412 A GR1CUL TURE. 



mended to the farmer, by some authors. " Nature," says Varro, 

 " has pointed out to us two paths, which lead to the knowledge 

 of agriculture ; viz. : experience and imitation. The ancient 

 husbandmen, by making experiments, have established many 

 maxims. Their posterity, for the most part, imitate them. We 

 ought to do both, imitate others and make experiments our- 

 selves, not directed by chance, but by reason." 



The topics of produce and profit in agriculture are very diffi- 

 cult to be discussed satisfactorily. In manufactures, the raw 

 material is purchased for a certain sum, and the manipulations 

 given by the manufacturer can be accurately calculated ; but in 

 farming, though we know the rent of the land and the price of 

 the seed-grain, which may be considered the raw materials, yet 

 the quantity of labor required to bring forth the produce depends 

 so much on seasons, accidents, and other circumstances, to 

 which agriculture is more liable than any other art, that its value 

 or cost price cannot be easily determined. It is a common 

 mode to estimate the profits of farming by the numerical returns 

 of the seed sown. But this is a most fallacious ground of judg- 

 ment, since the quantity of seed given to lands of different 

 qualities and of different conditions is very different ; and the 

 acre which, being highly cultivated and sown with only a bushel 

 of seed, returns forty for one, may yield no more profit than that 

 which, being in a middling condition, requires four bushels of 

 seed, and yields only ten for one. The returns of the seed 

 sown, mentioned by the ancients, are very remarkable. We 

 have noticed Isaac's sowing and reaping at Gerar, where he re- 

 ceived a hundred for one. In St. Mark's gospel, good seed sown 

 upon good ground is said to bring forth in some places thirty, 

 in others forty, in others sixty, and in others even an hundred 

 fold. " A hundred fold," Varro informs us, " was reaped about 

 Garada, in Syria, and Byzacium, in Africa." Pliny adds, that, 

 from this last place, there were sent to Augustus, by his factor, 

 nearly four hundred stalks, all from one grain ; and to Nero 

 three hundred and forty stalks. He says that he has " seen the 

 soil of this field, which, when dry, the stoutest oxen cannot plow, 

 but after rain I have seen it opened up by a share, drawn by a 

 wretched ass on one side and an old woman on the other." 



The returns in Italy were less extraordinary. Varro says : 



