george orwell tried his hand at hop-picking at blest's farm, somewhere near west malling, in september 1931, travelling down from london disguised as a tramp. he spent his time living in a hopper hut made of tin (corrugated iron), thus discovering that fruit and hop picking was not quite the idyllic life described by many scholars and writers of the time. orwell earned 9/- in a week, and observed that a family of gypsies who had picked every year since birth earned 14/- each. his account was published in "a clergyman's daughter" in 1935.