[- 1477 J 
and if the farmer takes one branch of the active 
labour upon himfelf, the other branches are fuffér- 
ing for want of his fuperintending eye; and a farm 
of this kind furnifhes very little employ for his wife 
and daughters. ) 
* The great object of confolidating farms, is an 
increafe of rent; but it may be laid down as a cer~ 
tain maxim, that fuch increafe cannot be obtained, 
except where a decreafe of ufelefs hands, and par- 
ticularly of ufelefs horfes, can be made by fuch 
confolidation. 
In this diftria, the confolidation of {mall eftates 
has tended very much to reduce the number of 
horfes;* and it is chiefly by this reduction, that a 
fall eftate is frequently worth more to be added 
to a farm, than occupied feparately. But there 
muft be a period in the fize of farms, at which this 
advantage muf{t end; and beyond which, a farm 
may be too big to be managed properly or profitably. 
The fize of a Wiltfhire farm fhould be, there- 
fore, fuch as the mafter’s eye, and one principal fer- 
* As proofs of the reduction of horfes by confolidating fimall 
farms, the parifh of Monkton-Deverill, which contains 8 yard- 
ands, or {mall eftates, of 4ol. a year each, was occupied, 50 years 
ago, by 7 farmers, who kept 29 horfes. It is now in 4 hands, and 
‘managed with 19 horfes; and the adjoining parifh of Brixton- 
Deverill, which, 50 years ago, was in 6 hands, and employed 43 
horfes, is now in 3 hands, and employs only 26 horfes; and the fize 
of the horfes is very little increafed fince the former period. 
VOL. VII. N vant 
