snow in these parts of the island seldom lies for any time, and frost hardly ever continues beyond a few days, and while it lasts it is by no means intense. The mildness and humidity of the atmosphere produce a luxuriance and rapidity of growth in vegetation, to which no other part of the empire can afford any parallel; and this appears in the most remarkable manner in the ivy, and other evergreens, with which the kingdom abounds. These are not only much more plentiful, but far more luxuriant, and of much quicker growth, than in the most favoured parts of Great Britain. To those who are accustomed to the dry weather of this island, the continued rains of the south and west of Ireland are extremely disagreeable; but it is to this peculiarity in their climate, that the Irish have to attribute the richness of their pasturage, an advantage which, coupled with the remarkable dryness and friability of the soil, points, in an unequivocal manner, to a rotation of crops, in which grazing should occupy a principal place.

817. The territorial surface of Ireland affords a pleasing variety, consisting in some parts of rich and fertile plains, in others of little hills and acclivities, which succeed one another in frequent succession. The most elevated ground is to be found in the bog of Allan. Its height above the sea does not exceed 270 feet, yet, from this ridge, the waters of the rivers run to the different seas. This elevated ground is connected with the principal mountains of Ireland, diverging in the north from the hills of Tyrone, and leading in the south to those of Sleeve Bloom and the Galtees. The chains of mountains are neither numerous nor considerable; the most remarkable are, the Kerry mountains, those of Wicklow, the Sleeve Bloom chain between the King's and Queen's county, and the mountains of Mourne, in the south of the province of Ulster.

818. The soil of Ireland is, generally speaking, a fertile loam, with a rocky substratum; although there are many exceptions to this description, and many varieties. Generally speaking, it is rather shallow; to which cause the frequent appearance of rocks near the surface, or at no considerable depth, is to be attributed. It possesses a much greater proportion of fertile land, in proportion to its extent, than either England or Scotland. Not only is the island blessed with this extent of cultivable ground, but it is almost all of such a quality as to yield luxuriant crops, with little or no cultivation. Sand does not exist except on the sea shore. Tenacious clay is unknown, at least near the surface. Great part of the land of Ireland throws up a luxuriant herbage, without any depth of soil, or any skill on the part of the husbandman. The county of Meath, in particular, is distinguished by the richness and fertility of its soil; and, in Limerick and Tipperary, there is a dark, friable, sandy loam, which, if preserved in a clean state, will yield crops of corn several years in succession. It is equally well adapted for grazing as for arable crops, and seldom experiences either a winter too wet, or a summer too dry. The vales in many of the bleakest parts of the kingdom, as Donegal and Tyrone, are remarkable for their richness of soil and luxuriance of vegetation, which may be often accounted for by the deposition of the calcareous soil, washed down by the rains of winter, which spreads the richest manure over the soil below, without subjecting the farmer to any labour. (Wakefield, i. 79, 80.)

819. The bogs, or peat mosses, of Ireland, form a remarkable feature of the country, and have been proved by the parliamentary commissioners to be of great extent. They estimate the whole bogs of the kingdom at 2,330,000 acres, English. These bogs, for the most part, lie together. In form, they resemble a great broad belt, drawn across the centre of Ireland, with its narrowest end nearest to the capital, and gradually extending in breadth as it approaches the western ocean. The bog of Allan is not one contiguous morass, but this name is indiscriminately applied to a great number of bogs, detached from each other, and often divided by ridges of dry country. These bogs are not, in general, level, but most commonly of an uneven surface, swelling into hills, and divided by valleys, which afford the greatest facility to their being drained and improved. In many places, particularly in the district of Allan, the rivulets which these inequalities of surface produce have worn their channels through the substance of the bog, down to the clay or limestone gravel beneath; dividing the bog into distinct masses, and presenting, in themselves, the most proper situations for the main drains, for which purpose, with the assistance of art, they may be rendered effectual.

