LIVE STOCK. 331 



hundred and twenty pounds of butter and two hundred pounds, 

 as the annual produce of a cow, or between three hundred 

 pounds of new milk cheese and five or six hundred, is of easy 

 calculation. In the attempts to improve our cultivation, to in 

 crease our products, and to produce the best, we shall not always 

 succeed ; and when we have done all we can, we may fail from 

 causes wholly inscrutable ; but we must continually try for suc 

 cess, for we are certain not to succeed unless we do try. 



I have never considered farming, under any circumstances, as a 

 source of extraordinary profits, or the means of rapid accumula 

 tion ; but, under good management, it presents, ordinarily, the 

 means of fair, reasonable, and honest gains. It is a hard case, 

 when, to an industrious and frugal man, it becomes, as it may, a 

 losing concern. Dr. Franklin, with his usual shrewdness, has 

 said, that the thermometer, by which to judge of a man s feel 

 ings or enjoyment, is his pocket. When that is empty, the mer 

 cury goes down below &quot; zero.&quot; With railway speculators, stock 

 brokers, land-jobbers, and all that class, it may often go up to 

 boiling heat ; and in as many instances, it may be found frozen 

 in the bulb. Such extremes disturb all comfort ; they always 

 endanger morals ; they too often lay waste the human heart, 

 stripping it of its best affections, and make shipwreck of life. 

 With the farmers, at least, I should be glad always to find it, at 

 &quot; temperate.&quot; As a means of health, as a source of rational, and 

 delightful, and innocent occupation, as a branch of high intel 

 lectual philosophy and study, an enlightened and improved ag 

 riculture may commend itself to many thoughtful, and virtuous, 

 and well-governed minds ; but to the great mass, in order to 

 stimulate their exertions, and to satisfy purposes which are not 

 unreasonable, it must be a means of comfortable subsistence and 

 profit ; and it can only be made so by adopting, pursuing, and, 

 if possible, enlarging by science, experience, inquiry, and prac 

 tice, the great improvements which have already been made in 

 this first and best kind of human effort. 



3. SHEEP. In importance, sheep occupy a high place among 

 the live stock of Great Britain. It would not be easy to make a 

 just comparison between the amount of wool and mutton pro 

 duced and the product of the dairy or the stall ; but the num 

 ber of sheep in Great Britain is very great. The wool finds a 



