of rent, or a union of farms, and which have secured to the owner the full enjoyment of the use of the land, have prevented any person, except the sovereign, from amassing an enormous quantity, and have preserved, among the inhabitants a species of equality as to property. There are, comparatively, few absolutely destitute labourers. The mass of the people do not live in such affluence as Englishmen; but this is more than compensated to them by all being in some measure alike. In civilised society, it is not destitution, but the craving wants which the splendour of other persons excites, which are the true evils of poverty. The metayer regulations have hindered improvement; but they have also hindered absolute destitution and enormous accumulation. (Hodgson.)

552. From the regulations concerning landed property in Germany, it has resulted that fewer paupers are found there than in our country. Some other regulations are known, which have probably assisted in protecting Germany from the evil of pauperism to the same extent in which it exists with us. There is no legal provision for paupers. Α law of the guilds, which extended to most trades, forbade, and still forbids, where guilds are not abolished, journeying mechanics from marrying; and, in most countries of Germany, people are obliged to have the permission of the civil magistrate, before it is legal for the clergyman to celebrate a marriage. The permission seems to be given or withheld, as the parties soliciting it are thought by the magistrates to be capable of maintaining a family. At least, it is to prevent the land from being overrun with paupers, that the law on this subject has been made.

553. The agricultural produce of Germany is for the greater part consumed there; but excellent wines are exported from Hungary and the Rhine; and also wool, flax, timber, bark, hams salted and smoked, geese, goosequills, the canary, goldfinch, and other singing birds, silk, &c.

554. The culture of the mulberry and rearing of the silkworm, in Germany, are carried on as far north as Berlin; that of the vine, as Dresden; and that of the peach, as a standard in the fields, as Vienna. The maize is little cultivated in Germany; but patches of it are to be found as far north as Augsburg, in Swabia. Rice is cultivated in a few places in Westphalia. The olive is not planted, because to it, even in the warmest part of Germany, the winters would prove fatal.

555. The common cultivation includes all the different corns, and many or most of the legumes, roots, herbage, and grasses, grown in Britain. They grow excellent hemp, flax, and oats; and rye is the bread-corn of all Germany. They also cultivate turnips, rapeseed, madder, woad, tobacco, hops, saffron, teasel, caraway; many garden vegetables, such as white beet, French beans, cabbage, carrots, parsneps, &c.; and some medicinal plants, as rhubarb, lavender, mint, &c. ; independently of their garden culture of fruits, culinary vegetables, and herbs for apothecaries. The most common rotation in Germany is two corn crops and a fallow; or, in poor lands, one or two corn crops, and two or three years' rest; but in rich lands, in the south-western districts, green crops or legumes intervene with those of corn.

556. The best pastures and meadows are in Holstein, and along the margin of the German Ocean; and for the same reasons as in Holland and Britain, viz. the mildness and moisture of the winters. There are also good pastures and meadows on the Danube, in Hungary; but the great heats of summer stimulate the plants too much to send up flowers; and the culture there is not so perfected as to regulate this tendency by irrigation. Irrigation, however, is very scientifically conducted in some parts of Holstein, and on the Rhine and Oder.

557. The operations and implements of German agriculture vary exceedingly. They are wretched in Hungary, and some parts of Bohemia, where six or more oxen may be seen drawing a clumsy plough, entirely of wood, and without a mould-board. In Denmark, Hanover, and in Prussia, they use much better ploughs, some of which have iron mould-boards; and in many places they are drawn by a pair of oxen or horses. The plough, in the more improved districts, has a straight beam, two low wheels, a share, which cuts nearly horizontally, and a wooden mould-board sometimes partially shod with iron it is drawn by two horses. In Friesland, and some parts of Holstein, the Dutch swing-plough is used. The common waggon

:

is a heavy clumsy machine on low wheels. (fig. 65.) The theoretical agriculturists are well acquainted with all the improved implements of Britain, and some of them have been introduced, especially in Holstein, Hanover, and Westphalia; but these are nothing in a general view. Horses are the most common animals of labour in the north

65

and west of Germany, and oxen in the south. Fallows are rarely well cultivated; and nothing can be worse than the mode of resting lands, and leaving them to be covered with weeds during two or three years in succession.

