AGKICULTUKE. 129 



can enter upon a farm without possessing fully as much 

 capital to work it, as he could buy an estate of as many acres 

 for in Sweden. And does he suppose that such a man would 

 invest so large an amount of capital, if he were only allowed 

 to hold his land as a tenant-at-will ? But let us hear what 

 " Sam Slick/' the American, says on this subject, and it is 

 not very likely, much as he advocates the use of "soft 

 sawder " when selling his clocks, that he will flatter the 

 English. Sam observes, in his pithy style : 



' ( Yes, too much land is the ruin of us all on this side of 

 the water. Afore I went to England I used to think that 

 the unequal divisions of property there, and the system of 

 landlord and tenant, was a curse to the country, and that 

 there was more dignity and freedom to the individual, and 

 more benefit to the nation, for every man to own the land he 

 cultivated, as with us. But I've changed my mind. I see 

 it's the cause of the high state of cultivation in England and 

 the prosperity of its agriculture. If the great men had the 

 land in their own hands, then every now and then an im- 

 provident man would skin the soil and run it out. Being 

 let to others, he can't do it himself, and he takes plaguy 

 good care by his lease, that his tenant shan't do it either. 

 Well then, there he is, with his capital to make great im- 

 provements, substantial repairs, and so on, and things are 

 pushed up to perfection. 



(f In Nova Scotia there are hundreds and thousands who 

 would be better off as tenants, if they would but only think 

 so. When a chap spends all his money in buying lands, and 

 mortgages them to pay the rest of the price, he ain't able to 

 stock his farm and work it properly, and he labours like a 

 nigger all his life, and dies poor at last, while the land gets 

 run out in his hands, and is no good for ever after. Now, 

 if he was to hire the farm, the money that he paid for the 

 purchase would stock it complete,, enable him to hire labour, 

 to wait for markets, to buy up cattle cheap, and sell them to 

 advantage. He'd make money hand over hand, while he'd 

 throw the cost of all repairs and improvements on the owner. 

 But you might talk till you were grey-headed, and you 



