62 FURTHER IMPROVEMENT 



2. J^ot to keep more cattle than the crops of the farm 

 will feed and fatten , and than may be made profitable to 

 the owner. 



CHAPTER VIII. 



FURTHER IMPROVEMENT OF THE SOIL. 



We have seen, in the preceding chapters, what must 

 be apparent to every intelligent observer, that the improve- 

 ment of the soil by the first settlers, has generally ter- 

 minated in clearing up the land, and in rendering it sub- 

 servient to their personal and immediate wants ; and that 

 the further progress in its cultivation, has been rather to 

 wear it out, and exhaust its fertility, without attempting 

 to husband, or even to develope all its resources of wealth. 

 We have said, that under a better, a more modern sys- 

 tem of husbandry, a considerable portion of our lands, 

 hitherto unproductive, may be rendered of great value ; 

 that the fertility of the soil may be kept up in lands already 

 subjected to culture — and, where they have been empov- 

 erished by severe cropping, that they may be renovated, 

 and may be made to produce as much and more than 

 ever. This better, or more modern system of husbandry, 

 of which we speak, is new only comparatively, and the term 

 new is used in contradistinction to the old system, which 

 is generally adopted in the first settlement of a country, 

 in some degree as a matter of necessity ; but which, being 

 once established, has been too often persisted in till it has 

 empoverished most of the old-settled districts upon our 

 Atlantic border, and is already causing indications of 

 premature exhaustion and poverty in some districts of 

 the west. This deterioration particularly happens in 

 countries like our own, where new and virgin soils are 

 constantly inviting to emigration. What we denominate 

 the new system of husbandry has long been in operation 

 in the valley of the Po, in Italy, and in Flanders ; for 

 the last hal/ century it has been gaining strength in Great 



