526 Agricultural Possibilities . [September, 
more immediately a people who enjoy a better climate than 
do we, — that is, who can reckon with a nearer approach to 
certainty upon suitable weather for the maturing and in- 
gathering of the harvest, — he naturally fixes his main 
attention upon appliances for increasing the productivity of 
the soil. He points out the curious and unwelcome fact 
that the progress of agriculture has not in France (and the 
same holds good in England) been at all proportionate to 
the increase and spread of manufactures. The manufac- 
turer, indeed, enjoys certain advantages unknown to the 
farmer. If he sees fit to double his production he need 
only erect more powerful machinery and increase his number 
of hands, and he generally finds that by so doing his returns 
increase more rapidly than his outgoings. Not so the 
farmer : an increased quantity of labour often has no appre- 
ciable effect upon the returns at all. Improved manuring, 
as M. Ville advocates, will no doubt in the long run increase 
the amount of food to be extracted from the soil, but the 
uncertainty of the seasons forbids us to calculate upon this 
result as a matter of certainty for any given year. It has 
even been asserted that the rudest agriculture, where the 
seed is simply committed to a virgin soil, without manure 
and with little tillage, is the most remunerative where land 
is cheap and labour scarce, the returns, large or small, being 
almost entirely profit. This method of cultivation is of 
course quite out of the question in modern Europe. 
But beyond the peril to the farmer of American competi- 
tion, there lies a further and more serious danger to the 
entire community in England, France, Germany, &c. In 
what position shall we be when that competition ceases, if 
unable to produce our own food ? Yet that time must 
assuredly come, and is every day drawing nearer. All the 
civilised portions of the earth are becoming more populous, 
and therefore require an increased amount of their produce 
for home consumption. At length the time comes when they 
begin to import food. The child just born may live to see 
the time when the United States will have nothing more to 
spare for Europe. This consideration should be stronger 
than all others in stimulating the nations to improvement 
in agriculture. 
There are of course two very distinct directions in which 
minds of respectively different natures may look for the 
means of meeting the growing difficulty. Some, like the 
present writer, may fix their hopes on mechanical, physical, 
and chemical invention. Others, I fear the more numerous 
class in England, will seek relief for the farmer and plenty 
