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INTRODUCTION. 



No surer test of the degree of agricultural advancement of a 

 country can be found than the relative acreage of land laid down 

 to grass and devoted to tillage. Wherever the grass is most abund- 

 ant there is the highest farming. This statement is most strikingly 

 established by comparing the agricultural systems of France and 

 England. In France 53 per cent of the tillable land is annually 

 sown in some kind of grain, while in England the grain-bearing 

 per cent of land is only 25. On the other hand, while France has 

 ' but 22 per cent in grass, England has 50. Notwithstanding this 

 os difference in the amount of land devoted to grain, the yield of 

 g wheat to each inhabitant is almost identical in the two countries 

 "' Every acre of grain land in England receives, on an average, the 

 manure from the animals fed off three acres of grass. In France, 

 J on the contrary, the manure made from each acre of grass has to 

 $ be spread over two and a half acres of grain. In other words, 

 o each acre of grain in England gets nine loads of manure to one 

 load given to the acre in France. 



A further comparison would show that the acknowledged supe- 

 6 riority of English cattle, sheep and other domestic animals, over 

 ^ those of France, or any other country for that matter, is due more 

 8 to the superiority in quality and quantity of the meadows and pas- 

 tures of that wonderful island than to anything else. If we turn 

 5 our attention to other countries we shall find that the amount and 

 3 character of grasses grown may always be taken as a measure of 

 ' the degree of advancement to which their agriculture has reached. 

 It must be borne in mind that this statement holds good only of 

 the cultivated grasses, but of these it is perhaps universally true. 



Under this test the agricultural system of Tennessee falls very 

 low. It is a notable fact, often observed and commented upon, 



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