t 363 ] 



539. The single-crop system, however remunerative at 

 first, is bound to end in failure sooner or later: - (i) Competi- 

 tion brings down prices, increases wages and diminishes 

 profit. (2) The land gets exhausted for this special crop. 

 (3) Special insect and fungus parasites accumulate. (4) The 

 proprietor or the manager understanding only the handing 

 of this special crop thoroughly, sticks to it to the very last and 

 is unable to take to anything else for want of experience and 

 for fear of losing more, until the crop fails entirely. 



540. Middle-class men going in for farming should go in 

 for mixed cropping, which gives rest to land if a judicious sys- 

 tem of rotation is adopted. They should not say, "We will 

 go in for dairying, or for tea, or, vanilla, or coffee, or banana, 

 or sugarcane, or rice". They should go in for as many 

 things as have a good local sale. They must proceed tenta- 

 tively, i. <?., at first grow only such things as they can consume 

 at home i.e., what they require for the consumption of the mem- 

 bers of their family, for their servants and their farm animals. 

 That is the market ready for them. Then they can extend the 

 cultivation of any thing that they find they can grow particu- 

 larly well on their land, or which suits their tastes and fancy 

 best. If they come to find, that cows are doing very well under 

 their management, that they understand them, and that they 

 would like to keep more of them, they must give dairying some 

 prominence, and begin selling milk and butter and bullocks 

 and bulls. If they find goat-breeding does well and that 

 they would like keeping more goats, they should extend 

 this branch of their farming, though at first they should keep 

 only just as many goats as they require for supplying 

 meat to their family and perhaps some of their neighbours. 

 In this way they should advance from supplying the needs 

 of their own family, to supplying the needs of their friends 

 and neighbours, and then supplying the general market. 

 It is easier and more lucrative to create a special market for 

 produce which shows any speciality. 



