6€ N. H. STATE AGEICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



ing is annual, but the mildness of climate, wliicli renders 

 the cultivation of perennials practicable, facilitates the 

 labor of agriculture, by allowing them to be continued 

 through the year, instead of being crowded, as they are 

 "with us, into the compass of little more than a season, and 

 at the same time, it increases the rewards of industry by 

 admitting a succession of crops wliich makes the whole 

 year a perpetual harvest. In the same countries the ab- 

 sence or rarity of frost both exempts the people from the 

 expensive and laborious necessity of providing a large 

 supply of fuel, and permits the growth of pasture-grasses 

 through the winter, whereby the cost and toil of securing 

 and feeding out a stock of hay or other winter fodder is 

 in a great measure avoided. Other circumstartces which 

 tend to lessen both the labors and the anxieties of rural 

 life in rude climates are the slowness of vegetation, and 

 the general dryness of summer and harvest time. Where 

 the changes in the condition of the crops are very gradual 

 and the weather almost certainly fine, agriculture has few 

 critical periods, and those occasions so common with us^ 

 where an unavoidable delay of a day or two involves or 



hazards the sacrifice of a crop, are of rare occurrence in 

 southern Europe. 



In provinces devoted especially to the growth of the 

 mulberry afid the rearing of the silk-worm, there is an ex- 

 ception to this remark founded however not so much on the 

 uncertainty of the weather, as on the necessities and the 

 habits of the animal. Through the feedins: season which 

 lasts from about the middle of April to the end of June, 

 the whole rural population, old and young, is absorbed ia 

 this single occupation, which requires little outlay of phys- 

 ical strength, but makes very large demands on the intelli- 

 gence and watchfulness of the laborers. " During this 

 period," says a French writer," all other labors cease. 

 " We neither Iniy nor sell. Legal proceedings are sus- 

 " pcndcd. Everything is adjourned which can possibly be 



