viduals respected. The extent to which fruit is grown in any country indicates how much liberty is enjoyed, and how much intelligence the people possess. In England more fruit was raised two hundred years ago than now, for then each yeoman, living on a small farm of his own, cultivated fruit of all kinds, and in the aggregate the amount was large. When the yeomen removed to America, their lands were united to large farms, and when the orchards decayed, there was no one interested in replanting them, for only one family owning the soil, was to be supplied. For the same reasons such productions as eggs, poultry, honey, and feathers, which once were in full supply, now are largely imported from France, for the reason that in this country much of the land is owned by the cultivators. But into such small parcels is the land divided in France, that they scarcely deserve the name of farms. In the United States, fruit-growing is more extensive, and the business is pursued with more energy and skill than in any other part of the world. The French have the reputation of being skillful fruit-growers, but this would seem not the case, for the reason that foremen and not proprietors are in charge, and wherever this is the case, a pursuit can be successful only in part. On the occasion of several Horticultural Exhibitions, both in England and France, where large numbers of specimens of apples and pears were shown, it was found upon inspection that many plates bearing different names were the same. Such ignorance in any fruit-grower's collection in this country would stamp him as a pretender. It is true, that about forty years ago, there was great confusion regarding varieties in all our nurseries, but in the general advancement of agricultural, and other knowledge, it has disappeared.

It is taken for granted that English farming is better than ours, and they who suppose so, speak of the high average of their wheat crop and their fine breeds of cattle. So little attention has been paid to what may be called Agricultural Geography, that many errors arise. England by reason of climate alone has no superior. The large amount of moisture, and at the same time the tendency of the Gulf Stream to give a much higher temperature than would be natural in so high a latitude, undoubtedly do make it the best country for the grasses in the world. Perhaps, however, a belt of country some 200 miles wide and 1,500 miles long, through the center of which runs the parallel of forty-one degrees, and reaching from the Atlantic in New England, to the great plains in Kansas and Nebraska, is nearly equal. It would be impossible to grow the Short-horns, or the South-downs, or Leicesters in France as successfully as they are grown in England. On the prairies of Illinois, where grass and grain are abundant, the common herds of cattle, with good care and with perhaps a slight dash of Durham blood, have been brought up to a grade nearly equal to pure Durhams, and they are constantly improving. When the Kerry cattle, which thrive on short and rough feed, are transferred to rich pastures, they gradually lose their distinctive character and progress towards a higher type. That England raises more wheat than we raise is true, but they do not raise a bushel at less cost. Only by raising double crops can their rent be paid. High farming there is

as much an evidence of impending distress as of agricultural skill. Whether farming is good or poor is not to be decided by large or small crops of coarse products, but by the condition of the laboring people. If wages are low, if the laborer is ignorant, and if he has no other home in his old age than the hospital or the work house, farming is not good, because it shows that food is scarce, and it is scarce because with such labor only meat and bread can be raised. Whenever grain is raised to be sent out of a country, the average yield will be smaller than if the same amount finds a market at home among manufacturing people. It is probably an advantage to us that we raise so little wheat, for whatever we spare now enriches the soil of England and impoverishes our own, and until a proper time the capacities of our soil might as well remain undeveloped.

That time is rapidly approaching. Changes which in former periods of human progress required many ages, now occur in a few generations. Goethe says that although progress seems to be in a circle, for the past appears to be repeated, still this circle is a spiral, hence, the short time in which a circle in these last ages is repeated. There are signs that new conditions are before us, called into being by improved methods of culture and above all, by the advance in mechanic arts. Whenever changes come, distress is an attendant. The most startling fact is, that when crops shall be cut short by reason of drought, frost or the ravages of insects, as great a deficiency will be found now as ever existed in semi-barbarous ages. The immense growth of cities and towns through the interior, with a population which consumes but does not produce, already have made the market in these places where bread used to be cheap, comparatively dear, and as this class of people increases, bread must grow still dearer and more deficient in supply. Meanwhile, the demand from sea board cities and foreign countries is so constant and the means of transportation so easy and uninterrupted, that it is impossible for stocks of any kind of food to accumulate; hence when distress comes, as come it must, nowhere will there be granaries from which supplies can be drawn. This condition is not confined to our country alone. The grain regions of Russia, Hungary, the Black Sea and Egypt, are swept every year by demands from the commercial nations of western Europe, and now, notwithstanding their triumphs in science, arts and agriculture, bread is as difficult to obtain as when the land was sown by women or slaves and the plow was the crooked branch of a tree hardened in the fire. Continually does a merciless destiny seem to pursue the human race. Still, with the diffusion of knowledge and with expertness in many industries, we must turn and grapple with this destiny that what has been gained through many ages of suffering and tears may not be lost.

