is, they, say, absolutely necessary to agricultural progress and improvement. It is only where the land is parceled out in large estates, and belongs to men of wealth and intelligence, that experimental husbandry can be successfully carried on. Experiments and novel processes, to yield a general and reliable result, should be conducted on a large scale. They require a liberal outlay-with a capital which can afford to wait long for profitable returns, and which will not be seriously impaired though the experiments should fail. They demand concentrated, harmonious, persevering action-and such action can be expected only where ample means are wielded by a single mind and single will.

And it is, we are told, just this condition of things, it is the existence in Great Britain of large, enlightened landowners, that has made her agriculture what it is. While in France, and other countries, where the land is owned by millions of small proprietors in little strips and parcels, there is no visible improvement in the husbandry, and from the nature of the case, never can be.

Such, substantially, is the reasoning of the English landlord. To a certain degree, and in an important sense, I think he is right. The broad lands-the long purse-the single purpose and the persistent action-do offer a very great advantage in experimental agriculture. On our small farms and with our moderate capitals, the grand operations of English farming are simply impossible—and there must be great changes in our social and general condition, before we shall see a tract of 5000 acres the property of an individualreceiving the benefit of drainage, under one grand, systematic and scientific operation-from a force of several engineers, and of several hundred men. What would here be thought of such an experiment as that of Mr. Walker on his farm of Newbold Range-where he takes the entire sewage of the town of Rugby-lifts it by steam-power to a height of sixty feet-sends it through more than five miles of iron pipe to all parts of his land—and then, by means of hydrants and

of hose, scatters the fragrant spray over every rod of the ground?

Undoubtedly the science and the art of agriculture are largely indebted for their present advanced condition to the liberal and skillful farming of the English nobility and gentry to their ample domains and their abundant resources. Let them have all the credit they deserve. But even this unquestioned good may be bought too dear. If agricultural improvement can be expected only where the land belongs to a small and powerful aristocracy-and if such an arrangement involves-(as in England it certainly does seem to involve)- the degradation of the masses-then I think we should say-let improvement take care of itself. Surely it is far better that we should get a smaller yield of grass and ruta-bagas, than that man should wither and decay.

But though we have conceded something to the British argument—let it not be supposed that we give up the whole ground-or that we despair of all progress and improvement in agriculture, because our farms and our pecuniary resources are of so limited extent. On the contrary, there has been, as you know, a substantial advance, in our American agriculture, and the signs of a still more auspicious era for the farmer, multiply and brighten on every hand. Meanwhile our generous and well-wishing brethren across the water will, of course, continue their magnificent and praise-worthy operations, not, we trust, without an occasional thrill of disinterested pleasure in the thought, that the class of small farmers in other lands (a class, by the way, which outnumbers them, a thousand to one) though unable to add anything of consequence to the sum of agricultural knowledge and skill, can yet avail themselves of what others are doing, and are not likely either to starve or to freeze, so long as England is there to show them how to raise wheat, and turnips, and wool.*

*JOHN STUART MILL in his chapters on Peasant Proprietors (Political Economy, Vol. I. Book II. 7, 8) gives many facts of great interest and value in regard to the condition and character of the small land-owners in Nor

Let me allude to another difference between our Essex landscape, and that which meets the eye of him, who looks out upon the English counties of Surrey and of Middlesex. Within that range stand the famous schools of Westminster, Eton, and Harrow. We can point our visitor to no such establishments-hoary with age-splendid in their foundations and appointments-and rich with the classic memories of five hundred years. Yet we can show him academies, and high schools, and normal schools of which we are not ashamed, and some of which are known far beyond the limits of County and State. But especially should we call his attention to our small district schools: vines, set by our wise fore-fathers along these hills and valleys,-vines which, nurtured by their grateful children, have become plants of perennial bloom-of unfading leaf-and of never-failing fruitage. Need I add, that this institution-the free-school-standing with open door in each small neighborhood, and within easy reach of every boy and every girl-is something unknown, as yet, to our kinsfolk in England? Is it strange that ignorance and degradation way, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, and France. The conclusions to which he comes on the whole subject of small properties in land,—conclusions which he sustains by the clearest reasoning and the strongest evidence, are certainly very different from those of his countrymen in general. Mr. LAING, an Englishman, who had been much on the continent, even denies the alleged superiority of British farming. I transfer the following from Mill's quotation:

"If we listen to the large farmer, the scientific agriculturist, the ('English') political economist, good farming must perish with large farms; the very idea that good farming can exist, unless on large farms cultivated with great capital, they hold to be absurd. Draining, manuring, economical arrangement, cleaning the land, regular rotations, valuable stock and implements, all belong exclusively to large farms worked by large capital, and by hired labor. This reads very well; but if we raise our eyes from their books to their fields, and coolly compare what we see in the best districts farmed in large farms, with what we see in the best districts farmed in small farms, we see, and there is no blinking the fact, better crops on the ground in Flanders, East Friesland, Holstein,-in short, on the whole line of the arable land of equal quality of the continent, from the Sound to Calais, than we see on the line of British coast opposite to this line, and in the same latitudes, from the Frith of Forth all round to Dover."

prevail to an extent no less alarming than deplorable, among the laboring population of that country? Surely, if moral beauty is of a higher order than that which belongs to art and nature, we might claim the palm in our comparison of scenery, upon this distinction alone.

Reminded of his country's greatness and renown by what he saw before him, our Poet, as you may remember, proceeds to a descriptive enumeration of her heroes and statesmen, her philosophers and bards,-and it is worthy of remark, that in all his catalogue of glory, there is scarcely a name-from Alfred to Hampden-from Bacon to Newton-from Chaucer to Milton-which belonged any more to him, than it belongs to us. And do not we experience the same kindling memories, whenever we survey the much-loved scenery of our native land? Need I remind you that in the chronology of New England, or at least in that of "the Massachusetts," Essex comes next to Plymouth, or that Endicott was here, before Winthrop came? Among our ancestors, the pioneers of Essex, and their descendants from that day to our own, it is our privilege to trace a long, illustrious line-and were not the theme all too fruitful, I could wish for no pleasanter task than here to revive, for an instant, their names and their virtues.

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Let us not forget that a distinguished ancestry sheds no lustre on degenerate children. Say rather, the more renowned our fore-fathers, the more conspicuous our dishonor, if we fall greatly below them. While we aim at a more profitable culture of the earth than our fathers attained—or could, perhaps, attain,-let us bear in mind that there are other fields, fields of the intellect, fields of the heart, from which they gathered many a glorious harvest, and that the momentous question, whether these shall yield us only weeds and briars, or golden, imperishable fruits of joy, will be determined solely by our care, or our neglect of them.

As we run over the ample list of our Essex celebritiesboth the living and the dead-we find many statesmen, ora

tors, divines, lawyers, jurists, scholars, inventors, doctors, teachers, merchants, and farmers. But I do not think we we can lay claim to more than one great prose-writer, or to more than one unquestionable poet. And, surely, the county which gave birth to HAWTHORNE and to WHITTIER, may well feel content with her production in these two departments. No more, alas! with words of wondrous melody and power will Hawthorne delight the world. But the Poet yet lives. Long may he live to enjoy and to sing the harmonies of peace-the anthems of freedom-the triumphs of humanity!