting different types of crop. A scythe was used for cutting hay (and still is, in mountainous fields inaccessible to machinery). A sickle on the other hand, would have been used for harvesting other grains (though admittedly, the scythe took over this role with time).

we have rain always in South England between the sickle and the scythe

I would presume this to mean that rain is common in this part of the country between cutting the hay, and harvesting the crops.

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  • I think you mean, "before being baled."
    – Teacher KSHuang
    Jan 17, 2017 at 9:09
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    I do indeed (was rushing to get out of work) - thank you, and spelling updated.
    – mike
    Jan 17, 2017 at 9:21
  • Traditionally in Southern England Haymaking would be done in June around midsummer, and Harvest would start later in July and August. It's why the British state school system has a 6 week holiday from mid July to the end of August children could help with the harvest. In Kent there used to be an industry of poor Londoners going down to farms and helping the harvest, allowing the family to earn a little more money and get healthy fresh air at the same time.
    – Sarriesfan
    Jan 17, 2017 at 9:23
  • Your guess for the meaning of "pulling the ground" makes much more sense in context! When I thought it was about the roots, it seemed out of place because he's talking about cutting the grass, not pulling the grass.
    – Elisa Sinn
    Jan 17, 2017 at 12:37
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Grass is not only those green plants commonly found in fields and lawns. All the cereal plants (Corn, wheat, barley, oats, rice and millet) are grasses as well. And this sheds a different light on "we have rain always in South England between the sickle and the scythe".

Hay can be made from the stems of the cereal plants after the grain is harvested.

And how were cereals harvested in the days before the combine harvester? Farm hands went out with sickles, grasped the grain tops of the plants and cut them from the stem with the sickle.

Later on, to make hay, the remaining stems were cut down with the broader blade of the scythe.

So "between the sickle and the scythe" is the time between the harvesting of the grain and the cutting of the grass for hay.

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    In Britain straw is the term for the dried stem of crop plants such as corn ( which is used to mean wheat, barley, oats etc. ) Hay only refers to grass cut to be animal feed.
    – Sarriesfan
    Jan 17, 2017 at 9:13

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