AGRICULTURAL POPULATION. 59 



wigwam of a North American savage ; for there, at least, there 

 is a squaw to provide the food and look after the premises.* 

 The wages of a Scotch laborer are about 12 sterling per year, 

 and living as above ; and for a woman, as a field laborer, four 

 shillings sterling per week, or about eighty-eight cents, out of 

 which she provides for herself. 



The condition of labor forms, as is obvious, a most important 

 element in the agriculture of a country. Human labor, indeed, 

 seems far more essentially concerned in agriculture than in either 

 commerce or manufactures. A few hands may manage a large 

 ship, freighted with immense wealth, and performing voyages 

 which equal the circuit of the globe. A child may superintend 

 a large number of spindles ; and a single power wheel sets in 

 motion a vast and complicated machinery. Agriculture has 

 already derived vast benefits from mechanical ingenuity, and may 

 confidently anticipate from this source an immense extension of 

 her power ; but there can be no question that she must, at least 

 for a long time to come, continue mainly dependent upon human 

 labor. The cost of labor, therefore, and the general support arid 

 condition of this labor, are alike interesting to the agriculturist 

 and the philanthropist. 



In an old country like England, where labor is so abundant, it 

 is to be expected that the rules of labor should be exact and 

 stringent ; indeed, without this the management of a large farm 

 would be impracticable. The women usually begin work at eight 

 o clock, and, resting an hour for dinner, they work until five, or, 

 in a pressure of work, until six. The ploughman must feed and 

 clean his horses at four o clock in the morning, and at six o clock 

 the plough must be under way. At two o clock, his horses are 

 put up for the day, and he devotes himself until six o clock to 

 their cleansing and feeding, and to the care of his plough and 

 harness ; eight hours in the field, and the ploughing an acre of 



* Of the Bothie system, as it is called, or employment of unmarried men, 

 living together in a bothie or hovel attached to the steading, it is hardly neces 

 sary to say, that a more effective means of demoralizing and brutalizing a peas 

 antry could not be devised than that of crowding together a parcel of young 

 men, half of them perhaps strangers, Irish, or bad characters, in a hovel by them 

 selves, without even an attempt at moral superintendence. This is one of the 

 worst evils that has attended the introduction of the large farm system. 

 Luting s Prize Essay. 



