NEW ENGLAND EMIGRATION. 
145 
NEW ENGLAND EMIGRATION. 
The spirit of emigration so rife in New England, 
tending as it has, within the last fifteen or twenty 
years, to concentrate the lands in the hands of a few, 
is producing a great and deleterious influence on their 
agricultural interests, and operating against those im¬ 
provements which are advocated by all enlightened 
agriculturists of the present day. I have been led to 
this conclusion in viewing the half-cultivated and 
neglected land that abounds in almost every part of 
New England, and it has induced me to make a few 
suggestions on the subject of emigration, with the 
hope that some more experienced person may be dis¬ 
posed to examine it, and give his views of its effect 
on agriculture. 
All who are conversant with the habits of the peo¬ 
ple of New England, have observed their disposition 
to rove over the face of the globe. So true is this, 
that no country or island can be visited where a son 
of New England has not penetrated. The wilds of 
the west, the deserts of the east, the icy shores of 
the north, the luxuriant lands of the south, and the 
savage islands of the ocean, all have representatives 
from ** the land of the pilgrims ” dwelling in their 
midst. It seems to'be an inbred principle with them, 
to tread where civilized man never trod before. 
Their fathers set the example in leaving their homes 
in Europe to come to the wilderness of America; 
and verily the mantle has fallen on the sons. 
A large proportion of the young men of New 
England, who have been trained to agricultural pur¬ 
suits, are leaving their homes and emigrating to the 
west in pursuit of a fortune. They look upon the 
west as an El Dorado , where everything is to be 
gained and nothing can be lost; alasJ how many, ,out as many have been led to suppose. It is true 
after struggling for years to find it, are doomed to dis¬ 
appointment. Go into any of our villages and ask, 
“ Where are all your young men ?” and the response 
will be, “ Gone to the west; they could not be in¬ 
duced to stay at home and improve our * worn-out 
lands,’ when the west was open to them as ‘ a land 
flowing with milk and honey.’ ” Westward the tide 
of emigration makes its way, and what can be done 
to stay its progress? All classes seem to look upon 
a home at the west as the greatest earthly possession. 
A man that can be contented to stay at home and cul¬ 
tivate a farm, with all the natural advantages its 
location gives him for a market, is thought by many 
to be weak-minded. It is this infatuation for the 
west, causing many to sell their farms that they may 
emigrate, which throws so much land into the pos¬ 
session of comparatively few individuals, not leaving 
enough engaged in agriculture to cultivate them in a 
proper manner. They are furthermore crippled by 
the fact, that in most cases those who purchase them, 
instead of being able to return to the land a proper 
share of what is taken from it, must send it to the 
west to pay for the very land they are not able to 
improve. The land at the east is impoverished to 
improve the land at the west 
None can deny that the’ west holds out great temp¬ 
tations to the farmer who has become disheartened 
and tired of working the impoverished land of New 
England, in the cheapness of the land and the fer¬ 
tility of the soil; yet still 1 doubt whether these in 
have made more money at home, with the same 
amount of labor and privation they there endure, if 
money be their object. If education and social privi¬ 
leges are brought into the account, the east possesses 
every advantage over the west. 
If the land be higher and the soil not so rich at the 
east, the farmer does not require so much of the for¬ 
mer, and the latter can be made as fertile as they 
wish, it they will use the knowledge placed before 
them. Here the farmer has a ready market for all 
he can raise, at much higher prices than at the west; 
and as manufactories increase, the demand is more 
than the supply. The eastern farmer has an advan¬ 
tage in being able to purchase cheaper all he wishes to 
buy, in consequence of the saving of transportation. 
The agricultural products of the west must necessarily 
seek a distant market, and articles that cannot be 
produced there must be returned in exchange. The 
transportation, commissions, &c., thus operate as a 
bounty in favor of th^ east—forcing the western 
farmer to sell cheaper and buy dearer than his eastern 
neighbor. By reference to the prices of agricultural 
staples, I find that they are from 25 to 50 per cent, 
less at the west than at the east, so that though their 
crops are more abundant, they do not in fact realize 
as much in proportion for them; and when they add 
the cost of clearing the land, the difference in price of 
labor and agricultural implements, the heavy taxes 
for farm buildings, fences, roads, school-houses, 
churches, and other improvements that are necessary 
in all new States, emigrants will find their land has 
cost them nearly or quite as much as it does in the 
Eastern States. 
The land in New England is not so poor and worn 
it has been cultivated for a long time, but is that 
a sufficient reason for its not yielding more abundant¬ 
ly? Old England has been longer under cultivation, 
yet they find no difficulty in producing the largest 
crops ever raised in any country, because they culti¬ 
vate their lands on scientific principles; and when 
the farmers of New England go and do likewise, they 
will find their lands bringing forth abundantly, if 
any doubt it, a trial will convince them that pooi 
New England can still produce large crops. (For 
proof of this assertion, see article on “ Improved 
Fanning,” vol. 3, p. 248 of the Agriculturist) The 
sun shines as genially, and the showers are as 
abundant as they ever were; large crops have been 
raised; what, then, is in the way of our farmers’ suc¬ 
cess ? It wants the sons to stay at home and study 
theoretical and practical farming, with a determina¬ 
tion that they will do their duty; then we should not 
hear the land evil spoken of, or so many complaints 
of the necessity of emigrating to make a living. 
Some of the farmers of Connecticut are now receiv¬ 
ing from $>400 to $500 an acre by the cultivation of 
tobacco, and other crops may be made to pay as well. 
Another class of the sons of our farmers are 
not contented to gain their living by the sweat of 
their brow, but they must play the gentleman , oi 
crowd our cities as clerks in stores, or other occupa¬ 
tions they consider more genteel —there is not enough 
respectability in the business of a farmer to suit 
them. They look upon farming as degrading, instead 
ducements overbalance the advantages, ail things! of being, as the beloved Washington designated it, 
considered, a farm at the east possesses. Probably j “ the most healthful, the most useful, and the most 
two- thirds of those who have emigrated west could I noble employment of man.” This ought not so to 
