INTRODUCTION. ILE 
for the time most necessary, will effect a vast saving 
on the expenditure of him who endeavours to carry 
on many works at one and the same time. Finally, 
he who administers half a pint of lime and 4 oz. of © 
bonedust to each plant when three months out will 
reap an abundant return in due time. 
The planter who is well up in the what, the when, 
and the how, of estate work, and works up to 
his knowledge, can in an average case bring his 
estate into bearing for less than R200 per acre, and ~ 
have everything ready and in good order for the 
first crop, but I think no prudent man would in the 
firs: instance undertake it. If in the course of the 
work it is found, that a saving can be effected, it 
is easy enough to extend afterwards, but if the work 
is under estimated, and alarger tract opened than 
the available funds can do justice to, there must be 
a resort to borrowing, by which ninety planters 
have been ruined for every ten that finally escaped 
from the toils. For my own part I would rather 
have 50 acres, or even 20 acres, that I could by my own 
resources cultivate in the best style known to the 
profession, than struggle with a large extent, of which 
I was only proprietor in name, and at the mercy 
of parties who might force a sale on a declining 
market, any day that suited them. Every planter 
of thirty years’ standing can call to mind many in- 
stances of this kind of transaction among their own 
friends and acquaintances, and has had good oppor- . 
tunities of watching how it affected men of different 
characters. One would toil late and early deny himself — 
necessaries, economize in every way possible, and sink 
struggling to the last. Another would fight manfully 
for a time, but as fate closed in about him he would 
give in, seek comfort and oblivion in the bottle, and ~ 
sink rapidly into adrunkard and a loafer; to reside 
some time in a lunatic asylum, and finally die in a 
pauper hospital. Perhaps those who made the best 
of the circumstances were those who went to Hngtand, 
and enjoyed life, as long as their agents would honour ~ 
their drafts. The collapse came very hard on tiose 
who to the very last believed themselves on the high 
road to fortune, and assumed matrimonial responsibilities 
on the strength of it. The tale of ‘‘ How I Lost My 
