And while in more rigorous climates, with a soil requiring 

 skill and labor to compel the harvest, the art assumes a 

 higher character, agriculture under apparently more propitious 

 circumstances, continues to retain its simplest and rudest forms : 

 as, however, the gifts of Providence, though varied, are not 

 probably so unequal as they may appear, it may well be 

 questioned, whether if in the life and energy imparted to the frame 

 by the bracing airs of apparently less favored climes, in the vigor 

 of body and activity of mind, leading to the development of 

 both, even under the condition of necessity for constant labor, a 

 compensation is not found, for the soft airs and glowing suns 

 of the tropics, with their enervating influences upon both body 

 and mind, inducing to sensual indulgence or dreamy indolence, 

 although with what appears an object of exemption from 

 the effect of the stern decree : — " In the sweat of thy face shalt 

 thou eat bread." 



Another cause that operates, to a not inconsiderable degree, 

 upon the character of the agriculture of a country, is its 

 territorial extent when compared with its population. When 

 population is limited, with vast tracts of unoccupied land, the 

 cultivation of the occupied part will be more superficial and 

 less thorough, than in countries with a population approaching 

 their capacity of maintenance, because such will be most 

 profitable. Neither in such will any endeavor be made to 

 prevent exhaustion ; for while new lands can be drained for 

 perhaps a nominal consideration, when one field becomes 

 impoverished, another will be resorted to, and the more 

 expensive processes of husbandry must be neglected. 



But when the population is dense, and land on that account 

 limited in quantity and valuable, then the endeavor will be to 

 obtain the greatest amount of produce from the smallest quantity 

 of land. And all the appliances of science and art will be 

 appropriated to its improvement in fertility. It may peihaps be 

 a question, but one of which the consideration is not now called 

 for, whether v.hat is gained in one direction by an improved 



