I shall not stop to point out the difference between the English crisis of 1848 and the French one of the same period. The rural interest is that which suffered most with us also; but it did not suffer alone--all were shaken at once. We witnessed a sudden fall in food -not, as in England, because it was too high, but because, industrial and commercial occupations being at a stand-still, the non-agricultural classes had not the wherewithal to buy food. Consumption, in all branches, in place of increasing, as with our neighbours, was reduced to bare necessaries; and in a country where the ordinary quantity of meat and corn was scarcely sufficient, both were found to exceed the resources of an impoverished population. Farming and property, dismayed, found no support from capital as in England, since much of it had been swept away, and the remainder in alarm was sent out of the country or secreted. Happily, by peculiar favour of Providence, the fruits of the earth were abundant during that trial; for if the least doubt had arisen as to supplies, in the midst of general disorder, we should have seen the horrors of famine associated, as formerly, with the horrors of civil war.

Returning confidence begins to repair in part these disasters. France once again shows, what she has so often shown, especially after the anarchy of '93 and the two invasions, that she cannot do herself an irreparable injury. The more resources she exhibits, in spite of the immense losses she has sustained, the more one is struck with the progress she ought to have realised in the last five years, had she not violently put a stop to her own progress. The receipts from indirect taxation, which is one of the most certain signs of public prosperity, were eight hundred and twenty-five million francs in 1847, and have recovered slowly, after an enormous falling off, to

These would

eight hundred and ten millions in 1852. have reached, in the present year, nine hundred and fifty millions, or one milliard, if the impetus which they had received previous to 1848 had been sustained; and all branches of public wealth would have responded to this brilliant sign of prosperity.

Finally, if I have found it necessary to relate what has taken place in England since 1847, it must not be concluded that a similar revolution appears to me desirable, or even possible, in France. We are in all respects differently circumstanced. To establish cheapness of food cannot be a question with us, for that we already have; since England, after all her efforts, has not been able to come below our highest current rates; and over half the country our prices are only too low. The rich and fully populated parts of the country must not be confounded with those which are not so. The requirements of the one are not at all those of the other. We do not resemble the England of 1846, but the England of 1800. With us it is not production which fails consumption, but, in the half of France at least, it is consumption which falls short of production. Instead of seeing everywhere corn at 56s. per quarter, and meat at 6d. per lb., we have whole districts where the producer scarcely obtains half of these prices for his commodities. It is not a fall, but a rise that they there require. The time is still distant when they will suffer from the excess of demand for their agricultural produce, and from high prices.

But neither must it be imagined that the sliding-scale for corn, and exorbitant duties upon foreign cattle, could do any good to France. In fact, these duties have hitherto had no effect in raising prices: they have rather contributed to lower them by arresting the expansion of

commerce. French agriculture, which considered itself protected, was not, and could not, be so its own prices gave it only too much protection from foreign competition. It is not, then, upon custom-house regulations, but upon the increase of foreign consumption, through the improvement of communication and reciprocity, and in some respects upon exportation, that it should rely for a better market for its products. Every other plan is chimerical, and, what is more, hurtful to its interests. The same freedom of trade which tends to lower prices of food in England, because they are too high, would have rather the contrary effect in France, because they are habitually too low with us, at least in a great many quarters.

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CHAPTER XIII.

HIGH FARMING.

AMONG the innovations in agriculture which the last crisis produced, by far the most important-that which will remain as the most useful effect of that great disturbance is the process of putting the land into good condition, known by the name of drainage. The draining away of superabundant water, especially upon stiff soils, has always been the chief difficulty in English agriculture. Hitherto the means employed for getting rid of it were imperfect. Now, however, the problem is completely solved. "Take this flower-pot," said the President of a meeting in France lately; "what is the meaning of this small hole at the bottom?-to renew the water. And why to renew the water ?—because it gives life or death : life, when it is made only to pass through the bed of earth, for it leaves with the soil its productive principles, and renders soluble the nutritive properties destined to nourish the plant; death, on the other hand, when it remains in the pot, for it soon becomes putrid, and rots the roots, and also prevents new water from penetrating." The theory of drainage is exactly described in this figure.

The new invention consists in employing cylindrical tiles of burnt clay to carry off the water, instead of open ditches, or trenches filled with stones or faggots,-methods known even to the ancients. These tiles are several

The

small hole always open They attract the water, parts, and carry it out

decimetres long, and placed end to end at the bottom of trenches, which are then filled in with earth. It is difficult at first to understand, without having seen the effect of these tiles, how the water can get into them and so escape; but as soon as one sees a drained field, not the smallest doubt of the fact can remain. tiles perform the office of the at the bottom of the flower-pot. which comes to them from all either into drain-pits, or main-drains, where the inclination of the land admits of it. These tiles are often made by machinery, which renders their manufacture inexpensive. They are made of various dimensions, and laid in the trenches at a greater or less depth, and more or less apart, according to the nature of the soil, and the quantity of water to be drained off. The total cost for purchase and laying amounts to about £4 an acre. It is now generally considered that this outlay is money invested at 10 per cent, and the farmers scarcely ever refuse to add to their lease 5 per cent per annum upon the proprietors' outlay for draining.

There is something magical in the effect of draining. Both meadow and arable lands are equally benefited by it. In the meadows, marsh plants disappear; the hay produced is at once more abundant and of better quality.t On the arable lands, even the most clayey, corn and roots shoot more vigorously, and are healthier, and less seed is required for a larger crop. The climate itself gains sensibly by it. The health of the inhabitants is improved; and in

* The decimetre equal to nearly four inches.

+ Experience has shown, for some time past, the danger of draining grassland in the drier parts of England. I mention this exceptional fact here, in order to put upon their guard those who are seeking to introduce drainage into France. One cannot be too cautious where an agricultural innovation is concerned.