62 FROM A NK\V ENGLAND HILLSIDE. 



and here, at least, the bitter winds of a week 

 ago found few victims. 



As I tramped across the fields this after 

 noon and looked at the evidences of the 

 patient toil that had been spent in prepar 

 ing them for the production of the scanty 

 crops which can now be wrung from them, 

 I wished that some of our closet philan 

 thropists who are very wise upon the sub 

 ject of taxes in books and speeches and 

 who talk glibly on the relation of land and 

 improvements and the unearned increment, 

 would just once in awhile take to the coun 

 try and look at the thing itself. (I am sure 

 that I am talking quite correctly, and in the 

 true orthodox philosophical fashion, when 

 I say &quot;das ding an sich.&quot;) Here island 

 which, with the buildings upon it, might 

 bring in the market perhaps fifteen dollars 

 per acre. To say that labour to the extent 

 of fifty dollars per acre had been expended 

 upon it to fit it for the pasturage or other ser 

 vice that is now obtained from it, in clear 

 ing it of trees and shrubs, in removing and 

 piling up the stones in long walls and heaps, 

 or in digging great holes and trenches in 

 which to bury them which is, I find, a 

 favourite way here of getting rid of them 

 would be to make a very modest statement. 