The commissioners employed by government to report on the bogs of Ireland found three distinct growths of timber immersed below three distinct strata of bog. The timber was perfectly sound, though deprived of its bark, which has communicated its antiputrescent quality to the water, and of course has preserved every thing embedded in the mass; though, as Miss Plumtree remarks, without "any thing like a process of tanning ever taking place." The bogs of Ireland are never on low ground, and have therefore evidently originated from the decay of woody tracts. (Plumtree's Residence in Ireland.)

821. Landed property in Ireland is more generally in large estates of some thousands of acres, than in small ones; but in its occupation it is subdivided in a degree far beyond any thing which occurs in any other part of the empire. In some counties, as Mayo for example, there are upwards of 15,000 freeholders on properties of not more than 40s.

value, and who are perhaps not worth 107. each. These are, for the most part, tenants of the great proprietors, possessing a life interest in their little farm.

822. In Ireland there are no manorial rights separable from the right to the soil, as in England, nor legal poor rates, which are circumstances materially in favour of the former country. (Wakefield, i. 242.)

823. Leases are generally of long endurance; and three lives, or thirty-one years, is a common rate. The price of land varies in different parts of Ireland. In the neighbourhood of Belfast, and thence to Armagh, it brings thirty years' purchase; in the greatest part of the island it does not exceed twenty; and, in the richest districts, it may often be bought for sixteen or eighteen. The exposure of landed estates to public sale takes place very seldom, which is, perhaps, one cause of their not bringing so high a price as they would otherwise do. (Wakefield.)

824. Farming in Ireland is, generally speaking, in a very backward state. With a few exceptions, such as the county of Meath, and some other well cultivated districts, the farmers are destitute of capital, and labour small crofts, which they hold of middlemen interposed between them and the landlord. The fact that in Ireland the landlord never lays out any thing upon repairs or buildings, coupled with the general inability of the farmer to do either in a substantial manner, is very significant as to the state of agriculture. (Tighe's Survey of Kilkenny, 412.; Wakefield, i. 244.) But the worst features of the rural economy of this island are the entire want of capital in the farmers, and the complete indifference of the landlord to the character, wealth, or industry of his tenant. "Capital," says Wakefield, "is considered of so little importance in Ireland, that advertisements constantly appear in the newspapers, in which it is stated, that the preference will certainly be given to the highest bidder. Bargains are constantly made with a beggar, as a new tenant, who, offering more rent, invariably turns out the old one, however industrious.'

825. The rent of land in Ireland from these causes, coupled with the excessive competition of the peasantry for small farms, as their only means of subsistence, has risen to a great height. (Townsend's Cork, 218.; Wakefield, i. 582.)

826. Ireland is divided, by Wakefield, into nine agricultural districts, in each of which the mode of culture is somewhat different from what it is in the others.

827. The first district comprehends the flat parts of Antrim; the eastern side of Tyrone, Down, Armagh, Monaghan, and Cavan. Throughout this district, the farms are extremely small, and the land is generally dug with a spade. Potatoes, flax, and oats are the crops usually cultivated, and these are grown till the land is exhausted, and suffered to "lie at rest," as they term it, till its strength is recruited by the cow, the goat, two or three sheep, and the poultry lying upon it for some years. The ploughs used in this district are of the rudest structure, and perform their work in the most slovenly manner. Three or four neighbours unite their strength to each plough, every one bringing his horse, his bullock, or his cow. All the other operations of agriculture are performed in an equally slovenly manner. The little wheat that is raised is " lashed," as they call it; that is, the grain is knocked out by striking the sheaf across a beam placed above a cloth: it is, however, afterwards threshed with a flail. The operation of threshing usually takes place in the highway, and it is dressed by letting it fall from a kind of sieve, which, during a pretty strong wind, is held breast-high by a woman. Many cottiers in this district have a cabin with no land attached to it. They hire an acre or two, for grass or potato land, from some cottier in their vicinity. The custom of hiring labourers is unknown. The neighbours all assist each other in their more considerable occupations, such as sowing and reaping. The dwellings here are miserably small; often too small to contain the numerous families that issue from their doors. Land is every where divided into the most minute portions. (Wakefield, i. 363.; Dubourdicu's Down, 39.)

