73 FACT AGAINST FICTION. 



^^ pick-mc-iip," leaviiii^ notliino: for cultivation 

 that is to come. 



I deny that the crops we now see are in any 

 degree heavier, on an average, than those grown 

 by our forefathers under the wheels of their 

 heavy dung-carts, before ^' science," as it is called, 

 had taken the i)lace of well-tried system, and 

 ushered in novelties the success or failures of 

 which no man at the moment knows. It is 

 doubtful to my mind if we have not imported 

 or locally created some of the diseases which had 

 never been lieard of, and were certainly not 

 known, in the United Kingdom when I was a 

 boy. I allude to the ^^ potato disease," to the 

 ^^foot-and-mouth disease," and to the ^^ plague 

 among cattle." Set these new inflictions side by 

 side witli the effects of what is called ^' science," 

 and look at the condition of the farmer and of 

 tlie people, and I question if the world is better 

 off under our l)latant teacliers and would-be 

 scientific men of tlie present day, than it was 

 when agricultural practice kept at arm's-length 

 vain theory and conceited assumptions tliat only 

 tended to disturb the matter-of-fact study of single- 

 purposed men. 



