668 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Dec. 



and capable as they are, ■will be likely to take 

 one of those farewells which don't leave much 

 welfare behind them. 



Home Market. 



After giving some very " favorable statistics of 

 the agricultural productions of the State, and of 

 what legislation can and cannot do, Mr. Chamber- 

 lin proceeds : — 



What we want then is a home market — close 

 home. That more than anything else will ren- 

 der the pursuit of agriculture profitable and 

 popular. Then will follow — reacting and in- 

 teracting — improvements in culture ; higher 

 intelligence ; better manners ; better arts ; 

 and when the true ends are Realized, a happier 

 condition for society, and for the good and 

 glory of the State. 



Now there are some little matters of polit- 

 ical economy that we do not always think of 

 as we should. We talk about richness of soil, 

 and proclaim Thanksgivings for abundant har- 

 vests. But it requires something more than 

 both of these to make prosperity. Were it 

 not so you would not have seen the cotton 

 States on the verge of ruin from the super- 

 abundant crop of 1861, nor the luxuriant 

 West looking with soitow at her teeming fields 

 and reduced to the dire extremity of burning 

 her com for fuel, because if sent to its distant 

 and surfeited market the toll would take it all. 

 Abundant crops tend to lower prices, and in a 

 region purely agricultural the market is always 

 distant and sometimes overstocked, either of 

 which diminishes the profits, and both will 

 sometimes produce financial distress in the 

 midst of agricultural plenty. No such thing 

 could happen where there are varieties of in- 

 dustry. Good seasons will not glut the mar- 

 kets, nor will bad ones cause distress — for 

 prices will rise by a limited supply, and so the 

 farmer will be partly compensated for waste 

 of labor on spoiled fields. If half a crop 

 pays as much as a full one, there is no great 

 loss. Now take Massachusetts ; why with her 

 poorer soil and her half million less acres in 

 cultivation than ours, does she so surpass us 

 by millions of dollars in the value of her agri- 

 cultural products ? Because three quarters of 

 her working population are engaged in manu- 

 facture of some kind, leaving the farmers who 

 make up the other quarter to feed all the rest, 

 if they will. The great diversity of indus- 

 tries in that State requires a larger conssump- 

 tion than the local production. The home 

 market is greater than the home supply. This 

 makes the home producer master of the situa- 

 tion. It stimulates the farmer to devote him- 

 self to those specialties which are the most 

 profitable. He is near and can take his choice 

 of the market. He finds what he can raise 

 best and then makes the most of his ground. 

 Variety of Industries. 



It is this variety of industries which gives 

 the fanner precisely what he rt(iuires — a near, 

 flure and diversified marktt. The certainty, 



quickness and variety of his sales more than 

 make up for deficiencies of soil and season. 

 Ordinary sagacity and nioderate skill will be 

 able to seize upon the advantage, and turn to 

 account all the peculiar circumstances of the 

 situation. 



We see the advantage too, of keeping our 

 raw material as near home as possible, to be 

 wrought into fabrics here ; to give employ- 

 ment to all industries, to encourage native 

 talent and skill, and to attract a population of 

 diversified employment which is the very best 

 encouragement of Agriculture. It is better 

 to bring the market to your goods than carry 

 your goods to the market. 



It comes to this, then, that the farmer who 

 will benefit himself, must take an interest in 

 others. His prosperity lies in a broad and 

 generous recognition of the whole industrial 

 system of society. This is one of the ft!W 

 examples of that paradoxical maxim, "The 

 longest way round is the shortest way home." 

 Practice and Science. 



Along with all this, if not before it, must 

 go Intelligence. I should scarcely be par- 

 doned for intimating in such a presence that 

 we need to grow in knowledge. But I ven- 

 ture to say it. Whether it comes from books, 

 from tradition, or from experience, isn't of so 

 much account. If a man only knows, for ex • 

 ample, that to raise grain successfully, he must 

 also raise clover and peas and crops of that 

 kind and keep them on his farm and give them 

 back with their rich freight of nitrogen to feed 

 his grain field, it is no matter whether he 

 learned it from his grandfather or the school 

 mistress, or hit upon it himself. Bat that is 

 one of the things he ought to know — the very 

 philosopher's stone of Agriculture — the al- 

 chemy which turns all base things to gold. 

 So if he understands that by a judicious tillage 

 and skilful application of dressings, he may 

 loosen from the very granite rich elements of 

 food, and draw from the air, and sun, and 

 ram, and snow the choicest fertilizers, I can 

 have patience with him, if he can't express the 

 whole process in the barbarous hieroglyphics 

 of chemistry. But he had better study a Clii- 

 nese chemistry than not to know these things 

 at all. 



It won't do always to pride ourselves too 

 much on experience. This is wh;it oonii' times 

 makes a man set in his way, when owing to 

 changed circumstances it is no longer the best 

 way. Unless it is intelligent — that is. unless it is 

 based on the thorough cognizance of the im- 

 mediate matter in hand and surrounding cir- 

 cumstances which effect it, — a too stiff reli- 

 ance on experience may possibly mislead. All 

 that experience tells us surely is what has been 

 — we argue from it less surely as to what shall 

 be. And then we want to be certain that we 

 know all the necessary conditions; otherwise 

 our conclusions may be false. 



Changes are taking place on our farms 

 which we are not apt to discover, or take into 



