94 AGRICULTURAL REPORT. [March, 



peat-bogs and low meadows, or the general improvement of 

 his arable lands, would often obtain a return of four times that 

 amount in their increased and improved production. 



I should regret, in this case, to be misunderstood. Agricul- 

 tural improvements may be divided into two classes, productive 

 and unproductive. With respect to the latter class, such as the 

 erection of buildings beyond the absolute needs of the farmer, 

 and of expensive and ornamental fences, where a plainer and 

 much cheaper erection would serve every purpose of enclosure 

 and protection, or any work of embellishment, they are only 

 eligible under peculiar circumstances. They may add sub- 

 stantially to the intrinsic value of the farm, and be strongly 

 commended where the rights of primogeniture and entail pre- 

 vailed, and the estate was likely to remain in the same family 

 through successive generations ; yet in the moderate circum- 

 stances in which most of our farmers are placed, and under the 

 rapid changes of property, which are continually goiug on 

 among us, they can hardly be advised. On the other hand, 

 where the means are ample, we hardly know a better appropri- 

 ation of money, within reasonable limits, than to the purposes 

 of rural embellishment ; or one more gratifying to a cultivated 

 and refined mind. But with respect to improvements, which 

 may be denominated productive, the propriety and expediency 

 of making such, resolve themselves entirely into a question of 

 pecuniary profit or loss. In ihis matter, then, the Massachu- 

 setts farmers have an important lesson to learn. They have 

 seldom, and in very infrequent instances, regarded agriculture 

 as a proper subject for the investment of capital ; but their great 

 object has been to keep down their agricultural expenditures 

 to the lowest scale. There are, indeed, some honorable excep- 

 tions. In my first report,* I referred to a case of this sort, re- 

 markable for the boldness and success of fhe enterprise, and es- 

 pecially as having been undertaken by a poor man, who had 

 to rely upon the credit of lii.s induslry and perseverance for the 



'' First Rnporl of llic- Agrirnllnro .'I ,Mas-:n(linseltS, p. 79. 



