On the Size of Farms. 3 



in proportion to their importance, at a cheaper rate, than on a small 

 one. For instance, where a large flock of sheep is kept, or a num- 

 ber of cattle, careful and intelligent servants may be hired for attend- 

 ing them, which no farmer on a small scale can afford. A large far- 

 mer can also sell at market, in the same space of time, ten times 

 the number of cattle or sheep, or ten times the quantity of grain, that 

 nny small farmer can have to dispose of; and in general, has better 

 information regarding the state of the markets. 15. The large far- 

 mer, possessed of all these advantages, in addition to his superior capi- 

 tal and credit, can generally afford to pay a higher rent, with more 

 punctuality, than the small farmer ; from whom the rent which he 

 agreed to pay, cannot often be exacted without compulsion. 16. The 

 large farmer pays more taxes to Government for his house, windows, 

 and horses, and for every article of his consumption. Indeed, small 

 farmers, whose rents were under L.50 a year, were considered by Par- 

 liament, and justly too, to be in so humble and poor a state, that they 

 were not made liable to the payment of the income or property tax ; 

 and if all the farms in the kingdom had been under that amount, 

 Government would not have received a single shilling from the occu- 

 piers of land, on account of that tax. 1 7. Large farms, in the occu- 

 pation of wealthy renters, are a species of magazines or repositories, 

 kept for the use of the public, but without any of those mischiefs 

 which would attend them if they were a public concern *. In the 

 last place, respectable farmers are a most important link in the great 

 chain of society, rarely to be found in any country, Great Britain ex- 

 cepted ; a class of individuals, whose habits of industry, intelligence, 

 and spirit, and the extent of whose capital, which it has required cen- 

 turies to accumulate, form a species of bulwark, materially tending to 

 preserve the existing order of society ; but if that bulwark were once 

 laid prostrate, it would baffle human policy, without the existence of 

 similar circumstances, ever to renew it f . 



Dr Rigby, in his Report of the Husbandry of Holkham, after ob- 

 serving that some of Mr Coke's tenants occupy not less than 1200 

 acres of arable land, maintains, that such large farms, will always have 

 the advantage, in productive and profitable cultivation, over small ones, 

 as larue manufactories, and extensive mercantile establishments, with 

 large capitals, will be superior, in relative profit, to those, which are 

 carried on with more limited capitals, and on a smaller scale J. He 

 adds, that the improvements which are acknowledged to have taken 

 place in agriculture, are unquestionably to be dated from the time 

 when the land began to be cultivated by individuals, on an extensive 

 scale. 



Mr Blaikie likewise remarks, that where the system of folding 

 sheep on turnips is practised, large farms are indispensable. That 

 excellent system is necessary, for maintaining fight arable land, in 



* Gloucestershire Report, p. 54. 

 f Husbandry of Scotland, vol. ii. p. 150. 

 j Dr Rigby's Report, p. 116. 



That system is very different from the plan of folding sheep from upland 



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