£2 ON IMFROV£M£NTS IN AGRICUIiTURE. 



This is an important question, to which we can give only an imperfest 

 and somewhat unsatisfactory answer. 



The superficial area of Great Britain comprises about 57 millions of 

 acres, of which 34 millions are in cultivation, about 13 millions are in- 

 capable of culture, and the remaining 10 millions are waste lands suscep- 

 tible of improvement. The present population, therefore, is supported 

 by the produce of 34 millions of acres, or every 34 acres raises food for 

 about 20 people. Suppose the 10 millions of acres which are suscepti- 

 ble of improvement to be brought into such a stale of culture as to 

 maintain an equal proportion — the most favourable supposition — they 

 would raise food for an additional population of about 6 millions, or 

 would keep Great Britain independent of any large and constant foreign 

 supply till the number of its inhabitants amounted to 26 millions. 

 But at the present rate of increase this will take place in about 20 

 years,* so that by 1860, unless some general improvement take place 

 in the agriculture of the country, the demands of the population will 

 have completely overtaken the productive powers of the land. 



But though we cannot say how far the fertility of the soil may be in- 

 creased, or how long it may be able to keep a-head of the growing 

 numbers of the people, we have our own past experience, the example 

 of other countries, and the indications of theory, all concurring to per- 

 suade us that the limit of its productive powers can neither be predicted 

 nor foreseen. 



If we glance at the history of British agriculture during the last half 

 century — from the introduction of the green crop system or the alternate 

 iusbandry from Flanders into Norfolk, up to the present time — we find 

 the results of each successive improvement more remarkable than the 

 former. The use of lime, a more general drainage of the soil, the in- 

 vention of improved ploughs and other agricultural implements, as well 

 as the introduction of better and more economical modes of using them, 

 the application of bone manure, and more recently of thorough draining 

 and subsoil ploughing, have all tended not only to the raising of crops 

 at a less cost, but in far greater abundance, and on spots which our 

 forefathers considered wholly unfit for the growth of corn. 



The result of each new improvement, I have said, has seemed more 

 astonishing than the former. For after a waste piece of land has been 

 brought into an average state of productiveness, we are not prepared for 

 any great improvement upon it by new labours; nor could we readily 

 believe that, half a century after such land had been in culture, its pro- 

 duce or its value should at once be doubled, by a better draining, a 

 deeper ploughing, or by sprinkling on its surface a small quantity of a 

 saline substance imported from a foreign country. 



Yet the example of the Chinese shows us that the productive powers 

 of the soil are not to be easily estimated. Nothing repays the labours 

 of the husbandman more fully than the willing soil — nothing is more 

 grateful for his attention, or offers surer rewards to patient industry, or 

 to renewed attempts at improvement. 



In China we see a people whom we call semi-barbarians, multiply- 

 ing within their own limits till their numbers are almost incredible? 



• For more precise data and calculations see Porter't Progress of the Nation. 