828. Under the second district may be comprised the northern part of Antrim, Londonderry, the north and west of Tyrone, and the whole of Donegal. Agriculture here is in a worse state than in the preceding district. There is no clover, and hardly any wheat.

829. The third district comprehends the northern parts of Fermanagh. Here the farms are much larger than in the former, and the agricultural system pursued far superior. They plant potatoes on a lea, twice reversing the lands; and flax, oats, and weeds constitute the course. Some wheat is grown, but oats still form the prevalent crop. In the neighbourhood of Enniskillen, the farmers are so rich as to be able to eat butcher's meat daily, and drink smuggled wine. (Wakefield, i. 379.)

830. The fourth district comprehends Sligo, Mayo, Galway, Clare, and parts of Roscommon, and Longford. In some parts of this district the spade culture is pursued; but, in general, the land is cultivated by a plough drawn by four horses abreast. In Roscommon, the old custom of yoking the horses by the tail is still continued; although, as early as 1634, an act of parliament was passed against this absurd practice. (Life of the Duke of Ormond, i. 79.) Oats are chiefly raised in this district, and, along the coast, barley is cultivated. A large portion of the rent depends on the illegal distilleries, and much of the district is let on lease to several persons jointly, according to the village system. (Ibid., i. 381.)

831. In the fifth district, which comprehends Limerick, Kerry, the south side and northern part of Cork, and the county of Waterford, cultivation is in a very rude state; little corn is grown here, with the exception of the southern part of Cork. Land is extremely divided, and the farms very small. The greater part is a grazing country. (Ibid., i. 387.)

852. The sixth district includes the southern parts of Cork. The spade culture is here almost universal, and the farms unusually small. Hogs constitute the main support of the poor. (Townsend's Cork, 194.) 833. The seventh district includes part of Tipperary, with Queen's county and King's county. The best farming in Ireland is observable in this district; a systematic course of husbandry being pursued, by which the land is kept in good heart. Oxen and horses are used in the plough, and hedgerows and good wheat fallows are to be seen. Near Roscrea the cultivation of turnips is followed, and they succeed well. Ninety acres are considered a large farm. Leases are generally for three lives. (Wakefield, i. 398.)

834. The eighth district comprises Wexford and a part of Wicklow. Beans are here sometimes introduced into cultivation, but they are sown broadcast, and never hoed. The mode of ploughing is very awkward: one man holds the plough, another leads the horse, and a third sits on it to keep it down. Notwithstanding this rude culture, however, the rents are enormous, owing to the demand for land created by an excessive population, who, if they had not a portion of land to grow potatoes (getting no employment), could not live. (Ibid., i. 407.)

835. The ninth district comprehends the northern part of Kilkenny, Kildare, the cultivated parts of Westmeath, Meath, and Louth. Wheat here enters into the system of culture, but the preparatory fallows are very bad. Clover has been introduced into the district, but under the bad system of sowing it upon land exhausted, and covered by weeds. Farms are large, and the mode of culture similar to what is pursued in England, though the details are executed in a slovenly manner. (Ibid., i. 413.)

836. The agricultural implements and operations used in Ireland are all of the rudest construction. The plough, the spade, the flail, the car, all equally partake of imperfections and defects. The fallows are not well attended to; three ploughings are usually deemed sufficient, and, from the imperfection of the plough, the ground at the end is generally full of weeds. Trenching land is very general; they form it into beds, and shovel out a deep trench between them, throwing up the earth. The expense of this operation is about eight shillings an acre. Wheat, as will be seen from the preceding details, is not by any means generally cultivated. It is unknown in Monaghan, Tyrone, Derry, Donegal, Sligo, Mayo, Leitrim, and Cavan, though it is grown to a considerable extent in Kilkenny, Carlow, Dublin, Meath, Louth, and parts of Limerick, Tipperary, Clare, and Cork. It is generally sown after potatoes or fallow. The Irish wheat is, for the most part, coarse and of inferior quality, and does not yield so much saccharine matter by twenty per cent, as the English. (Ibid., i. 429. 442.)

