BRITISH AND FRENCH AGRICULTURE. 163 



merits of Cote-d'Or, Meurthe-et-Moselle, and Nord. 

 Tobacco is cultivated more or less in twenty-four depart- 

 ments, but chiefly in four contiguous departments of the 

 South-west — Dordogne, Lot et Garonne, Lot, Gironde — 

 in Isere, in Pas de Calais, and in the island of Corsica. 

 Vines, although, of course, mainly to be found in the South, 

 are more widely grown than is sometimes supposed ; 

 practically every department, except those actually 

 bordering on the English Channel, having a certain acreage. 



The extension or contraction of the acreage under one 

 or two of the principal crops common to both countries is 

 concisely indicated by the following figures. 



The years 1882 and 1892 are taken as those for which 

 the results of the decennial agricultural inquiry in France 

 are available. The results of that taken in 1902 are not 

 yet published, but the latest figures, as issued by the 

 Minister for Agriculture, may be adopted. It should be 

 noted that wheat in France includes spelt. 



If the latest figures (those of 1904) for the United 

 Kingdom were taken, they would show a somewhat 

 different comparison. They stand : Wheat, 1,407,618 

 acres ; barley, 2,002,854 acres ; oats, 4,351,183 acres ; 

 potatoes, 1,200,419 acres. In any case the salient point 

 of this comparison is the relative change in the wheat area 

 of the two countries. In both there has been a decline ; 



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