70
AGRICULTURE ON THE RHINE.
have cattle driven from Moldavia to the chief German
meat-markets, and without this care diseases would con-
stantly be spread amongst us.
We have already indulged in many general reflections
in this early portion of our task, but we cannot leave this
district of the Lower Rhine to enter upon the novel and
varied scenes that lie in and beyond the mountains
to whose base we have wandered, without once more
looking back on what we have passed, because w,e feel
that our readers have by this time obtained an insight
into agricultural life that must awaken deep and stirring
reflection. From Cloves to Cologne in a straight line is
about 70 miles ; from Aix-la-Chapelle to Hagen in West-
phalia, the base of the triangle we have ttɪeasured, is
nearly 100 miles. Our triangle is therefore equivalent
to one leaning with its base upon London and Bath, and
having its apex either at the extremity of the Isle of
Wight, or in a northern direction at Coventry. Yet how
different an appearance do the two English districts here
marked out present from the portion of Germany with
which we would compare them 1 Good high roads and
navigable rivers traverse the German as the English dis-
tricts, and afford them the advantages of trade. The popu-
lation is nearly equal in density, and in abundance of iron
and cheapness for the general consumer there is no great
disparity. To the most Unpractisedeye, however, it must
be evident that in the English districts more wealth is
acquired in the year than in the German. The crops are
more abundant, the outlay of capital is repaid sooner, the
prices of produce are all higher in England than on the
Rhine. Let us go into the details of the comparison.
It will hardly be disputed that the profit drawn from
AGRICULTURte OX TH® RHINE.
71
agriculture, as well as from other branches of industry,
is the more conspicuous the fewer the hands are that
divide it. Now since farming, properly so called, is
carried on in England upon allotments varying from IOO
to IOOO acres, whereas the common limits in this part of
Germany are from 10 to 300 acres ; the difference in the
numbers sharing the profits in both countries is at least
as one to eight or perhaps ten. We have no doubt that
the number of estates exceeding 1000 acres, managed by
one farmer in central England, exceeds the number of
those above 300 acres on the Rhine. In the districts
more remote from the thoroughfares of trade, the propor-
tion of the population employed in agriculture is over-
whelming as compared with other occupations. Hence
the low prices of produce in good years, and the difficulty
the Germans find in accumulating capital. Where there
is a superfluity of produce, if all produce the same, there
can be no market. So it is in Germany. Every man
grows his own bread. Who is to buy of those who pro-
duce more than they require for their own consumption ?
It is owing to this circumstance, and not because the cost
of tillage is less, that prices are so low. Toraise them it
will be necessary to open new fields of labour in trade
and manufactures, into which many of the present culti-
vators of the land must be induced to migrate, and thus
to leave to a smaller number the division of the profits in
agriculture. The gift to the peasants of the small lots
they held, in the manner before described, had quite a
contrary tendency, by keeping them on the land which
they would by degrees have left. But at that time, and
even still, the panacea prescribed in Germany for all
widely spread discontent is to subdivide the land. Unless