558. Of the live stock of Germany, the best breeds of working horses and of oxen are in Holstein, and some districts between Hamburg and Hanover. The best saddle horses are reared in Hungary. There are also excellent oxen and cows reared in that country, and exported to Italy and Turkey. The best sheep are in Saxony and Prussia, where the Spanish breed has been naturalised. Swine are common; but the breed is every where very indifferent. Goats are reared in the mountains; and also asses and mules. The forests are stocked with wild deer, boars, stags, hares, and other game. Fish are carefully bred and fattened in some places, especially in Prussia; and poultry is every where attended to, and carried to a high degree of luxury at Vienna. Bees are attended to in the neighbourhood of the forests; and silkworms in the southern districts, as far as Presburg. Canary and other singing birds are reared in Westphalia, and exported to most parts of Europe. 559. The culture of forests is particularly attended to in Germany, for the same reasons as in France, and the details in both countries are nearly the same. The number of German books on Forst-wissenschaft is astonishing, and most of the writers seem to consider woodlands in that country as a more eligible source of income than any other. 560 The common agriculture of Germany may be considered as every where in a state of gradual improvement. Both governments and individuals have formed institutions for its promotion, by the instruction of youth in its principles and most enlightened practices; or for the union of men of talent. The Imperial Society of Vienna, the Georgical Institution of Presburg, and that of the late Professor Thaer, in Prussia, may be mentioned as recent efforts. The farmers in Germany are particularly deficient in the breeding and rearing of horses, cattle, sheep, and swine. Of the latter two, they require new breeds from judicious crosses; and the former require selection, and much more care in rearing. The implements of husbandry also require to be improved, and the importance of working fallows in a very different manner from what is now done should be inculcated. If peace continue, there can be no doubt that these, and all other ameliorations will go rapidly forward; for the spirit of agricultural improvement is at present, perhaps, more alive in Germany than in any other country of Europe.

561. In noticing some traits of agriculture in the different states of Germany, we shall begin with Denmark at the most northerly extremity, and proceed, in the order of geographical position, to Hungary in the south.

SUBSECT. 2. Agriculture of the Kingdom of Denmark, including Greenland and Iceland. 562. The improvement of the agriculture of Denmark may be dated from 1660, when the king became despotic, and was enabled to carry measures of national benefit into execution without the jarring interference of councils. The slaves of the crown were immediately made free, and the example followed by several wealthy proprietors. Acts were passed for uniting and consolidating landed property by equitable exchanges, and for preventing the right of free way; both which led to enclosures, draining, and irrigation. There are now better meadows, and more hedges and walls, in Denmark, than in any country of Germany of the same extent. Various institutions for instruction and reward were formed, and among others, in 1686, the first veterinary school founded in Germany. Artificial grasses and herbage plants enter into most rotations, and rye-grass is perhaps more sown in Holstein than any where, except in England. In a word, considering the disadvantages of climate, the agriculture of Denmark is in a more advanced state than that of any other kingdom of Germany.

563 The Danish farm-houses are described by Dr. Neale, in 1805, as "generally built upon the same plan, having externally the appearance of large barns, with folding doors at each end, and of sufficient size to admit loaded waggons; on one hand are the apartments occupied by the farmer and his family; on the other, the stable, cow-house, dairy, and piggery; in the centre, a large space, set apart for the waggons, ploughs, harrows, and other implements of husbandry; and overhead, the granary and hay-loft." As the postmasters are generally farmers, it is customary to drive in at one end; change horses, and then drive out at the other, which is the case in the north of Germany and in Poland, and more or less so in every part of the north of Europe.

564. Of the farmer's family, the same accomplished traveller observes, "we were often agreeably surprised at finding the living-apartments furnished with a degree of comfort and neatness bordering upon luxury; every article was substantially good in itself, and was preserved in the greatest order and deanliness. Thus, white muslin curtains, with fringes and draperies, covered the windows; lookingglasses and chests of drawers were placed around; excellent large feather beds, and a profusion of the best well-bleached linen displayed the industry of the good housewives, while their dinner tables were equally well supplied with damask cloths, and snow-white napkins; and near the doors of the dairies were ranged quantities of large, singularly shaped, brass and copper vessels, bright as mirrors." 565 The dimensions of some of their buildings, he says, " is surprising; one measured 110 yards long, resembling in extent the area of Westminster Hall. On the tops of their roofs are generally displayed a set of antlers, and a weathercock; on others, two horses' heads are carved out in wood, and announce the rank of the inhabitants; the antlers, or rather bulls' horns, denot ing the house of a tenant; and the horses' heads, that of a landed proprietor. This form of building (fig. 66.) seems to have been adopted from the earliest ages amongst the inhabitants of northern Germany," similar ones are described by Joannes Lasicius in the

