AGRICULTURAL DISCONTENT 703 



what it is to have enough of even the bare necessities of hfe, and 

 the yearly income of each member of the nation is but two pounds, 

 while in England it is thirty-three. Again, when serfdom was 

 abolished in Prussia in 1807, the agriculture of the country was 

 so inefficient that seven-eighths of the people thus engaged were 

 able to produce only a very inadequate food supply. " By the 

 year 1867 the agricultural population . . . had fallen to forty- 

 eight per cent ; and thirty-nine persons more than in 18 16, out of 

 every one hundred, were thus set free from the fields to take part 

 in those industries which contribute to clothe and shelter a popu- 

 lation or minister to its higher wants." Yet the allowance of food 

 that fell to each was not only one-third greater in quantity, but 

 better in quality than in the wretched days of serfdom. It is well 

 known, also, that in the days of slavery in the South a very small 

 portion of the people were subject to the conditions of city life. 

 The industrial organization which rested upon slavery made the 

 factory system impossible, and agriculture was inefficient, slovenly, 

 and wasteful in the extreme. One qualified to speak has said : 



Main strength, human muscle, unassisted by intelligent skill, was slavery's 

 method of labor. With a capital of about sixty dollars in the shape of a good- 

 natured old ox, attached to the end of a stout rope, New Bedford, Massachu- 

 setts, did the work of ten or twelve thousand dollars, represented in the bones 

 and muscles of slaves, and did it far better. In a word, I found everything 

 managed with a more scrupulous regard to economy, both of men and things, 

 time and strength, than in the country from which I had come. 



Further, " prices of grain, meat, etc., are invariably lower in 

 countries where the bulk of the people are engaged in agriculture 

 than in those which are given chiefly to manufactures. On the other 

 hand, all manufactured products are cheaper in countries where 

 agriculture is of little importance." From the point of view of civi- 

 lization, also, those nations having the smallest percentage of city 

 dwellers can hardly be classed in the first rank. Compare Russia, 

 for example, with England, or Turkey with the United States. 



The conclusion to be drawn from these facts is clear. The 

 inference that the growth of cities in the United States is con- 

 clusive evidence of a less profitable condition of agriculture than 

 formerly existed, or that it points to the economic decline of the 



