426 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Sept. 



For the New England Farmei , 



EURAL ECONOMY OE THE BEITISH 

 ISLES-No. 17. 



FRANCE. 



It may make the views developed in these num- 

 bers still clearer, if Ave compare the agriculture of 

 France, in a few particulars, with that of England. 



France is one of the finest countries in the 

 world. Its soil and climate are both superior to 

 those of England. This is the testimony of Arthur 

 Young, and of all observers. Take the thirty-six 

 departments which are grouped around Paris, and 

 you find in them forty millions of acres, which sur- 

 pass in quality, as they do in extent, the twenty- 

 six millions of English acres. You find scarcely 

 any mountains, few natural marshes, extensive 

 olains, sound almost throughout, a soil sufficiently 

 deep, and of a nature most suitable for production, 

 rich deposits in the broad valleys of the Seine and 

 the Loire, and their tributaries, a climate not so 

 moist but warmer than that of England, less favor- 

 able, perhaps, to meadow vegetation, but more suit- 

 able for ripening wheat and other grains ; all the 

 products of England, obtained with less trouble, 

 and in addition other valuable products, such as 

 sugar, tobacco, wine, fruits, textile and oleaginous 

 plants. It would be easy to carry out, step by 

 step, the comparison between France and England, 

 and the result would show the marked superiority 

 of the French soil ; that there are no lands so bad, 

 in France, for which worse may not be found in 

 England, nor so rich in England, which may not 

 be equalled or even surpassed, in France. 



The French landscape is peculiar and character- 

 istic. The country is comparatively level, and 

 fences almost unknown. Here and there is a 

 chateau, or large farm-house, with its appendages, i 

 But the common or laboring people live chiefly in 

 villages, scattered about like islands over the face of 

 the country, with the spire of the church over-top- 1 

 ping the cluster of houses. These villages, with a 

 paved street running through them, more resemble 

 compact towns, than th'ey do our country villages, i 

 While the EngHsh farmers,with Protestant indepen-| 

 deuce, live in their soUlary and remote farm-houses ; ' 

 the French country people congregate in these com- j 

 pact villages, for social enjoyment, and to celebrate i 

 the rites and festivals of the Catholic church, going 

 every morning a good distance to their field la- 

 bors. 



The French farmer is of a happier temperament 

 than the English, but less energetic, and self-sus- 

 tained and persistent; he is more economical, and 

 will live well on a smaller income than the English 

 farmer. The love of a country life is not part of 

 the nature of a Frencliman, as it is of an English- 

 man ; if he prospers and wishes to play a part, his 

 heart turns more towards P.iris than to his estate. 

 France, too, has been a country of conscriptions, of 

 war, of revolution, sometimes of anarchv, twice of 

 invacions, never of liberty. The elements of socie- 

 ty are volcanic, and political shocks, at intervals 

 not infrequent, scatter and waste the accumulations 

 of capital, and impede the national progress in ag- 

 riculture, as in all arts. 



But let us leave these details, and compare, first, 

 the sheep husbandry of the two countries. The 

 whole British Islands contain sixty-two millions of 

 acres, and support thirty-five millions of sheep; 

 v,'hile Fran"" contains one hundred and six millions 



of acres, and supports the same number. In pro- 

 portion to its acres, France should support sixty 

 millions of sheep. But the difference between the 

 two countries becomes more striking, if we com- 

 pare France with England proper, which has thir- 

 ty millions of sheep, on thirty millions of acres, or 

 one sheep to each acre. France, on the other 

 hand, devotes three acres to one sheep — so that 

 England proper, in the proportion of acres, has 

 three times as many sheep as France. 



All that France has done, in the last eighty 

 years, to improve the race of sheep, may be summed 

 up almost entirely in the statement, that France 

 has introduced the Merinos from Spain ; she has 

 not improved her breeds nor developed their size 

 and weight. France has made the wool of its 

 sheep the primary object, and not meat. Eng- 

 land, on the other hand, has made meat the prin- 

 cipal product of her flocks, and wool the accessa- 

 ry product. The sheep of England average, in net 

 weight of meat, 80 pounds each ; those of France 

 40 pounds each. Of her flock, England slaughters 

 annually, ten millions; the sheep of France not be- 

 ing precocious, France slaughters annually eight 

 millions. England obtains from her flock eiglit 

 hundred millions of pounds of meat, annually; 

 France, from her flock, three hundred and twenty 

 millions of pounds. The weight of wool on the 

 EngHsh sheep, from their size, is greater than on 

 French sheej) ; but the quality of French wool is 

 superior to that of English wool. Therefore, the 

 product of wool from the flocks of the two coun- 

 tries may be called equal, in value ; though the 

 English think they have an advantage in this re- 

 spect, of twelve or fifteen per cent. Inasmuch, as 

 England feeds three sheep on the number of acres 

 on which France feeds one, and as the produce of 

 English sheep is more than double that of French 

 sheep, the conclusion to which we are brought, in 

 regard to the sheep husbandry of the two coun- 

 tries is, that the return of an English sheep farm is 

 six times greater than that of a French one. 



Compare the agriculture of the two countries, in 

 respect to cows and their produce. France pos- 

 sesses four millions of cows, and Great Britain 

 three millions. The French work their cows, and 

 inure them to labor, whereby they become a strong 

 and hardy race, and, in consequence of want of 

 care, bad food and labor, lose their milking quali- 

 ties. Three-fourths of the French cows are not 

 really milch cows, which all the English are. Ob- 

 serving Frenchmen are of the opinion that the 

 United Kingdom milks from its three millions Oi 

 cows, double the quantity of milk, which France 

 does from her four millions. Owing to the num 

 ber of manufacturing towns and cities with which 

 England is crowded, the English farmer sells his 

 milk at four cents a quart, while the price of milk 

 in France is two cents a quart. It is supposed, 

 therefore, that while the French farmers realize 

 twenty millions of dollars, annually, as the produce 

 of four millions of cows, the English farmers realize 

 eighty millions of dollars, as the product of three 

 millions. 



Of cattle. Great Britain supports eight million 

 head, of the most improved breeds, never worked, 

 perfect animals, fed and developed so as to yield 

 the greatest weight of butchers' meat, at the earli- 

 est age, and killed at the precise period when the 

 animals have reached maximum growth. France 

 supports ten million head of unimproved breeds, 