as

566. The rural economy of Greenland and Iceland has been given, the former by Crantz, and the latter by Sir G. Mackenzie. Only a small part of Greenland produces pasture, and a still smaller part grain. The culture of the last, however, is now given up. Cabbages and turnips grow well in the gardens, and there are some oak trees, brambles, and junipers between the 60° and 65° N. lat. Sir G. Mackenzie thinks potatoes and barley might succeed in some places. There are considerable pasture farms, a good and hardy breed of horses, and herds and flocks of cattle and sheep. Farmers have no leases, but pay rent in kind, and cannot be removed from the land unless it can be proved that they have neglected its culture; that is, they hold on the metayer system. The stock of cattle and sheep is considered as belonging to the soil of the landlord. A tenant may quit his farm whenever he chooses, but must leave the proper amount of stock to be taken by his successor.

SUBSECT. S. Of the Agriculture of the Kingdom of Prussia.

567. The agriculture of Prussia was considerably advanced by its second king, Frederic William, who is said to have imported 16,000 men from Saltzburg, and expended 25 millions of francs in building villages and distributing lands among them. His successor, Frederick the Great, after having procured a peace, made exertions in agriculture as extraordinary as in war and architecture. He drained and brought into cultivation the borders of the lakes of the Netz and the Wasta, and established 3500 families on what before was a marsh. He drained the marsh of Fridburg, and established on it 400 families. He made extensive drainages, enclosures, and other improvements in Brandenburg, and in Pomerania, and built the extensive embankments of Dallast, in Friesland, by which, by degrees, a large tract of land was recovered, which the sea submerged in 1724. He formed a Council of Woods and Waters for managing the national forests, and regulating rivers and lakes. He established the Royal Economical Society of Potsdam, and other societies, and cultivated a farm. He created a market for agricultural produce, by the establishment of manufactures; and, in short, he left nothing unattempted that might benefit his kingdom. The successors of the great Frederic have not distinguished themselves as encouragers of agriculture, with the exception of the present king, Frederic William I.

568. The surface and soil of a country so extensive as Prussia are necessarily various ; but, nevertheless, there are few or no mountainous or hilly districts, or fertile plains. The prevailing soil is sand, and almost the whole of the country is in aration.

569. The soil of the maritime provinces of Prussia is in general so light, that it may be easily ploughed with two oxen, and those of diminished size, and no great strength. Jacobs not unfrequently saw, on the smaller portions of land, a single cow drawing the plough, and whilst the plough was guided by the owner, the cow was led by his wife. The more tenacious soils, on the banks of the streams, are commonly but of small extent. There is, indeed, a large portion of land in the delta, formed by the separation of the Nogat from the Vistula, between Derschau and Marienburg, which, under a good system of management, would be highly productive, and which requires greater strength to plough; there are some others, especially near Tilsit, of less extent; but the whole of them, if compared with the great extent of the surface of the country, are merely sufficient to form exceptions to the general classification which may be made of the soil. (Jacob on the Trade in Corn, and on the Agriculture of Northern Europe.)

570. The landed estates in Prussia, previously to the year 1807, were large, and could only be held by such as were of noble birth, or by merchants, manufacturers, or artisans, who had obtained a patent of nobility. When the French had overrun the country, in 1807, these restrictions were removed; and, by successive measures, personal services have been abolished, and the whole of the enslaved peasants have become converted into freemen and freeholders. These small and numerous freeholders are the occupiers and principal cultivators of the soil; rent-paying farmers being seldom to be met with, except in the vicinity of large towns, and on the domains of the crown. (Ibid.)

571. The general course of cultivation in Prussia is to fallow every third year, by ploughing three times when designed for rye, or five times if intended for wheat, and allowing the land to rest without any crop during the whole of the year, from one autumn to the next. Most of the land is deemed to be unfit for the growth of wheat, under any circumstances. Where it is deemed adapted to that grain, as much as can be manured, from their scanty supply of that article, is sown with wheat, and the remainder of the fallow-ground with rye. The portion which is destined for wheat, even in the best farms, is thus very small; and, as on many none is sown, the whole of the land devoted to wheat does not amount to one tenth of that on which rye is grown. (Ibid.) 572. The live stock, in proportion to the surface, is very deficient. According to a calculation by Mr. Jacob, the proportion of animals to an acre, over the whole of East Prussia, West Prussia, and Pomerania, is less than one third of what it is in England.