837. Barley is more generally cultivated in Ireland than wheat, and it is generally sown after potatoes. Oats, however, constitute the species of grain most extensively raised; it is calculated that, throughout the whole kingdom, there are ten acres of oats sown for one of any other species of corn. The Irish oats, however, are decidedly inferior to the English.

838. The potatoes of Ireland have long been celebrated, both on account of their quantity and excellent qualities: they are cultivated on every species of soil, either in drills or lazy beds. Potato land lets from six pounds six shillings to ten pounds ten shillings per acre; and the expense of culture, including rent, varies from thirteen pounds to sixteen pounds per acre. The produce is from eight hundred stone to one thousand stone the acre, at twenty-one pounds to the stone; that is, from sixteen thousand eight hundred to twenty-one thousand pounds. (Ibid., i. 450.)

839. The indigenous grasses of Ireland are not of any peculiar excellence. Notwithstanding all that has been said of the fiorin grass, its excellence and utility may be called in question. Their hay is seldom from sown grasses, generally consisting of the spontaneous produce of the soil. Clover is almost unknown. Newenham calculates that there are not five thousand acres under this crop in the whole island. (Newenham, 314. ; Wakefield, i. 467.)

840. There are few live hedges in Ireland; in the level stone districts, stone walls, and in other places turf banks, are the usual fences.

841. The dairy is the most extensive and the best managed part of Irish husbandry. Kerry, Cork, Waterford, Carlow, Meath, Westmeath, Longford, and Fermanagh, as well as the mountains of Leitrim and Sligo, are principally occupied by dairy farms. Butter is the chief produce. The average number of cows on a dairy farm amounts to thirty or forty; three acres of land, of middling quality, are deemed necessary for the subsistence of each cow. A cow produces on an average eight quarts in twenty-four hours in summer, and five in winter; four good milkers will yield a quarter of a cwt. of butter in a week. The best butter is made in Carlow; the worst in Limerick and Meath. Generally speaking, the Irish are very cleanly in making this article; and it is exported to England, the East and West Indies, and Portugal. (Wakefield, i. 325. et seq.) The art of salting butter, Chaptal observes, is better known in Ireland than in any other Country. (Chimie appliqué à l'Agriculture.) The grazing of Ireland is not, as in England, a part of the regular rotation of crops, but is carried on in a country exclusively devoted to the breeding of cattle, like the highlands of Scotland. Great tracts of the country also are devoted to the grazing of sheep. Roscommon, Galway, Clare, Limerick, and Tipperary are the chief breeding counties for sheep; and Galway, Clare, Roscommon, Tipperary, and Meath are the places where they are fattened. The sheep are of the long-woolled kind, and very large: they are never kept in sheepfolds, and hardly ever fed on turnips; which is chiefly owing to the very limited demand for mutton among the labouring people. (Ibid., i. 341.)

842. The depressed state of the agriculture of Ireland is considered as proceeding from the depressed state of the people. The main cause of their sufferings is traced by most writers (Young, Dewar, Newenham, Wakefield, Curwen, &c.) to the redundancy of population. In 1791, the population of the whole kingdom amounted to 4,200,000 persons, and it increases at the rate of one forty-sixth part per annum; or, in other words, it doubles itself every forty-six years. As might be expected in a country where the increase in the number of mankind has so far outstripped the progress of its wealth, and the increase of its industry, the condition of the people is in every department marked by extreme indigence. (Dewar, 91.; Young, ii. 123.) The houses in which they dwell, the furniture in their interior, their clothing, food, and general way of life, all equally

indicate the poverty of the country. The dress of the people is so wretched, that, to a person who has not visited the country, it is almost inconceivable. The Irish poor, indeed, have no conception of the comforts of life; and, if they felt their full value, they could not afford them, for though necessaries are cheap, conveniences of all sorts are very dear.

