there were 220 subscribers, and their funds amounted to about L.1000. The offspring societies of the county are in operation, and we trust that their dissolution is far distant. We shall close our article with one other extract from the Ordnance memoir, bearing on a very interesting branch of rural economy, and expressed with the point and vigour which we think characterize, in a remarkable degree, the portions of the work which we believe to emanate from the pen of Captain Portlock.

"The improvement, however, of cottage husbandry is still a desideratum; and it would, perhaps, tend to promote it, were the agricultural societies to keep in view, that the great majority of farms are small, and that the premiums to affect them should be such as would apply to very small spaces,— for instance, for a single cow stall fed, for a certain quantity of cabbages, &c. -and should always be accompanied by an announcement, that the seed of the particular sorts of vegetables recommended, might be procured for reasonable prices, at named establishments,-a very great point in bringing about improvements, being the removal of the small difficulty at the begin ning, to overcome which, a much greater share of resolution is often required than to surmount infinitely greater difficulties at a more advanced stage of the experiment. Were this principle also extended to horticultural societies, so as to induce an improvement in the taste of the cottager, the greatest benefits might be confidently anticipated, since it may be fairly asserted, that the repetition of moral injunctions or precepts would effect far less towards the civilization of the peasantry, than the introduction of that refinement of mind which is a consequence of floriculture."

D.

ON AN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION FOR THE SONS OF LANDED PROPRIETORS.

THE ordinary education of the landed proprietors of this country is as complete as it can be effected by private tutelage and at public schools and universities. Accomplished in classical learning, literature, or the physical sciences, as each department of study may suit particular tastes, not a few of them have enhanced the literary and scientific character of the country, and some have even conferred lustre on it in the learned professions of medicine, law, or theology; and not to be outdone in the race of honourable distinction by their English compeers, many have participated in the academic honours of Oxford and Cambridge. Yet strange to remark, anxious as landed proprietors certainly are to

bestow a liberal education on their families, which is the best legacy they can leave to their younger sons, agriculture, which most materially affects the interests of themselves and their eldest sons, the very profession by which they are upheld in the high status of society they occupy, they almost entirely neglect, as if, after the acquirement of a superior education, a man should be ashamed of attending to the means of his subsistence. Is it not "passing strange," that any country gentleman should be unacquainted with farming, the very source of his livelihood, when all other classes of people, in learning their respective professions, whether learned or vulgar, serve apprenticeships and toil through life thereafter? It seems to be forgotten that landownership is a profession, that it is in the manner in which it is conducted, that the best interests of the country may be injured or promoted, and that it is a profession which requires as great capacity of mind to practise it aright as to conduct those large commercial and manufacturing establishments whose importance is so much lauded. The comparison between them can in truth be pursued no farther; for, whilst commercialists conduct their business in person assiduously, landowners consign the guidance of their valuable estates to persons who, in too many instances, are ignorant of agriculture, and who, at any rate, cannot feel the same interest in their prosperity as the proprietors themselves. This allegation is made against landowners generally, though not indiscriminately sweeping; for we have the satisfaction of personally knowing landowners, members of the nobility as well as the gentry, who have made it a duty to acquire a knowledge of agriculture, and who, in consequence, manage their estates of themselves, or through competent factors, on the principles of the most approved practice. Those proprietors who entrust their estates to factors of known practical ability, adopt the best safeguard against the evils arising from their own want of knowledge.

There are many evils attending the neglect of farming by landowners. When called upon to take a share in the discussions or business of those interesting agricultural meetings which of late years have excited so much notice over the kingdom, the remarks or speeches of the landowners consist, with few exceptions, of apologies for not having attended sufficiently to agricultural subjects, and of excuses for want of practical knowledge;

and when it is their lot or ambition to become members of the legislature, how lamentable it is to find that, beyond every other class of representatives in Parliament, the landed interest know the least of what concerns themselves. They should know much more upon every subject connected with agriculture as an art, as being the most influential interest in the state, or the laws affecting the different branches of it, than mere tenants, whose education and means of observation must be comparatively limited. Yet the tenantry are frequently left to fight their own battles on public questions.

