And task of captive tribes, have ceased to be: Extracts, so much longer than we are in the habit of making, are a sufficient proof of our sense of the talent displayed in these poems. The public will be thus enabled to determine whether this talent is not of a cast deserving of a more careful cultivation than has been yet bestowed upon it. Continued and systematic labour, every where the condition of productions really excellent, is a condition more especially attached to our native genius, as well as to our soil and climate. True enough, we all love to 'lie i' th' sun.' But, Mr Alford must learn to have less confidence in the pleasant doctrine that this is the best security for the majesty of earth and sky' descending upon us, and for God's unwritten teaching' passing from human souls into human writing. He must not persist in thinking so slightingly of persons, who 6 6 For, if genius is genius, art is also art; and most assuredly it must be so considered by all to whom the immortality of this world is an object of ambition. Hints are thrown out of a future work, to be by patient labour wrought in manly years' and a desire to teach his thoughts new melodies, and his hand a safer skill, is the reason alleged for pausing for the present. This looks like being aware that he has an arduous training to undergo, before he can justify to the world the internal consciousness, which he apparently possesses, of the call that he has received. In which hope we part;-admiring the spirit that breathes throughout these volumes, and assuring their author that, in our opinion, it will be his own fault, if the buds which are to-day so full of promise, have not opened into a beauteous flower when "next we meet.' 6 ART. III.-1. Rural Recollections, or the Progress of Improvement in Agriculture and Rural Affairs. By GEORGE ROBERTSON, Esq. 8vo. Irvine: 1829. 2. Objects and Advantages of Agricultural Associations. 8vo. London: 1835. T HE increase of manufactures and commerce in Great Britain since 1760 has been so very extraordinary-so unprecedented in the history of industry-that it has engrossed the almost undivided attention of most enquirers into our progress in wealth and civilisation. But, how paradoxical soever the assertion may at first sight appear, we are not sure that the improvement and extension of manufactures can, all things considered, be truly said to have materially exceeded the advances made in agriculture. The results of manufacturing and commercial improvement-the great towns, the factories, warehouses, docks, and other vast establishments, and the increase of population and of wealth to which they give birth-arrest the attention of every one, and impress the mind with the most exalted ideas of their productive powers and capacities. Compared with them, the results of the most im proved and skilful agriculture escape the public attention. They are spread over a wide surface; they have nothing striking or imposing about them; a crop of three quarters an acre does not appear very different from one of four quarters; and a country imperfectly cultivated, especially if it be well wooded, may seem, to a common observer, to be little inferior to, if it do not surpass, one that is cultivated in the most approved and efficient manner. It is only when we survey them in the aggregate, when we bring the scattered and singly inappreciable results of agricultural industry into a collected mass, that we become duly sensible of their magnitude and extreme importance; and that the panegyrics of the ancients on agricultural industry seem to be almost as correct as they are eloquent. The insular situation of Great Britain, and the rigidly enforced regulations under which the trade in corn and other agricultural products has long been conducted, afford the means of establishing some most important conclusions as to the progress of agriculture. If the population has been greatly increased, if all classes be at present better and more liberally fed than at any former period, if the consumption of corn by horses be at least three or four times as great as about the middle of last century; if, we say, all these things have been accomplished, not only without any increase, but with an actual cessation of impor tation, is it not a clear proof that agriculture has been wonderfully improved? It may not be possible to point out the different modes in which the grand result has been brought about, or to measure the exact influence of each, but of the result itself there cannot, under the circumstances supposed, be the shadow of a doubt. We shall briefly show that such has been the case. As to the increase of population in England and Wales, since 1700, it is exhibited in the following table, calculated by Mr Finlaison of the National Debt Office. Population of England and Wales, from the year 1700 to the year 1830, including the Army, Navy, and Merchant Seamen: Years. Population. Years. Population. Years. Population. 