573. The implements of husbandry are quite of as low a description as the working cattle. The ploughs are ill-constructed, with very little iron on them. The harrows are made of wood, without any iron, even for the tines or teeth. The waggons are mere planks, laid on the frame loose, and resting against upright stakes fixed into its sides. The cattle are attached to these implements by ropes, without leather in any part of the harness. The use of the roller is scarcely known, and the clods, in preparing the fallowground, are commonly broken to pieces by hand with wooden mallets. In sowing, the seed is carried in the apron or the skirts of the frock of the man who scatters it on the ground. (Ibid.)

574. The produce of the soil, whether in corn or cattle, is of an inferior quality, and bears a low money price. The scale of living of all classes, is influenced by this state of things. The working classes, including both those who work for daily wages, and those who cultivate their own little portions of land, live in dwellings provided with few conveniences, on the lowest and coarsest food; potatoes, rye, and buckwheat form their chief, and frequently their only, food; linen, from flax of their own growth, and cloth from wool spun by their own hands, both coarse, and both worn as long as they will hold together, furnish their dress; whilst an earthen pot that will bear fire, forms one of the most valuable articles of their furniture. (Ibid.)

575. The improvement of the agriculture of Prussia is ardently desired by the present government, and in consequence, about twenty-four years ago, the Agricultural Institution of Moegelin on the Oder, conducted by the late Von Thaer, justly celebrated in Germany as an agricultural writer, was founded. This institution was visited by Jacob in 1819; and from his Travels we shall give a short account of it.

516. The Agricultural Institution of Moegelin is situated in the country or march of Brandenburg, about forty-five miles from Berlin. The chief professor, Von Thaer, was formerly a medical practitioner at Celle, near Luneburg, in the kingdom of Hanover; and had distinguished himself by the translation of various agricultural works from the French and English, and by editing a Magazine of Rural Economy. About 1804, the King of Prussia invited him to settle in his dominions, and gave him the estate of Moegelin to improve and manage as a pattern farm.

5. This estate consists of 1200 acres. Thaer began by erecting extensive buildings for himself, three professors, a variety of tradesmen, the requisite agricultural buildings, and a distillery. The three professors are, one for mathematics, chemistry, and geology; one for veterinary knowledge; and a third for botany and the use of the different vegetable productions in the Materia Medica, as well as for entomology. Besides these, an experienced agriculturist is engaged, whose office it is to point out to the pupils the mode of applying the sciences to the practical business of husbandry. The course com. mences in September. During the winter months, the time is occupied in mathematics, and the first six books of Euclid are studied; and in the summer, the geometrical knowledge is practically applied to the measurement of land, timber, buildings, and other objects. The first principles of chemistry are unfolded By a good but economical apparatus, various experiments are made, both on a large and small scale. For the larger experiments, the brew-house and still-house with their respective fixtures are found highly useful

58. Much attention is paid to the analysation of various soils, and the different kinds, with the relative quantity of their component parts, are arranged with great order and regularity. The classifica. tion is made with neatness, by having the specimens of soil arranged in order, and distinguished by different colours. Thus, for instance, if the basis of the soil is sandy, the glass has a cover of yellow paper; if the next predominating earth is calcareous, the glass has a white ticket on its side; if it is red clay, it has a red ticket; if blue clay, a blue one. Over these tickets, others, of a smaller size, indicate by their colour the third greatest quantity of the particular substance contained in the soil. This matter may appear to many more ingenious than useful, and savouring too much of the German habit of generalising. The classification of Von Thaer is, however, as much adopted, and as commonly used on the large estates in Germany, where exact statistical accounts are kept, as the classification of Linnæus in natural history is throughout the civilised world.

57. There is a large botanic garden, arranged on the system of the Swedish naturalist, kept in excellent order, with all the plants labelled, and the Latin as well as German names. A herbarium, with a good collection of dried plants which is constantly increasing, is open to the examination of the pupils, as well as skeletons of the different animals, and casts of their several parts, which must be of great use in veterinary pursuits. Models of agricultural implements, especially of ploughs, are preserved in a museum, which is stored as well with such as are common in Germany, as with those used in England, or other countries.