To bring agriculture another important step forward, it is required that the high culture established in England for the growing of special crops on a large scale should be applied to the small farm system in America. This can be done by giving such an education to those of our young men intending to be farmers, as shall enable them to cultivate by their own labor a few acres devoted to a variety of productions, with the same success that wheat

and roots are grown in England by hired labor. Our Common School system, the intelligence and wealth of our people, prepare the way for our agricultural colleges. These may or may not be successful at their outset, but should they fail in whole or in part, the need for such knowledge as they alone can give will compel the repetition of efforts until our hopes shall be realized. Whenever a class of men, both educated and practical, shall appear, such changes will follow as would shock many were they to come now.

Scientific agriculture, properly speaking, is so little understood that it has not even been defined. Every science must have for its foundation a classification, the element of which is analysis, but this has not been attempted in agriculture. The first steps in this direction will be to consider what productions belong to particular climates in connection with particular soils, and the lines of latitude and even of longitude are to be traced on which particular crops can be grown most successfully. This will require many details and the whole will come under the general head of Agricultural Geography.

Next, one should have a general analysis of soils, by which it will be ascertained from what sources they have been derived, whether from the decomposition of primitive, lime or sand-rock or from secondary elements such as fresh and salt water deposits, and decayed vegetation, including the order of their formation, their depth, also the effect of climate, rain fall and local influences, all of which will come under the general head of Agricultural Geology. When these divisions in all their necessary details are classified, the way will be opened for chemical agriculture by which the application of special fertilizers may be intelligently and profitably made. And yet, this is the only branch of scientific agriculture which has hitherto demanded attention, although it is anticipating its position of time by at least one generation of active and broad investigation. Whatever may be the success of scientific men in other branches where they discover principles and leave others to make the application, little can be expected from their researches as thus far conducted in regard to the agriculture of a continent, where the elevation of the laborer is of first importance. Great changes must come before the scientific agriculturist shall himself plant and cultivate the soil which he studies, still, changes certainly are before us, and. the change referred to will be no greater than has taken place since the time when the cultivator wore a brass collar around his neck inscribed with his master's name. If the investment of capital in improved real estate shall be continued, the time must come when land will be in a few hands, and the laborer will be degraded. Nor can there be relief except by revolution, for there are no more continents to be discovered to keep back the evil day. Nothing is better settled than that the management, economies and yield of large farms are less than on the same amount of land divided into small farms. This is manifest from the fact that the large landed proprietor knows as if by instinct, that only coarse staple articles of food can be grown at a profit, and accordingly their efforts are so limited as in English farming. By such a system, an overseer directs, wages must be low because skill is neither de

veloped nor required, and the laborer sinks almost to a level with the animal he drives. Fortunately, there is so much land in America, and it has gone into the hands of so many, that at present wages are high, and it may be generally stated that farming on a large scale is unprofitable, while in many cases, whether on a large or small scale where wages are paid, all the profits are absorbed. Notwithstanding that land is growing still dearer, so great is the success attendant upon the small farm system, the happiness, the intelligence and the independence it has produced, that which has been gained can neither be lost nor forgotten, and before the people of this country would submit to the accumulation of land in a few hands, they would arise and demand that their natural right to the soil be confirmed by agrarian laws.

