258 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER, 



PEBRUART 33. 18 7. 



stronger is the necessity for their reduction to the 

 best possibl:^ niethort and order ; and the less 

 chance there is for a division of labor, the more 

 regularity should there he in the order in which 

 its details are committed to the hands of the Oji- 

 erator. 



The ado]ition of system in husbandry is apt to 

 induce that minute attention and close observation 

 on which its success so much depends. Every 

 thing in its turn and degree will then receive the 

 care and attention which are its due. The profits 

 of nearly all business are made up from small 

 gains and savings, the fruits at once of frugality 

 and vigilance. These are the life blood of agri- 

 culture. If they arc wasted, its vigor soon feels 

 the decay ; its resources become exhausted ; the 

 means of improved and extended cultivation fail ; 

 industry seems fruitless; labor finds only half its 

 return ; the farmer has reached tho meridian of 

 his years ; independence and ease still lie at a 

 distance before him ; he sees the infirmities of age 

 waiting to beset him on the way ; he loses the 

 animation of hope and sinks into the perplexed 

 and negligent husbandman. Such doubtless is 

 the history of many a farm and many a farmer 

 who need.jd nothmg but a systematic beginning 

 to have brought the one early to fertility, and the 

 other to independence. 



The pro|ier size of farms has been the subject 

 of much discussion. The opinion that in New 

 England they are too large, seems to be very uni- 

 form. The fact thus indicateil cannot but be 

 greatly prejudicial to the interests of agriculture : 

 and the evil would certainly be reformed if the 

 business should be subjected to more accurate 

 calculation. Should a merchant plan his vessel 

 so large, and exhaust so much of his resources on 

 the hull, that he could furnish her with no more 

 sails and rigging than were suited to a nuich smal- 

 ler vessel, could only half fill her with freight, and 

 must then send her to sea half victualled and half 

 manned ; or if we should see a whale ship with all 

 her appointments sent on a voyage for mackerel, 

 it would need no argument to convince us of the 

 folly of the projectors. But do not these instan- 

 ces fairly illustrate the conduct of the farmer who 

 persists in holding an extent of land under the 

 forms of cultivatiori, over which he may indeed 

 make his annual pilgrimages in careful search after 

 the scanty and timid crops; around and about 

 which the fences are attenuated and stretched un- 

 til their existence becomes a problem, and whose 

 whole culture, with whatever industry it may be 

 prosecuted by its owner and such aid as his nar- 

 row means enable him t« obtain, is hut a manifes- 

 tation of the willingness of the spirit and the 

 weakness of the flesh ? Land and wealth are of- 

 ten associated in idta, and it is overlooketf^that 

 land is only the means of wealth when it is made 

 the source of rent, or when it is made productive. 

 If more is held than is made profitable by its an- 

 nual rent or produce, the interest of its cost, its 

 fencing and the taxes upon it are charges upon 

 the farmer; and the price paid for it is so much 

 deducted from the amount of money that he might 

 otherwise employ in the superior cultivation and 

 improvement of a smaller farm. 



Some of the considerations that should deter- 

 mine the size of the farm are very obvious. Jt 

 should bear a just proportion to the means of cul- 

 tivation that will be possessed.* The owner 



*In Scotland, the expenditures and proceeds of farma 



should be able to extend to every aire of it that 

 degree of cultivation which subjects the soil com- 

 pletely to the purposes of man. Over his terri- 

 tory he should no where hold a dividend empire 

 with bushes, with exhaustion, unruly cattle, or 

 mortgages It should not be so large as to re- 

 quire more experience and skill than the owner 

 will possess for its management, and its extent 

 should not be such that its proper conduct will 

 involve more business, and require more calcula- 

 tion than the talents and capacity of the proprie- 

 tor can accomplish. Its size should in all respects 

 be so inuch within his circumstances that it should 

 in some degree impose upon him the necessity of 

 a thorough cultivation. It should be such that he 

 may not look for sustenance from the merely nat- 

 ural growth of the surface, but it should be such 

 that he may feel the necessity for using some la- 

 bor, and some art to increase the powers of pro- 

 duction. The chief idea of agriculture in the 

 Netherlands, where it is canied to so great per- 

 fection is, " to make the farm as nearly resemble 

 a garden as possible." Tiie adoption of a princi- 

 ple like this at the first setting out, leads them to 

 undertake the culture of small estates only. They 

 have learned from experience, that ten acres im-, 

 der a good cultivation are worth more than forty 

 underone that is deficient. The consequence has 

 been that such is the skill with which farmers 

 cultivate even a bad soil, that they compel it to 

 return them a produce which the strongest and 

 richest lands of the neighboring province of Hol- 

 land refuse to yield to a less judicious manage- 

 ment. 



