r 254 ] 



portion of fervants, maids, and boys, that 

 imaller ones do. Their fuperiority in po- 

 pulation lies totally in labourers ; indeed it 

 would be ufelefs and impoflible for them 

 to keep the proportion of fervants of 

 fmall farmers ; their houfes would not con- 

 tain them. Now it is not the employ- 

 ment of fingle hands that promotes popu- 

 lation, but that of men who have families; 

 and this circumftance muft operate ftrongly, 

 in giving fo great a fuperiority to large 

 farms. The variation from thefe rules, 

 between, under, and over three hundred 

 acres, is not great ; nor can any remark be 

 totally unexceptionable. 



We may draw from thefe tables this 

 general corollary, which will ftate the cafe 

 m the cleareft manner: 



That the farms moft. advantageous to 

 population, without exceptions, are 

 thofe from five hundred acres up- 

 wards; and of fuch, thofe above a 

 thoufand acres are the fuperior; thofe 

 under five hundred acres much in- 

 ferior. 



I doubt not but you will allow me to 

 add upon this conclufion, that the vulgar 

 ideas, of great farms depopulating the 

 kingdom, are here proved, from fadts, to 

 be falfe; and not from one or two in- 



fUnces, 



