462 



CHAPTER XX. 



THE MARKET GARDENS OF PARIS. 



It has been frequently said that the minute division of 

 property in land retards the improvement of agriculture in 

 France. It may be so with farmings but it certainly does 

 not hold good with market gardens. Those in and around 

 Paris are very small^ but they are the best and most 

 thoroughly cultivated patches of ground I have ever seen. 

 Every span of the earth is at work ; and cleanliness^ rapid 

 rotation^ deep culture;, abundant food and water to the 

 crops — in a word, every virtue of good cultivation — are 

 there to be seen. I doubt very much if such good results 

 could be obtained by a larger system, and certainly in no 

 part of Britain is the ground, whether garden or farm, so 

 thoroughly cultivated, or rendered nearly as productive, as in 

 these little family gardens, as they may be called, for 

 they are usually no larger than admits of the owner^s eye 

 seeing the condition of every crop in the garden at once. 

 The Paris market gardeners as a class keep to them- 

 selves, marry among themselves, and seem content with 

 about as much ground as gives occupation to their family. 

 They are as a rule a prosperous class. The gardens vary 

 in size from one to two, and occasionally three acres, 

 are usually walled in and furnished with a cottage, a few 

 sheds, and a well. 



In the neighbourhood of our English cities the price of 

 ground is high — according to our scale, that around Paris 

 is very high indeed. From information gathered on the 

 spot, during September last, I may say the rent varies 

 from 24Z, to 33/. per acre. On entering a market garden 

 the tenant has to pay in addition to his rent from 200/. to 



