British Agriculture. 
303 = 57 
To these three classes are committed the agricultural interest Each of the 
and industry ot the kingdom. The two first have duties en- '^^3^^^^']'*'*'* 
trusted to them by the constitution, for the management of the vecruited bv 
public and local interests of their counties and parishes, in changes of 
addition to their special business as landowners and agricul- l"'op«''ty ancl 
T-> 1 /• 1 1 1 • 1 1 • 1 1 employment, 
tuiists. Ji,ach 01 the three classes is constantly being altered 
and recruited by changes and additions. Landed property of 
the value of several millions sterling a year changes hands, and 
as there is necessarily a larger body of persons capable of com- 
peting for small properties, there is a natural tendency to sub-divi- 
sion on sale. In every county many farms change their tenants 
at Lady Day or Michaelmas, new men with new ideas being 
substituted for the old, some of whom have died, some retired 
from business, and some moved elsewhere. Labourers move 
about more than they used to do, and learn something useful 
in each change, and large drafts of them pass off to the other 
industrial pursuits of the country, and to the colonies. The 
feeling of being bound to the soil or the parish of his birth has 
lost much of its strength, and every facility is now presented to 
tlie unmarried agricultural labourer for improving his position 
if he desires to alter it. 
In short, our system is that of large capitalists owning the 
land ; of smaller capitalists, each cultivating five times more 
:)f it than they would have means to do if they owned their 
arms ; and of labourers free to carry their labour to any market 
.vhich they consider most remunerative. It has been the gradual 
growth of experience in a country of moderate extent, where 
'and is all occupied, where capital is abundant and constantly 
leeking investment in land ; and where other industries than 
igriculture are always demanding recruits from the children 
)f the agricultural labourer, who find, besides, a ready outlet 
n those British colonies where the soil and climate are not 
nuch different from that which they leave, and where their own 
anguage is spoken. And doubtless this facility of language 
fias greatly helped the people of this country in encountering 
ihe trials and difficulties of emigration. But the want of it 
lay be successfully overcome, as the example of Germany has 
roved in the tens of thousands of her people who have gone to 
le United States. There, and in the vast continent of Australia, 
lere is room enough to take, with advantage, the surplus 
opulation of every country in Europe for many generations, 
instead of struggling at home as cultivators of small patches of 
knd, where nothing but the most sparing frugality enables 
■lem to live, the working men of all countries are invited and 
^sisted by Australia to take a share on equal terms with our 
>vn people in the great enterprise of colonising a new continent, 
VOL. XIV.— S. S. Z 
