196 STATE OF AGRICULTURE, 



cause in retarding the progress of agriculture in this 

 country than any we have hitherto mentioned, is to 

 be found in the too great diffusion of agricuUural capi- 

 tal and labor ; or. in other words, we cultivate too 

 much land to tiave what we pretend to do well done. 

 The desire of great farms is a distinguishing trait of 

 the American farmer. As fast as he acquires capital, 

 he spends it in purchasing more land. When there is 

 no longer any adjoining him to be purchased, he goes 

 to the wide west, and expends his hundreds or thou- 

 sands in buying prairie sections, or " corner lots " in 

 some of the multitude of cities there are promised in 

 that broad region : he may be making money by this 

 process : he may be acquiring wealth for his children 

 to differ about ; but, nine times out of ten, his system 

 of agriculture is barbarous, his method of living scan- 

 dalous, and his farm is the very reverse of neatness and 

 order. We cannot expect that a man will spend his 

 capital in beautifying and putting his farm in order, — 

 in planting, and draining, and repairing, — when such 

 expenditures will not repay him more than seven per 

 cent. ; when, by purchasing more or new lands, there 

 is a probability that thirty or fifty may be realized. It 

 requires too great an etfort of self-denial to see our 

 neighbors enlarging their domains to the size of a 

 German principality, while we are expected to be con- 

 tent with some two or four hundred acres. We have, 

 as a body of farmers, yet to learn that the products of 

 a small farm, in proportion to the capital invested, are 

 usually greater than on large farms. We have yet to 

 acquire a taste for small, neat, well-finished and well- 

 furnished houses, in preference to the enormous " shin- 

 gle palaces " which we take such a delight in erecting ; 

 and when shall we learn that a few acres, well fenced, 

 kept clean of foul weeds, and growing richer and more 

 productive yearly, is better than many acres with the 

 fences rotted or thrown down, the fields and the crops 

 choked with pernicious weeds, and the soil, from the 