5) The various implements used on the farm are all made by smiths, wheelers, and carpenters, residing round the institution; the workshops are open to the pupils, and they are encouraged by attentive inspection, to become masters of the more minute branches of the economy of an estate.

581. The sum paid by each pupil is four hundred rix-dollars annually, besides which they provide their own beds and breakfasts. In this country, such an expense precludes the admission of all but youths of good fortune. Each has a separate apartment. They are very well behaved young men, and their conduct to each other, and to the professors, was polite, even to punctilio.

552 Jacob's opinion of this institution is, that an attempt is made to crowd too much instruction into too short a compass, for many of the pupils spend but one year in the institution; and thus only the foundation, and that a very slight one, can be laid in so short a space of time. It is, however, to be presumed, that the young men come here prepared with a considerable previous knowledge, as they are mostly between the ages of twenty and twenty-four, and some few appeared to be still older.

and oats.

acre.

58 The farm at Moegelin was examined by Jacob in the autumn. The soil is light and sandy, and the climate cold. The wheat was put in the ground with a drill of Thaer's invention, which sows and covers nine rows at once, and is drawn by two horses. The saving of seed Thaer considers the only circumstance which makes drilling preferable to sowing broad-cast, as far as respects wheat, rye, barley, The average produce of wheat is sixteen bushels per acre: not much is sown in Prussia, as rye is the bread corn of that country; it produces, with Thaer, twenty-two bushels and a half to the The usual rotation of crops is, potatoes or peas, rye, clover, and wheat. Winter tares are killed by the frost, and the summer species come to nothing, owing to the dry soil and drought. The spurry Spergula) is therefore grown for the winter food of sheep; it is sown on the stubbles immediately after harvest, and in six weeks furnishes an herbage of which the sheep are very fond, and which is said to be very nutritious. Potatoes are a favourite crop; and the small-tubered and rather glutinous ill-flavoured sort common in France and Germany is preferred, as containing more starch in proportion to bulk, than the large kinds. Thaer maintains that, beyond a certain size, the increase of the potato is only water and

not nutriment. The produce per acre is 300 bushels or five tons, which, Thaer contends, contain more nutriment than twenty tons of turnips, because the proportion of starch in potatoes to that in turnips is more than four to one. The soil is excellent for turnips, but the long series of dry weather, common on the Continent in the beginning of summer, renders them one of the most uncertain of crops.

584. A brewery and distillery are the necessary accompaniments of every large farming establishment in Germany. The result of many experiments in the latter proved that the same quantity of alcohol is produced from 100 bushels of potatoes as from twenty-four bushels of wheat, or thirty-three of barley. As the products of grain or of potatoes are relatively greater, the distillery is regulated by that proportion. During the enforcement of the Continental system, many experiments were tried in making sugar from native plants. Von Thaer found, after many trials, that the most profitable vegetable from which sugar could be made was the common garden turnip (of which variety Jacob did not ascertain), and that whilst sugar was sold at a rix-dollar the pound, it was very profitable to extract it from that root. The samples of sugar made during that period from different roots, the processes, and their results, are carefully preserved in the museum, but would now be tedious to describe. They are certainly equal in strength of sweetness, and those refined, in colour and hardness, to any produced from the sugar-cane of of the tropics.

585. The improvement of the breed of sheep, which has been an important object of this establishment, as far as the fineness of the wool is regarded, has admirably succeeded. By various crosses from select Merinos, by sedulously excluding from the flock every ewe that had coarse wool, and, still more, by keeping them in a warm house during the winter, Von Thaer has brought the wool of his sheep to great fineness, far greater than any that is clipped in Spain; but the improvement of the carcass has been neglected, so that his, like all other German mutton, is very indifferent.