Had attention been called to one subject before, less labor, time and vexation would be required to adopt a proper plan now. This is the employment of the wicked, the ignorant and the idle. No high standard can be reached, and labor cannot be justly rewarded, while so many able-bodied men eat the bread of idleness. These should be the care of the state. Millions of acres of highly productive land can be obtained by drainage, which now exhale miasmas, breeding fevers and pestilence; while other millions yielding small or uncertain crops, require the application of much labor that their product may be abundant and sure.

That this class, now, in the aggregate, beginning to be numerous enough to make a nation, should prey upon the industrious and taint the moral atmosphere with the miasm of wickedness, should be left unrestrained to generate crime without a hope of improvement, is a disgrace to our civilization. In self-defence, and if necessary by force, they must be set to work, and when they learn how much labor sweetens and purifies life, they will be thankful to be taught how to live. This measure is demanded that man himself may be elevated, and that the whole world may be made better. Possibly our own vagrants might be absorbed by the operations of natural causes, but we can do little with the multitudes of foreigners who in an uninterrupted stream crowd to our shores with no other knowledge than that of living some how without labor. The next progressive move among advanced nations, will be first in considering, and next, in executing, a plan for transforming swindlers, petty thieves and beggars into steady and useful laborers. No enterprise conducted by the state has ever been so successful as when connected with practical agriculture. Some excellent farms in our country have few or no laborers, but such as are insane. At Lusk, near Dublin, Ireland, a government farm is worked by criminals of an intermediate grade, with the most remarkable success, for under skillful but mild management and without guards, the productions are abundant. Progress in the reformation of the criminal is almost in exact proportion to his progress in becoming a good farmer. The Divine blessing seems to descend upon him who earns his bread by the sweat of his brow, and we may suspect that more crimes originate from idleness and ignorance than from an evil heart.

CURRENCY AND FINANCE.

BY HORACE GREELEY.

The use of Gold and Silver as measures of the value of, and media of payment for, all other property, is older than History—older than Tradition. So long ago as the time of Abraham, we find that Silver had been divided or cast into "shekels" of definite valuc, and doubtless of specific weight also. The oldest pieces still existing are of square or oblong form, rather thinner than our modern coins of similar size: such were the Jewish "shekels," and such are the Japanese "itzebus" and other coins of to-day. Older than the invention of letters, the most ancient pieces of silver had no inscriptions, and were distinguished from those of different values, by size only. The circular form and raised edges of the coins of modern Christendom were obviously adopted to reduce to a minimum the loss of metal by wearing or rubbing. Governments, at an early day, coined gold and silver, and gave them legal recognition as money; but they had already been made such by the common consent of the more enlightened portions of mankind; while savages who lacked them were constrained to employ shells, beads, iron, nails, and other things less convenient and less widely accepted.

Though paper money was unknown till the invention of printing, kings had often, when sorely pressed by the exigencies of war or the fruits of their own prodigality, called in the money of their subjects for re-coinage, and debased it from ten to fifty per cent.-replenishing their coffers by impoverishing all within their power. They were ready enough to borrow when in need-as they often were-and were willing to pay (or rather promise) liberal rates of interest; but few were inclined to lend them, except at short dates and on the distinct pledge of jewels and other valuables, or of specified revenues, as security for repayment. Royal debts were thus frequently incurred in preparing for some crusade or other costly expedition; but National debts, now so vast and so general, are mainly the creation of the last century.

Rome, having absorbed the then civilized world, and having, by the introduction or the toleration of Slavery, degraded labor and discouraged industrial progress, the discovery of mines and the production of the precious met als nearly ceased; while the luxurious tastes and habits of the wealthy impelled a continual importation of silks, spices, &c., from India and China, which took little but gold and silver in return. The circulating medium of exchanges and payments being thus insensibly drawn away and not replaced, the Roman Empire languished under a growing dearth of money and a steady decline of prices. As fixed property constantly depreciated in value, those who bought on credit were too often unable to pay at maturity, and so sank into hopeless insolvency. Hence, labor lacked employment, since few chose to plant, or build, or improve, when the resulting property would be worth less than its cost. Population, wealth, prosperity, all declined and dwindled under the combined influences of labor in shackles and enterprise and business devoid of money wherewith to employ and pay that which was still free. And, though the silent progress of Christianity, the fruits of successive irrup