1859. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



53 



of labor which is noAV employed in cultivating 

 one acre. If the moral education and physical 

 improvement of laboring men were to be the 

 effects of this new system of farming, there 

 would be reason for rejoicing over the prospect 

 of the change. But no such happy results would 

 spring from it ; laboring men, instead of being 

 elevated into lords, would be degraded into mere 

 machines. 



Men are too prone to base their theories of 

 human progress on the assumption that labor 

 is a curse, and not, as it is undoubtedly, when it 

 is free and justly rewarded — a blessing. But la- 

 bor ceases to be free, in the highest sense, when 

 the laborers are under the control and in the 

 power of mammoth associations. Labor then 

 becomes servitude, which is closely allied to sla- 

 very. No one would say, that under the present 

 circumstances of the country, the operatives in 

 our manufactories, however well paid, are as free 

 as our farmers, masons and carpenters. It should 

 be remarked, also, that when labor is performed 

 by powerful machines, man becomes a slave to 

 the machinery ; when, on the other hand, \\\.i im- 

 plements in use are small, the machinery is the 

 servant of man. The production may be great- 

 er in the former case ; but the health and free- 

 dom of the masses are sacrificed to obtain it. 

 The object of the statesman and the philanthro- 

 pist should be to make the people free, virtuous 

 and happy ; and any increase of the wealth of the 

 nation which must be obtained at the expense of 

 the moral and physical welfare of the people, is 

 not to be desired. 



But it may be asked by some jealous friend of 

 "progress," if it is right to refuse to agriculture 

 those aids which have built up our manufac- 

 tures ? I would answer that we should refuse to 

 agriculture any aid which is not beneficial to the 

 agriculturist — for the farmer is of more impor- 

 tance than his crops. Let us not improve agri- 

 culture by any such means as will degrade man. 

 If we could double the agricultural produce of 

 the whole country at the present cost, by a sys- 

 tem which would destroy the independence of 

 our farmers, we should turn all our forces against 

 it, as against the invasion of a foreign army. 



In order to illustrate the consequences of this 

 sort of "progress," we will apply it to an imag- 

 ined case. We will suppose, for example, that in 

 some indefinite period of the future, when steam- 

 farming by associated capital has become nearly 

 universal, there remains, in a certain part of the 

 country, one of those farming villages which are 

 now so common in our happy land. The far- 

 mers in this place are intelligent working-men, 

 and small land-proprietors, who have but little 

 capital except their lands and stock, and support 

 themselves by ind-astry and honest trade. After 

 steam-plows, steam-rakes, steam mowing-ma- 

 chines, and other magnificent improvements con- 

 nected with them, have swept over the country, 

 they have arrived at last, at this antiquated vil- 

 lage, where labor is free, and where the farmers 

 are so old-fashioned and behind the times, as to 

 own the lands they till, and carry on farming as 

 we carry it on in the present barbarous age of 

 political and social equality. 



These industrious farmers have ascertained now 

 by bitter experience, that by the use of hand im- 

 plements and horse and cattle power, in the op- 



erations of the farm, they cannot compete Avith 

 the great agricultural corporations, which by 

 means of steam-power can produce at an expense 

 of ten dollars, results which they could not pro- 

 duce at an expense of less than one hundred. 

 The agent of a new company, chartered with ten 

 millions of capital, offers to these unhappy men 

 a price for their farms, which, through exceed- 

 ingly low, is such as under their present circum- 

 stances they feel obliged to accept, especially as 

 a promise accompanies the offer, to employ them 

 as laborers on the soil, under the direction of the 

 officers of the company. The majority consent 

 to the sale, and the remainder are obliged to 

 consent by a law of the legislature placing it in 

 the power of corporations "established for the 

 jmblic good" as it is now in the power of rail- 

 road corporations, to seize upon a refractory in- 

 dividual's land and estate, after paying him what a 

 body of commissioners deem an equivalent for 

 the property seized. These mammoth agricul- 

 tural corporations, by means of bribery and po- 

 litical manieuvreing, would easily obtain suffi- 

 cient influence over legislative bodies to cause 

 the enactment of such a law. This any one will 

 believe who has had any political experience, 

 and who knows how easily the worst measures 

 may be carried by making them party tests. 



Let us now examine the consequences in de- 

 tail, after this little village of happy and inde- 

 pendent laborers has been converted into a mam- 

 moth farm, owned by a company, and carried on 

 by steam-power. At the commencement all the 

 pleasant old farm-houses are removed, because 

 they stand in the way of tillage, which is per- 

 formed as much as possible in large, undivided 

 lots. All fences and boundaries, except those 

 by the roadside, are for the sam.e reason taken 

 down, to open many small fields into one. It 

 has been ascertained, by experience, that no 

 single field can be worked with the best advan- 

 tage, unless it contains at least five hundred 

 acres. If it contain a thousand, it is still better, 

 since the larger the field, the more conveniently 

 can it be worked by steam. Hence the prelimi- 

 naries for steam-farming are necessarily a work 

 of devastation. Many delightful groups of trees 

 and shrubbery, some that skirted a winding brook, 

 others that bordered the walls and fences, includ- 

 ing many standard oaks and maples, are swept 

 to the ground, rooted up by some giant infernal 

 machine, as easily as a farmer pulls up weeds. 

 All abruptly swelling ridges and other eminen- 

 ces — the charm of many a landscape — some of 

 them beautifully crowned with trees and shrubs, 

 and others velveted with green herbage, and 

 forming numerous little valleys, now smiling in 

 sunshine, and then sweetly sleeping under the 

 summer shadows of trees, where the flocks 

 found a comfortable resort in all weathers, are 

 now graded into one vast level. 



The brooks are conducted into canals, and 

 carried along in straight courses for the conve- 

 nience of labor and the purposes of irrigation ; 

 for it is necessary that their circuities should not 

 interfere Avith the progress of the steam-plow. 

 In fine, that pleasing variety of surface Avhich 

 beautified the landscape, when it was in posses- 

 sion of the original inhabitants ; those quiet rus- 

 tic lanes fringed with wild roses, hawthorns and 

 viburnums, conducting from the dwelling-hous- 