586. The various kinds of wool have been arranged by Von Thaer, with the assistance of the professors of the institution, on cards; and the fineness of that produced from different races of sheep, is discriminated with geometrical exactness. The finest are some specimens from Saxony, his own are the next. The fine Spanish wool from Leon is inferior to his, in the proportion of eleven to sixteen. The wool from Botany Bay, of which he had specimens, is inferior to the Spanish. He had arranged, by a similar mode, the relative fineness of the wools produced on the different parts of the body of the sheep, so as to bring under the eye, at one view, the comparative value of the different parts of the fleeces; and he had, also, ascertained the proportionate weight of those different parts. The application of optics and geometry, by which the scales that accompany the specimens are constructed, is such as to leave no doubts on any mind of the accuracy of the results. The scales, indeed, show only the fineness, and not the length of the fibre; which is, I believe, of considerable importance in the process of spinning. The celebrity of the Moegelin sheep is so widely diffused, that the ewes and rams are sold at enormous prices to the agriculturists in East Prussia, Poland, and as far as Russia.

587. The breeding of cows and the management of a dairy are secondary objects, as far as the mere farming is regarded; but it is attended to with care, for the sake of the pupils, who thus have before their eyes that branch of agricultural practice, which may be beneficial on some soils though not adapted to this. The cows are in good order, of an excellent breed; and, considering that they are, like the sheep, fed only on potatoes and chopped straw, are in good condition. They yield, when in full milk, from five to six pounds of butter weekly. The custom of killing the calves, when only a fortnight or three weeks old, prevails here as well as elsewhere in Germany. There is no disputing about taste; but though veal is a favourite food in Germany at the tables of the rich, it always seems very unpleasant to an Englishman. 588. The ploughs at Moegelin are better constructed than in most parts of Germany. They resemble our common swing-plough, but with a broader fin at the point of the share. The mould-board is constructed on a very good principle and with great skill; the convexity of its fore-part so gradually changing into concavity at the hinder-part as to turn the soil completely upside down. The land is cleanly and straightly ploughed, to the depth of six and a half or seven inches, with a pair of oxen, whose usual work is about an acre and a quarter each day.

589. A threshing-machine is rarely used, and only to show the pupils the principle on which it is constructed, and the effect it produces; but having neither wind nor water machinery to work it, the flail is almost exclusively used, the threshers receive the sixteenth bushel for their labour. The rate of wages

to the labourers is four groschen a day, winter and summer, besides which, they are provided with habitations and fuel. The women receive from two to three groschen, according to their strength and skill. They live on rye-bread or potatoes, thin soup, and scarcely any animal food but bacon, and a very small portion even of that; yet they look strong and healthy, and tolerably clean.

590. The culture of the vine and the rearing of the silkworm are carried on in the more southerly of the recent territorial accessions which have been made by Prussia. The culture of culinary vegetables is carried on round Erfurth, and other towns furnished with them whose neighbourhoods are less favourable for their growth. Garden seeds are also raised at Erfurth, and most of the seedsmen of Germany supplied with them. Anise, canary, coriander, mustard, and poppy seeds are grown for distillers and others, and woad, madder, teasel, saffron, rhubarb, &c., for dyers and druggists.

591. The present king of Prussia has done much for agriculture, and is said to design more, by lessening the feudal claims of the lords; by permitting estates even of knightly tenure to be purchased by burghers and non-nobles; by simplifying the modes of conveyance and investiture; by setting an example of renouncing most of the feudal dues on his vast patrimonial estates; and by making good communications by roads, rivers, and canals, through his extensive territories. (Jacob's Travels, 189.)

SUBSECT. 4. Of the Agriculture of the Kingdom of Hanover.

592. The agriculture of the kingdom of Hanover has been depicted by Hodgson as it appeared in 1817. The territory attached to the free town of Hanover, previously to its elector being made king of Britain, was very trifling; but so many dukedoms and other provinces have been since added, that it now contains upwards of 11,045 square geographical miles, and 1,314,104 inhabitants.

593. An agricultural society was founded in Hanover in 1751, by Geo. II., and about the same time one at Celle in Luneburg. The principal business of the latter was to superintend and conduct a general enclosure of all the common lands; it was conducted by Meyer, who wrote a large work on the subject. The present Hanoverian ministry are following up the plans of Meyer, and, according to Hodgson, are "extremely solicitous to promote agriculture."

One sixth belongs to corporations of towns The crown lands are let

594. The landed property of Hanover may be thus arranged: the sovereign, possibly three sixths to the nobles, one sixth to the and religious bodies, and less than one sixth to persons not noble. to noblemen, or rather favoured persons, at very moderate rents, who either farm them or sublet them to farmers. There are six hundred and forty-four noble properties, but few of them with mansions, the proprietors living in towns. For a nobleman to live in