FARMS. 2 



Zi 



might, in the future, find abundant subsistence within our 

 borders ; in other words, that by such production we arc depriv- 

 ing tlie soil of its ability to support millions in the future, to 

 increase the needless wealth of a few thousands who live in the 

 present. If the destruction of the goose that laid the golden 

 egg was not consummate wisdom, this is most egregious folly. 



It is useless to say that diminished fertility need not nccessa- 

 sarily follow increased production. We admit that it need not, 

 and we claim that it should not. But that it does is undenia- 

 ble, and hence the necessity for a radical change in our system 

 of agriculture. 



When the time comes, as come it will, if the present system 

 is continued, that our once fertile soil shall prove incapable of 

 sustaining its own population, the truth, now dimly discerned 

 by few, will become apparent to all, that men armed with 

 swords and spears are not the only men who ravage the earth, 

 but that even ploughshares and pruning hooks may be made 

 implements of spoil. 



The spoliation system of farming has its adherents among 

 Plymouth County farmers, some of whom profess to have no 

 higher aim than to make their farms serve their purposes 

 during their life or their occupancy. " Shall I not do what I 

 will with mine own ? " is their verbal or mental response to any 

 suggestion that such a system is not only unprofitable to them- 

 selves, but an infraction of the rights of others. 



The civil law, in most cases of limited tenancy, guards care- 

 fully against strip or waste by the tenant. But the possession 

 of an absolute title to land is deemed sufficient to authorize 

 strip, waste or destruction to any extent. And yet a title in 

 fee simple gives at the best but a life estate to the holder, with 

 a restricted power to direct its descent. Descend it must, 

 either by or without his direction, to succeeding generations, 

 whose claims for subsistence will be equally valid with his own. 

 Possibly the functions of the law are sufficiently extended in 

 protecting those who live in the present, without aiming at 

 protection for those who are to live in the future. Certain it 

 is that he who has no higher rule of action, in the treatment of 

 his land, or his domestic animals, than merely to avoid the lia- 

 bilities or penalties imposed by the civil or criminal law, is far 

 from being a model farmer, or an exemplary citizen. 