843. But while the Irish poor are in general destitute of all the accommodations, they hardly ever, except in years of extraordinary distress, know what it is to want the absolute necessaries, of life. The unsparing meal of potatoes, at which the beggar, the pig, the dog, the poultry, and the children seem equally welcome, seldom fails the Irish labourer.

844. Hence the laziness of the lower Irish. Limited as their wants are to the mere support of animal life, they do not engage in labour with that persevering industry which artificial desires inspire; and the mode in which they are often paid, that is, giving them a piece of potato land by the year, at once furnishes the means of subsistence, and takes away every stimulus to farther exertion. The farm-servants of the English or Scotch farmers, who carry on agriculture upon the improved system, are constantly employed in some species of labour; but, after the potatoes of the Irish cottier are planted, there is hardly any thing to be done about his little croft till the season of digging arrives. During a great portion of the year he is doomed to idleness, and the habits he acquires during the long periods of almost total inaction, are too strong to be overcome when he is transferred to a more regular occupation. Such is the condition of the labouring classes.

845. Ireland exhibits an assemblage of the most contradictory circumstances. It is a country in which, under the most distressing circumstances, population has advanced with the most rapid pace, in which cultivation has advanced without wealth, and education without diffusing knowledge; where the peasantry are more depressed, and yet can obtain subsistence with greater facility, than in any other country of Europe. Their miserable condition will not appear surprising, when the numerous oppressions to which they are subject are taken into consideration.

846. In the foremost rank of their many grievances, the general prevalence of middlemen must be placed. It is difficult to estimate the extent of the misery which the system of letting and subletting land has brought upon the Irish cultivators. Middlemen have, in every country, been the inseparable attendants of absent proprietors: and in such a country as Ireland, where there are numbers of disaffected persons in every quarter, the vigilant eye of a superior inspector is more particularly required.

847. The system of under-letting lands often proves a great evil in Ireland. By the law of England, the landlord is entitled to distrain for payment of rent, not only the stock which belongs to his immediate tenant, but the crop or stock of a subtenant; on the principle that whatever grows on the soil ought to be a security to the landlord for his rent : and in Scotland the same rule bolds where the landlord has not authorised the subtack; but if he has, the subtenant is free when he has paid to the principal tenant. There is little hardship in such a rule in England, where the practice of subletting is, generally speaking, rare; but when applied to Ireland, where middlemen are universal, it becomes the source of infinite injustice; for the cultivator being liable to have his crop and stock distrained on account of the tenant from whom he holds, and there being often many tenants interposed between him and the landlord, he is thus perpetually liable to be distrained for arrears not his own. The tenant, in a word, can never be secure, though he has faithfully paid his rent to his immediate superior; because he is still liable to have every thing which he has in the world swept off by an execution for arrears due by any of the many leaseholders, who may be interposed between him and the landlord. It is obvious that such a system must prevent the growth of agricultural capital: this, joined to the exactions of the middlemen, has been the true cause of the universal prevalence of the cottage system, and the minute subdivision of farms.

848. The tithes in Ireland have long been collected with a severity of which hardly any European state furnishes an example. This has arisen from the wealth and influence of the clergy, joined to the destitute situation of their parishioners. They fall, by the law of that country, only on the tillage land; the greater part of which is held by cottier tenants; and thus the rich are exempted from bearing their share of the burden.

