methods of building, whereby the hovel or pigstye of the peasant may be converted into a cleanly, comfortable, and wholesome dwelling, by introducing and encouraging the meliorated culture of their neighbours, and by rejecting the imperfections of their own, the Agricultural Society will pave the way for the gradual growth of that tower of national strength, a bold and independent yeomanry, an order of men unknown and unseen at present, in the Republic, but the pride and glory of Great Britain and America.

Stern o'er each bosom reason holds her state,
With daring aims irregularly great;

Pride in their port, defiance in their eye,

I see the lords of human kind

pass by;

Intent on high designs, a thoughtful band,

By forms unfashion'd, fresh from nature's hand,

Fierce in their native hardiness of soul,

True to imagin'd right, above controul;

While e'en the peasant boasts these rights to scan,
And learns to venerate himself as man.

The members of the Agricultural Society are well aware of the many difficulties which they have to encounter, and the obstinate prejudices to remove, before they can expect to bring the Rural Economy of France to that point of perfection of which it is susceptible. I have paid particular attention to this subject, and have made many minute inquiries, which have been answered with the utmost candour and liberality

by

by those intelligent members to whom I addressed myself at different times. From the whole, I think I am now competent to give you a tolerable account of the present state of Agriculture in France; to point out the principal causes which have hitherto retarded its progress, and the pru dent measures which are in agitation for removing them. As this is a subject, in which I know you take a greater interest than in any other circumstance relative to the French, I have endeavoured to place it in such a light, as to afford you a full view of it, in a very short compass.

In the first place, the same obstacle which interposes itself in the way of agricultural improvement in other parts of the world, exists in a much stronger degree in France, from the astonishing multitude and diversity of local customs, which even the violence of the revolution has not been able to eradicate: I allude principally to the misapplication and misconception of agricultural terms in different departments, which are of such magnitude and intenseness, that two farmers inhabiting contiguous provinces, cannot understand each other. I have several times experienced this difficulty; and when I could derive no instruction from Rozier, I have applied to several distinguished members, both of the Institute and the Agricultural Society, and they have all frankly confessed they were as ignorant as myself of the terms in question. So that unless I could

meet with an inhabitant of Britanny, in which province particular terms are employed, it would be of no use for me to apply elsewhere. I am sensible, that English agriculture lays under a similar imputation, though not to so great an extent.

Now, this impediment at the very outset, shews the difficulties which the society must experience in making known the result of their observations, experiments, and discoveries; while the chief cause of the great progress made in mathematics and chemistry, must be ascribed to the clear and thorough comprehension which every one engaged in those pursuits, has of the terms employed. The best and most useful part of Mr. Locke's Essay on the Human Understanding, is, the commencement of his work, wherein he displays the absolute necessity of acquiring the precise meaning of words. Hence, so long as one man remains entirely ignorant of the precise meaning of the words that are employed by another, he cannot possibly be benefited by the acquirements which he has made; so that here the line must be broken, and each individual must begin with the knowledge that his own observations furnish; nor is he able to communicate the knowledge he has acquired to others, unless it be in a very imperfect degree to his own immediate descendants, or nearest neighbours, to whom he can point out the identical objects themselves, with which he has been

been conversant, and whose qualities he has been able, in part, to ascertain.

In this way we are enabled to account for a fact that must have attracted the notice of every agricultural observer, namely, that striking improvements in this line have ever been of a local nature; and that though these may advance rapidly for a certain time in a particular district, it has always been found to be a matter of no small difficulty to extend them into other districts, or to make them be adopted in other countries. To give an example *: every person who has but entered on the study of agriculture, has heard of three or four grand divisions of soils, viz. clays, sands, loams, and gravels; and to each of these terms he annexes an appropriated idea, which particularly corresponds with the qualities of such soils as have been denominated clays, sands, loams, and gravels, in his native place; so that, whenever a soil of any of these denominations occurs to him, whether in conversation or in writing, he thinks it must be somewhat similar in its nature and qualities to the soils which he has been accustomed to discriminate by those names. But, as the clays of one region are extremely different from the clays of another region, some of the soils so called being endowed with almost inexhaustible fertility, while others are

*From Dr. Anderson.

as justly characterized by that of insuperable sterility, and as there are innumerable shades between these two extremes; as it also happens, that there is a diversity equally great in regard to every other peculiarity of clay, as that which respects its vegetative power; it must follow that, whenever a clayey soil is mentioned among any number of farmers, that single word must convey to each of them a separate idea; and as each of them thinks he understands the word perfectly well, they are not prepared to guard against the fallacy to which this gives birth, or to correct the errors which originate in this source. If it be likewise adverted to, that a similar undefined diversity takes place in regard to soils of every other denomination, it will appear very obvious to every considerate person, that so long as deficiency of language shall be unadverted to, agriculture, as a science, must be at a stand.

To remedy this evil, several plans have been projected; among others, Grégoire proposed in the National Convention, to simplify the language as far as it related to arts, and reduce it to elements common to all. But this could never be effected, without first obtaining the terms, with their definitions, which are adopted in the different departments. In the Agricultural Society, a paper has been read on the propriety of establishing a general system of Agricultural instruction, and of introducing professors into all the central schools, who, by receiving