318 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Jan. 



This unusual and extraordinary growth which has thus 

 far attended American agriculture is due not only to the 

 diversity of our soil and climate, and the rapid increase 

 of our population, and the vast improvement of our agricul- 

 tural machinery, but to the independent ownership of laud 

 which characterizes American institutions. It were not easy 

 to tell the strength and stimulus which come through the 

 ownership of the soil to him who occupies it, has fixed his 

 home upon it, and looks to it for his means of subsistence. 

 The proportion of land-holders in this country to the aggre- 

 gate population is great and significant, especially when w^e 

 consider the reponsibilities resting upon them, and the oppor- 

 tunities which they possess. The increase in the number of 

 farms in the United States, during the twenty years between 

 1860 and 1880, is remarkable. The aggregate in the entire 

 country in 1860 was 2,044,077 ; in 188^3 it was 4,008,907. 



The increase by subdivision is largest in the cotton-grow- 

 ing States, wdiere the share-tenant system prevails. In 

 Texas the increase is by both subdivision and new land, the 

 area in farms having nearly doubled in ten years ; while in 

 Alabama the enlargement is only twenty-six per cent, though 

 the number of farms is doubled. The South Atlantic group 

 shows an increase of 12.14 per cent in lands, 72.3 per cent 

 in farms. But, notwithstanding the great division and sub- 

 division of land in the United States, under the customs of 

 the country and the law^s of inheritance, and the demands of 

 emigrants and settlers for government lands, in accordance 

 Avith the various provisions of Federal legislation, a distin- 

 guished English statesman and economist has discovered that 

 landlordism in America has "resulted in fixing on the free 

 soil of the United States a land s^^stem that belongs to the 

 era of barbarism ; " and that "the tendency to landlordism 

 in the United States is inevitable and immense." He declares 

 that statistics show that "the popular notion that the agri- 

 cultural classes of the United States own the soil they till to 

 be incorrect ; " and he adds, with the triumphant air of a 

 prophet of evil, that " the United States possesses a quarter 

 of a million more tenant-farmers paying rent to landlords 

 than the three kingdoms and the principality together." 



Confident that these startling statements will attract the 

 attention of every member of this Board wdio is a land-holder 



