28 



of hose, scatters the fragrant spray over every rod of the 

 ground ? 



Undoubtedly the science and the art of agriculture are 

 largely indebted for their present advanced condition to the 

 liberal and skillful farming of the English nobility and gen- 

 try — to their ample domains and their abundant resources. 

 Let them have all the credit they deserve. But even this 

 unquestioned good may be bought too dear. If agricultural 

 improvement can be expected only where the land belongs 

 to a small and powerful ai'istocracy — and if such an arrange- 

 ment involves — (as in England it certainly does seem to in- 

 volve) — the degradation of the masses — then I think we 

 should say — let improvement take care of itself. Surely it 

 is far better that we should get a smaller yield of grass and 

 ruta-bagas, than that man should wither and decay. 



But though we have conceded something to the British 

 argument — let it not be supposed that we give up the whole 

 ground — or that we despair of all progress and improvement 

 in agriculture, because our farms and our pecuniary resources 

 are of so limited extent. On the contrary, there has been, as 

 you know, a substantial advance, in our American agriculture, 

 and the signs of a still more auspicious era for the farmer, 

 multiply and brighten on every hand. Meanwhile our gen- 

 erous and well-wishing brethren across the water will, of 

 course, continue their magnificent and praise- worthy opera- 

 tions, not, we trust, without an occasional thrill of disinter- 

 ested pleasure in the thought, that the class of small farmers 

 in other lands (a class, by the way, which outnumbers them, a 

 thousand to one) though unable to add anything of conse- 

 quence to the sum of agricultural knowledge and skill, can 

 yet avail themselves of what others are doing, and are not 

 likely either to starve or to freeze, so long as England is there 

 to show them how to raise wheat, and turnips, and wool.* 



*JouN Stuart Mill in his chapters on Peasant Proprietors (Political 

 Economy, Vol. I. Book II. 7, 8) gives many facts of great interest and value 

 in regard to the condition and character of the small land-owners in Nor- 