Few subjects require more accurate calculation 

 than those which belong tfi the economy of agri- 

 culture. The readers of fhe New England Far- 

 mer, and there are probab^ Cew members of this 

 Society, who do not cotne within that description, 

 will recollect a paragraph contained in that jjaper 

 a few weeks since, stating the result of a calcula- 

 tion that had been made between haviiig bars, or 

 a gate for our inclosure, by which it was proved 

 that if the bars were to be taken down once a day 

 for one year, the diflerence in time would pay for 

 three gates. This is a specimen of the computa- 

 tions that are to be made under this head. They 

 are not questions of mere curiosity, but they re- 

 sult in realities of profit or loss. Suppose also 

 the instance of a plough : it will last several years, 

 but it is of inferior construction, will not do good 

 work, and requires the application of more strength 

 than another that might he obtained. Shall he 

 continue to use it, or shall it bo disposed of at any 

 sacrifice .' Without a knowledge of the structiue 

 of ploughs, and without a practiced judgment, the 

 farmer may never discovor its defects, or should 

 he make the discovery and attempt an exchange, 

 he may obtain another just as defective. With- 



are reduced lo great cerlainly. In a species of banks, 

 combining the capacities of banks for circulation and 

 for savings, cash credits are advanced to the farmers up- 

 on the understanding that all the receipts from the farm 

 are to be immediately paid into the bank. There is a 

 difference of one per cent, interest between advances 

 and deposites, in favor of the bank. Ry means of ilie 

 accounts thus kept in the bank, the farmer and his cred- 

 itor are kept accurately informed of the condition and 

 prospects of the farm. In this is seen what may be ac- 

 complished by calculations and accounts which doubt- 

 less the farmsr who values his independence will prefer 

 to make and keep for himself 



out information, he will not know the latest im- 

 provements. In order to decide correctly, he 

 should understand precisely the defects of the old 

 implement, what change in its construction would 

 adapt it to his own land, and the comparative ad- 

 vantages of a new one, and the expense of an ex- 

 change. If he means to conduct his business with 

 certainty, he will make these calcidations, and not 

 leave the result to time and chance ; to the time 

 when by chance he may bargain with a neighbor 

 for a plough still worse perhaps than his own, Or 

 until it is worn out ; ami to the chance that it may 

 require extra labor eipial to the whole amount of 

 what would otherwise have been his clear profits, 

 — and effecting in the end a diminution of his 

 property to many times its vijlue. The maniifac- 

 tuier rejects, without a moment's hesitation, ma- 

 chinery found to be defective, and supplies its 

 place by the best that can be fabrictited. 



Such are a few of the instances which may il- 

 lustrate the necessity for the co-operation of unnd 

 and body in the conduct of a farm. That the 

 mind is strengthened by exercise, and that when- 

 ever it may be exercised, it may distinguish itself 

 by superiorstrength and information, are positions 

 too plain to admit of proof or illustration. The 

 earth yields or withholds her fruits, makes them 

 stinted or luxuriant, by the operation of fixed 

 laws. It can need no argument to show that he, 

 whose dependence is on the favorable operation 

 of these laws, should have all the knowledge of 

 them that can be acquired, and of all the means 

 by which their favorable operation may be ])ropi- 

 tiated. If the cultivator has a full knowledge of 

 the qualities of soils, of seeds, of manures, of 

 plants, of roots, of animals, and of all the influen- 

 ces that benefit or injure them. Nature is his coun- 

 sellor and fellow laborer. \\\ her powers are to 

 him as labor saving machines. She diminishes 

 for him the cost of her productions. Sle crowns 

 with plenty and with gladness tho devotee whose 

 love has led him to study hcrcharacter and honor 

 her affections. All cultivation is but an awaken- 

 ing and bringing into use, powers that wouhl oth- 

 erwise lie dormant. If we consider that no limit 

 has yet been found to the products of agriculture, 

 but that they have continued to increase with the 

 progress of art, and that one discovery commonly 

 leads to another, we may well conclude that there 

 are jiowers in nature not yet awakened, combina- 

 tions not yet formed, and that many fields yet re- 

 main for the conquests of agricultural genius. 



If the farmer has the knowledge and ingeimity, 

 the industry and skill which justly belong to his 

 character, the ajipropriate testimonies will not be 

 wanting. He needs the herald of no mercenary 

 partisan. lie builds bis own monuments. The 

 neatness and oriler of his homestead, the fertility 

 of hi's fields, the ]ierfection and symmetry of his 

 stock, and the system with which his business ig 

 conducted, are all eloquent panegyrists upon the 

 merits of their proprietor. The improvements 

 that he may make ; the new modes of culture, and 

 the new articles of cultivation that he may intro- 

 duce ; the oaks that he may plant, and the records 

 that he may leave of his own labors and expe- 

 rience, may hear his name with honor to otiier 

 generations. 



Certaiidy age and long experience may in some 

 degree supply the place of science. But nothing i 

 can show tnore strongly the value of science, than 

 the fact that those who have the most enlighten- 

 ed experience seek with the greatest avidity its 



il 