849. Another grievance, though not so extensive, is the fine imposed upon a township, for having had the misfortune to have a seizure for illicit distillation made within its bounds. 850. These evils have been attended with the usual depressing effects of oppression. They have prevented the growth of any artificial wants, or any desire of bettering their condition, among the mass of the people. Despised by their superiors, and oppressed by all to whom they might naturally have looked for protection, the Irish have felt only the natural instincts of their being. Among the Presbyterians of the north, and the peasantry in the vicinity of manufacturing towns, who are to a certain extent educated, higher notions of comfort may have imposed some restraint on the principle of population; but the humiliated poor of other parts, enjoying no respectability or consideration

in society, have sought only the means of subsistence; and finding, without difficulty, potatoes, milk, and a hovel, have overspread the land with a wretched offspring.

851. To these causes of a redundant population, of which the government of the country is, directly or indirectly, the source, are to be added others of a different kind.

852. The first is the influence of the parish priests, who encourage marriage, in order to increase their own emoluments, and the superstition of the people, who regard it as a religious duty.

853. The second cause is, the general ignorance of the people.

84. On the influence of education, in restraining the tendency to early and imprudent marriage, it would be superfluous in this place to enlarge.

855. Various other circumstances have combined to multiply to a great degree the facilities of population, and to expand, in this country, beyond almost any other, the means of subsistence.

856. The fertility of the country may be mentioned as one of the most obvious of these circumstances. The soil of Ireland is in general so rich, that it will yield an alternate crop of wheat and potatoes for ever, without any very great labour, and with little manure. The introduction of the potato, and its singular adaptation to the soil and climate of Ireland, are other concurring causes. An acre of potatoes, according to Newenham, will yield four times as much nourishment as one of wheat. By thus expanding the means of human subsistence, the potato has greatly promoted the population of Ireland; but as the able writer, from whom we have selected the above remarks, observes, “unless the people are predisposed, from other causes, to press upon the means of subsistence, it has no tendency to augment their redundance. Under the government and political institutions of the Irish, the population of the country would have been equally redundant, though much smaller that it now is, if they had lived on oats or wheaten bread. The introduction of the potato may be the cause why the population is now six in place of three millions: but it is not the cause why, during the whole period of this increase, the numbers of the people have been greater than, under existing circumstances, could be comfortably maintained." (Sup. Encyc. Brit., art. Ireland.)

857. That agriculture has made considerable progress in Ireland since the above was written, nearly twenty years ago, is obvious from the increased exports of wheat and other grain from her ports; but it may be questioned whether during this period any advance has taken place in the comforts of the general mass of her population. It is a remarkable fact, that in the year 1823, when great numbers of the labouring class in Ireland were starving from a failure in the potato crop, and when large subscriptions were raising in England, and even on the Continent, for their relief, the exportation of grain was going on from Cork and other Irish ports, as if nothing had happened. Before much improvement can take place in the condition of the mass of Irish population, it is necessary that they should possess such a taste for the comforts of life as will restrain the principle of population, by lessening the number of early marriages, or inducing that degree of restraint rendered expedient by a prudent foresight. At present nothing more is necessary for the happiness of an Irish country labourer and his family than straw and potatoes: if these fail him he is lost, because he can fall no lower; if any thing is superadded to his means, it only increases the desire for these necessaries, produces a greater number of children, and creates an additional demand for straw and potatoes. It is gratifying, however, to be able to state that the time seems arrived for the introduction of domestic improvement among the peasantry of Ireland. At no former period has the British government manifested so much anxiety to discover the real causes of the miseries which afflict that country, and in every session of parliament some enactments are made for its amelioration. The enlightened principles of political economy which are now acted on by ministers, and the knowledge of this science which within these few years has spread among all classes, cannot fail to bring Ireland rapidly forward in civilisation and refinement; and we wish it may be to such a degree, as in a very few years to render the account which we have above given mere matter of history. No one can desire this result more ardently than we do.

CHAP. VI.

Of the present State of Agriculture in Ultra-European Countries.

858. In this department of our history the reader will not expect more than a very slight outline; not only from our limited space and the comparative scarcity of materials, but because the subject is less interesting to general readers. We shall notice in succession