AGRICULTURE ON THE RHINE. 169 



world arc taxed to furnish a bill of fare for ten tables 

 d'iiote, that may be safely called the best furnished, and 

 the cheapest dinners in Europe, the said peasant burgesses 

 are sitting down to their homely meal, at which tlie rye- 

 bread figures that has grown upon their land, been carted 

 by their horses, and ground at one of the eleven privileged 

 mills of the district, little supposing that his outlay for 

 food is not much less than that of his more travelled guest 

 at the Rose, or the Four Seasons. Yet this is un- 

 doubtedly the case, and not only at Wiesbaden, but over 

 the greater part of Germany, as a result of the distance 

 at which the lands lie from the houses of the peasantry. 

 There happens in most parts to be land enough; and 

 where the population is most dense, the climate multiplies 

 its powers. Thus the pressure of actual want is rarely 

 felt by the present number of inhabitants ; but how much 

 capital that ought to accumulate is wasted, how much 

 labour that might be advantageously employed in other 

 ways is lost in this most expensive system of agriculture ! 

 The face of the country round Wiesbaden presents a 

 fair picture of the vast extent of level land that stretches 

 from the Taunus eastward, to the Spessart, Oden, and 

 Blackforest mountains ; and to the south as far as Breisach, 

 comprising the valleys of the Lower Maine, and one-half 

 of the vale of the Upper Rhine. The soil is alluvial 

 throughout, and of varying but nowhere of less than 

 average fertility. Between Wiesbaden and the rise of 

 the Spessart beyond Hanau, the soil is especially suited 

 for wheat, and the dryness of the ground that is un- 

 favourable for meadowing on the heights, admits of the 

 cultivation of artificial gri>.sses. This last branch of farm- 

 ing is here well understood by every peasant, even by 



