nr 



FARMERS' REGISTER— BREEDING CATTLE. 



knovvledp;e of tliat niOst imi)ortant operation, over 

 l)im who has not himself stood lietween tlie stilts ; 

 and it is earnestly to he recommended, that- every 

 youth who is destined to a farming: life should per 

 sonally assist in all the labors of the field, as the 

 surest means of enabling him to direct them here- 

 after with effect; but nothinii' can be more errone- 

 ous than the supposition that the continuance of the 

 toil is necessary to success. Formerly, indeed, 

 when husbandry was confined to one dull round of 

 (lrud<;ery, and when farms were generally so 

 small, that t!)e profit depended as much upon the 

 personal lalior as the capacity of the tenant, it 

 might be true : but since the introduction of the 

 ):»resent improved modes of cultivation, the more 

 systematic attention to live stock, and the enlarged 

 size of farms; since, in fact, agriculture has be- 

 come a science, rather than a mere meclianic art, 

 Ihe time of a man who occcupies sufficient land to 

 employ only a few laborers, would lie ill bestowed 

 on manual "toil. The axiom is not, indeed, always 

 applied in its literal sense; butthen it is construed 

 to mean, that no man can hope to become a good 

 farmer, who has not been bred to the business. 

 Undoul)tedly personal experience is necessaiy : but 

 it may be acquired at much less expense of time 

 and money than is commonly imagined, by any 

 man who will seduously devote h.is powers of re- 

 flection to the principles, and his attention to the 

 details of flirming operations, with a firm resolu- 

 tion neither to relax in his exertions, nor to suffer 

 himself to be daunted by disappointment in the 

 commencement of his career. Such a man will be 

 sure to succeed ; and, as encouragement to perse- 

 verance, he may bear in mind, that many of the 

 most eminent agriculturists, and those w ho have 

 introduced the most important iniprovcments in 

 rural economy, were not orignally tiirmers 



Jethro Tull, the fiUher of the 'drill husbandry, 

 was bred to the law ; but having a small estate in 

 Berkshire, he afterwards devoted himself to its 

 cultivation. He was unsuccessful as a farmer, and 

 he indubitably carried his tiieory respecting the 

 continued growth of corn, without the intervention 

 of fallows or green crops, too far. But the merit 

 of his system of tillage, and especially that of horse- 

 hoeing, on those soils to which it is applicable, has 

 nevertheless been generally admittecl, although it 

 was at first deemed visionary, and thirty years 

 elapsed before if attracted practical attention. The 

 original invention of the thrashing machine is also 

 due to a lawyer — M r. Men/.ies, a Scotch advocate : 

 we owe the introduction of mangel wurtzel to Dr. 

 Lettsom; and the recent notice of florin to Dr. 

 Richardson. 



Both the late Arthur Young, and Marshall, 

 whose writings have contritiuted so much to the 

 diffusion of agricultural knowledge, were brought 

 up to commerce; and it was not until the latter 

 had attained to a mature period ol life?, that he 

 turned his attention to the plough- lie then, w ilh 

 little other previous preparation than what he had 

 acquired from reading, enfered^upon a farm within 

 ten miles of London, of three hundred acres of 

 mixed soil, and which had been greatly misman- 

 aged. This, for one so unpractised, was an ardu- 

 ous undertaking; yet within three months he dis- 

 charged his bailiff, and became his own manager. 

 The consequence, as niight be expected, was, that 

 he at first committed some blunders; but at the 

 end of three years, he published his " Minutes of 



y/gi~iciiltiire," containing the memoranda of his 

 operations from 1774 to 1777, which, although not 

 free from error, yet show, that he had even then 

 attained to a greater proficiency than most of his 

 contemporaries : but, to use his own language, 

 " attendance and attention will make any man a 

 farmer.'^* 



The notion that farming is unprofitable to any 

 other than " regular-bred farmers," has been 

 strengthened by numerous examples of persons 

 who embarked in it during the late war, without 

 any previous experience, or any other incentive 

 than an expectation, encouraged by the high prices 

 of the day and the exaggerated representations of 

 some agricultural writers, that it would prove an 

 advantageous speculation. Impressed with that 

 idea, they gave exorbitant rents for land ; their 

 stock was purchased at an equally extravagant 

 rate; and when the markets declined, they incur- 

 red enormous loss. The publication on the agri- 

 cultural state of the kingdom in 1816, drawn up 

 from the replies to a circular letter on the subject 

 by the Board of Agriculture, teems with accounts 

 of farms thrown up in every county; and, in 

 many cases, the stock and crops were sold at less 

 than half their original cost. 



To these instances are to be added those, con- 

 stantly recurring, of men in easy circumstances, 

 who, without any knowledge of either the theory 

 or practice of husbandry, engage in it merely for 

 amusement, and not condescending to stoop to the 

 details, are exposed to numberless impositions of 

 their tradesmen and servants. They pay higher 

 wages, and obtain low er prices, than their neigh- 

 bors; they grow large crops, but at an expense 

 that the sale will not repay; and, retiring at length 

 in disgust, they declare fiirming to be " a losing 

 concern ;" but without acknowledging that it only 

 became so through their own improvidence. 



That such failures, however, do not always occur, 

 we have the evidence of a very competent judge, 

 who, alluding to persons who, having been in other 

 line's of business* yet having a strong inclination 

 (or rural occupation, had betaken themselves to 

 farming as a profession, says—" this class forms 

 the most intelligent and accurate of husbandmen. 

 Like converts in religion, they have more zeal, 

 give more application, in short, have fewer preju- 

 dices to surmount, and more enthusiasm for their 

 new profession, than those who have been brought 

 up in it from their infancy. They are, however^! 

 at the first outset, more liable to error or mistake, 

 from the want of practice; but their indefatigable 

 attention makes more tlian amends for their igno- 

 rance of the minutiae of the art ; and as they have 

 been at some pains to acquire a knowledge in the 

 theorv of agriculture, and hence established their 

 ideas'on rational principles, they most commonly 

 in the end make a distinguished ap|)earance, as 

 their labors, if judiciously performed, though often 

 in a new and experimental channel, seldom fail of 

 being crowned with success."! He adds, that one 

 of the best farmers in the county of Middlesex was 

 a retired tailor. 



That farming, when properly attended to, is not 

 unproductive even to gentlemen who cannot them- 

 selves superintend all its details, we may appeal to 



+ Digest of the Minutes, 4to , p. 63. 

 t Middleion's View of the Agriculture of Middlesex, 

 2d Edit., p. 59. 



