306 EUROPEAN AGRICULTURE. 



1. FORMS OF BUSINESS IN SMITHFIELD. It is not here, as it is 

 with us, that a drover goes through the country collecting, on his 

 route, cattle from the different farmers, as he may chance to find 

 them ; but usually the farmer himself sends them to Smithfield. 

 where they are put for sale into the hands of an accredited agent, 

 whose commission for sale is established and understood. This 

 commission is not a percentage upon the amount of sale, but so 

 much per head. These, of course, are persons well known, and 

 whose shrewdness and skill are undoubted. In the most extensive 

 transactions of buying and selling, no paper is passed ; but the 

 price of the stock on sale being inquired, if the bargain is struck, 

 the buyer and seller merely touch each other s hand, and there is 

 no retraction. It is highly creditable to the commercial charac 

 ter of the country, and to the general integrity which prevails 

 among the persons concerned in this great market, that, as I am 

 informed by an individual familiar for years with the most ex 

 tensive transactions in this place, a failure to fulfil these engage 

 ments, though no paper is passed between the parties, is of very 

 rare occurrence. 



In the sale of sheep and cattle, the business is always trans 

 acted through an accredited and established salesman, who has 

 his regular commissions upon every animal sold. The sales are 

 always for cash, unless the salesman himself chooses to assume 

 the responsibility of giving credit, and there are always banking 

 houses in the vicinity to render the usual facilities for business. 



The customary commission for the sale of an ox of any value 

 is four shillings, or about ninety-six cents ; of a sheep eight 

 pence or sixteen cents. The city receives a toll, upon every 

 beast exposed to sale in Smithfield, of one penny per head, and 

 upon sheep at the rate of one shilling or twenty-four cents per 

 score. 



The value of the services of an intelligent, experienced, and 

 honest salesman, is very great to the farmer, and much beyond 

 the compensation ordinarily demanded. He is familiar with the 

 state of the market, with the supply to be expected, with the 

 prices generally taken, and with the characters of the persons 

 with whom he has to deal, who know him as well. The 

 farmer, going into the market to sell his cattle for himself, is 

 liable to various impositions, of the extraordinary ingenuity and 

 coolness of which, many experiments will not be necessary to 



