STATE OF AGRICULTURE IN EUROPE. 23 



made by the Abbe D'Expillyt and others, it appears 

 that in 1777 the agriculture of France was not only 

 sufficient for the subsistence of its inhabitants, but 

 produced a surplus for exportation ;* and though it 

 be universally admitted that her condition in this 

 respect is not less prosperous now than it was then^ 

 still it cannot be dissembled that her husbandry has 

 many defects : 



1. A supposed resemblance between the earth 

 and animals gave rise to fallows : because men and 

 horses required repose after labour, it was supposed 

 that, after cropping, the earth also required it. Faith- 

 ful to this absurd analogy, the French landlord binds 

 down his tenant by lease not to crop the soil more 

 than three years out of four ; which, in effect, is to 

 consign to barrenness or weeds one fourth of the 

 whole arable land of France yearly ! 



2. There is not a sufficiently fixed or steady pro- 

 portion between arable and pasture land. The pro- 

 duction of grain is the great object of culture, often 

 with too little regard to the nature of the soil, 

 and generally without any to its improvements. 

 " Where pasturage is scanty, where natural mead- 

 ows are bad, where artificial are rare, and root hus- 

 bandry little extended, cattle cannot be either nu- 

 merous or well-conditioned ; and as without these 



* The products of agricultural labour were, in these tables, 

 stated at 114,552,000 L. T. Those of manufacturing labour at 

 128,015,000. 



t The effects of the revolution of 1789 on agriculture are no 

 longer doubtful. The suppression of tithes, of the exclusive 

 privilege, of the chase, of every species of corvee (labour perform- 

 ed by tenants for landlords), of taxes or rents, and of rights of 

 commonage, was among these effects ; and if to these we add the 

 division of the great landed estates of the nobility and clergy, there 

 can no longer be any skepticism on this point. No truth is bet- 

 ter established than the advantage of small farms over great, so 

 far as the public is concerned. The Roman latifundia (military 

 grants) destroyed Roman agriculture. 