A greater evil exists in consigning the management of their valuable estates to the care of men who have perhaps acquired an intimacy with the quill, and the blandishments of their own tables, but who have neglected the guidance of the plough, and the unwearying attention required at the feeding-in board. Want of knowledge in proprictors may only personally affect themselves, but the appointment of incompetent factors cannot fail to affect the fortunes and happiness of numerous families. The nature of the legal profession in which too many factors are brought up, predisposes their minds to carping at quibbles and litigiousness; which, whenever a farmer discovers, or thinks he discovers, in the factor, he withdraws his confidence from him, and places himself in a position of self-defence. Both are ever after prepared for disputation, and disputes inevitably ensue. And how can any other result be anticipated? How can a farmer hold "sweet converse" with a man who cannot understand his discourse, and it is only as a farmer that a tenant has occasion to converse with the factor at all? In these circumstances, when disputes do arise between the factor and the tenants, the proprietor, who is unwilling, or what is worse, and more likely to be the case, unable to interfere, leaves their settlement to him who commenced them; and who, to gain his point over the tenant, persuades his master, by flattering his prejudices, to refrain from interference; and, in the end, contrives to place the proprietor in the most disagreeable position with his tenants. The probable result of this cunning policy is the degradation of the proprietor into a scape-goat for the sins of the factor. Or, stopping short of actual litigation, the factor may refer the settlement of the dispute to expensive arbitration. In either case, the weaker party, the

tenants, are sure to be most injured, and, it may be, eventually ruined. The proprietor, instead of being the natural protector of his tenants, is thus converted into their oppressor.

By this train of argument, we do not maintain that factors should be ignorant of law, of business, or any other species of knowledge; but what we assert is, that they should be thoroughly versant in agriculture. Without that essential knowledge, we would not intrust a factor with the management of an estate, although he possessed the most amiable disposition. That knowledge, and no other, imparts the faculty of looking at all agricultural matters in the right light. By it he will know what covenants of the lease is applicable to the peculiarities of every farm, or the circumstances of the tenant to whom it is let. No disputes will then arise about miscropping. He will easily discover whether the progressive or retrograde condition of the tenants arises from their own industry or negligence, or from circumstances connected with the state or situation of the farms themselves. He will regulate his conduct accordingly, by en couraging the industrious and skilful, reproving the indolent, or amending the unfavourable circumstances of the farms. Such a man's opinion will greatly influence that of the tenantry, and community of sentiment will produce mutual kindliness of intercourse between them.

Every landowner who resides in his mansion-house in the country, must have as much land in his own possession as to make what is familiarly termed a "home farm." Corn, hay, and straw will be required for the horses; green food throughout all the seasons must be provided for the dairy cows; fowls and dogs must be supported; butcher's meat must be regularly supplied in the best condition; and the whole domestic establishment must be maintained. To effect all this, two hundred acres of arable land, besides lawns and paddocks, are required. A manager for all this establishment must be procured. Another evil arises from the appointment of this functionary. He becomes proud in his new place, because he is in the service of a laird; overbearing, because he knows he is the only one acquainted with the management of land; important, because he finds himself purveyor for the whole establishment, and could starve the garrison at any time to a surrender; haughty, because

disposing of a few unnecessary articles from the farm, he becomes the bearer for a time, of a little loose cash. The temptations of his office become too strong for his virtue, he aggrandizes himself and distributes hush-money liberally; at length his peccadillos are discovered, and he for ever after becomes unfit for a farm steward to any other proprietor or farmer.

When landlords have no knowledge of farming, their taste for the country usually declines. The sports of the field may detain them on their estates for the season, but are too rough and fatiguing to entice them to remain throughout the year. Without the excitement of field-sports, their life is nothing but a monotonous scene, and the same society at length be comes irksome to them. They leave their demesnes with partial disgust, and wander about in foreign lands or settle down somewhere far removed from their patrimonial inheritance. This we consider an evil; for we do not agree with Mr Macculloch, that it is of no importance to a country where the income derived from its land is spent. We are quite sure the small tradesmen of every class derive sensible benefits from the expenditure of the contiguous proprietors, and when the latter are absent, they soon feel that source of profit dried up. But on the other hand, we do not bewail the absence of proprietors so lamentably as our Irish neighbours. Good farming proceeds, and labourers are employed, by the enterprising tenantry in their absence; and, in as far as regards the substantial improvement of the country, the claims of the landowners in the participation of the honour is little compared with those of the tenantry.

Now the effects of all these evils, we venture to assert, may be most effectually remedied by the sons of landed proprietors, who will themselves become landowners, acquiring a thorough knowledge of farming in their youth, as a necessary branch of practical education, and the management of their estates will then be felt a desirable gratification, not a task. Proprietors would then be qualified to select and appoint competent factors, -to judge of the fulfilment of the factor's duty of impartial superintendence, and to convince themselves, by personal observation, that their tenantry receive substantial justice and protection. They would then be competent to select farm

VOL. VIII.-NO. XL.

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