TILE DRAINAGE. 53 



possible, and was gradually realized ; while, even with the 

 greatly increased ratio of food consumption, seven or eight 

 acres of land sufficed for the support of each inhabitant. 

 That is the ratio in Ohio to-day, where we have 88 persons 

 to the square mile, or one to each 7i acres. Carnivorous ani- 

 mals, that once destroyed the meat supply, and were of no 

 real use themselves to man, are themselves destroyed ; and 

 the short -horn beef, fed 011 purely vegetable food, and 

 weighing' 1800 Ibs. at three years old, is raised on the product 

 of as few acres as the fox or wolf that weighed a few pounds. 

 Meat became far more abundant per acre, and even per capi- 

 ta; and the vegetable, cereal, and fruit supply became 

 almost infinitely better and more abundant, both by the 

 development of better and more prolific varieties, and the 

 invention of machinery for their tillage and harvest. 



The highest stage is that of horticulture garden culture ; 

 that is, of intensive agriculture, with small farms tilled like 

 gardens, as in Holland and Belgium, where nearly all the 

 land is thoroughly cultivated in rotation, with the careful 

 saving of all manure, where human food is less of meat and 

 more of fish, fruit, vegetables, and dairy products, and where 

 (Belgium) there are 497 people to the square mile, and about 

 an acre and a quarter feeds, clothes, and shelters each inhab- 

 itant. 



This very rapid general survey, which might be greatly 

 widened in scope and filled out in detail, seems to show that 

 the position assumed in Chapter II. is a tenable and true 

 one; viz., that tillage of the soil does pay better, and sup- 

 port a larger population than exclusive animal industry, graz- 

 ing in summer and feeding in winter, with little or no tillage. 

 Nature pays for the increased labor put upon the soil. 

 If any doubt still exists, we may dispel it by comparing 

 those parts of Ohio, for example, where we once had dairy- 

 ing as an almost exclusive specialty, with no plowing and no 

 raising of grain, even for flour for the family or feed for the 

 live stock,^with those other regions where the thorough till- 



