84 AGRICULTURAL SURVEY OF chap* ?. 



Besides, we find that there is a great diversi- 

 ty among men, in respect of abilities and cir- 

 cumstances : it seems proper, therefore, that 

 the division and size of iarms should be propor- 

 tioned, in a correspondence to this diversity. A 

 man may be able to stock a farm of 80 or 100 

 acres, but not one of 300 or 400. Or, in point 

 of ability, he may be equal to the task of ma- 

 naging the former, and yet not qualified to con- 

 duct the more extensive and complicated opera- 

 tions of the latter. On the other hand, it 

 would be hard to confine a man of large stock, 

 and superior abilities, to a small possession, 

 where he can have no scope for his genius, 

 and where he cannot employ half his capital. 



A mixture of large and small farms appears, 

 in another point of view, to be extremely pro- 

 per, as it may be the mean of preventing a dan- 

 gerous diminution of active and experienced 

 hands for carrying on the operations of husban- 

 dry. Every gentleman-farmer has usually a 

 foreman, to whom he commits the manage- 

 ment of his farm : and almost every great farm- 

 er has one, either as a foreman or principal ser- 

 vant, on whose abilities and fidelity- he can 

 trust for conducting the practical part of his bu- 

 siness. If this foreman be married, as is often 

 the case, the prospect of being able to secure a 

 small farm for his son, if he has one, and to 

 stock it, by the savings of his honest industry, 

 will be a powerful inducement to breed him a 

 farmer. "Nor will this motive influence those 

 merely who are already engaged in the farming 

 line. The consideration of such a decent inde- 

 pendence, so easily accessible, will induce others 



