100 years ago: A touch of green on the lower plough-field

Originally published in the Manchester Guardian on 2 December 1916Surrey, November 30
A night frost made everything appear in the early morning as though it had been covered with a light fall of very fine snow. But when this melted with a slight shift of wind a touch of green came across one of the lower plough-fields. It is not a large stretch of land ­– the farmer calls it “a patch of corn,” – harrowed and sown, broadcast by hand while the surface was rather soft fo