264 OUR ENGLISH LAND MUDDLE. 



This criticism of the British land system 

 and attempt at analysis of the causes of British 

 land depression has now touched upon the 

 questions of closer settlement, of education, of 

 taxes, of tariffs, of agricultural loans, of trans- 

 port, and of land titles. But there yet remains 

 to be considered one other factor of great import- 

 ance in the problem of the land ; and that is 

 the drift, actuated by ennui, from the fields to 

 the cities which is observable in almost all 

 civilized countries. This is a matter not of 

 wages or of profits, but of social habits. It is 

 observable in countries where agriculture is a 

 prosperous industry, and where, notwithstanding, 

 the children of the farm tend to drift to the 

 cities, and sedulous care is needed on the part 

 of the State to keep a fresh flow of population 

 directed towards the country-side. 



It is a sign, perhaps, that our civilization is 

 growing old, this tendency, which is almost 

 universal in the older countries and in the 

 colonies of those countries, for the people to 

 prefer the crowded and feverish life of cities to 

 the calm and vacant life of the country-side. 

 Other civilizations were affected by it. In vain 