1730 1700 5,134,51 6 1750 6,039,684 1800 9,187,176 6,479,730 1810 10,407,556 7,227,586 1820 11,957,565 7,814,827 1830 13,840,751 1740 5,829,705 1790 8,540,738 We regret we have no similar account of the population of Scotland since 1700 to lay before the reader. Its population at the period of the Union in 1707 is generally supposed to have been about 1,050,000; but it was not till 1755 that it was estimated with sufficient accuracy, At that epoch the population was ascertained, from returns communicated from the different parishes to Dr Webster, to be 1,265,380. In 1801 it was found by the census of that year to be 1,599,068; and in 1831 it had increased to 2,365,114, or to nearly double its amount in 1755. Taking the population of England and Wales in 1755 at 6,259,707 (the mean between that of 1750 and 1760), and adding to it the then population of Scotland, we get 7,525,180 for the population of Great Britain in 1755. But the population in 1831 was 16,539,318, showing that in the interval there had been added to it the prodigious number of 9,014,139 individuals, or that it had increased in the ratio of nearly 220 per cent! increase of this sort is unparalleled in any other European country, and is to be matched only by the increase that has taken place in the United States. An Now, we affirm that the improvements that have been made in the agriculture of Great Britain since 1755 have sufficed to provide an ample supply of food for this additional nine millions of inhabitants; and if we suppose, which is certainly a moderate estimate, that they consume, one with another, to the value of L.8 a-year of raw produce, it will follow that the progress made in agriculture, since the middle of last century, has added the enormous sum of £72,000,000 a-year, or more than twice the total value of the cotton manufacture, and nearly three times the interest of the national debt, to the free disposable income of the country. It will not be difficult to show that such is undoubtedly the fact. Mr Charles Smith, the well-informed author of the tracts on the corn trade, estimated the population of England and Wales in 1760 at six millions, which the previous statements show was very near the truth. He then estimated the consumers of each sort of grain, the quantity consumed by each individual, and, consequently, the whole consumed by man, as follows: Consumed by man, In addition to this, Mr Smith estimated the wheat distilled, made into starch, &c. Barley used in Malting, &c. Rye for hogs, &c. Oats for horses, &c. Total of home consumption, Add excess of exports over imports, Add seed (one tenth), Total growth of all kinds of grain in England and Wales, in 1760, 999,000 do. 1,791,225 do. These estimates are believed to have come pretty near the mark; and they are interesting as showing the variations that have taken place in the food of the people. But whether accurate or not is of little importance to our argument. There is, at all events, no doubt about the fact that the average annual excess of the exports of corn over the imports, did not then amount to 400,000 quarters. This is a matter that does not depend upon estimate or conjecture of any kind; but upon the official returns rendered by the custom-house. But we have imported no foreign corn, or next to none, for the last four years; so that it necessarily follows, that all the vast numbers that have been added since 1760 to the population of Great Britain, must be exclusively indebted for their subsistence to the subsequent improvement and extension of agriculture; except in so far as we may suppose this result to be modified by the absorption of the 400,000 quarters referred to above, and by importations from Ireland. The imports from Ireland amount at present to about 2,500,000 or 2,600,000 quarters of all sorts of grain, from 1,600,000 to 1,800,000 quarters being oats. And, adding to the imports from Ireland the 400,000 quarters exported in 1760, the total extra supply, exclusive of that derived from the improvement of the agriculture of Great Britain, may be taken at nearly 3,000,000 quarters, of which about two-thirds are oats. Now, supposing this quantity were altogether used as food for man, it would not provide for more than 1,200,000, or at most 1,500,000 of the 9,000,000 added to our population since 1755 or 1760. In point of fact, however, not a single bushel of it can be fairly regarded as being so used. The horses at present in Great Britain, over and above those kept in 1760, certainly require at least from eight to ten, instead of three millions of quarters of corn, for their consumption: and, in addition to the vast increase of population there has been a material increase in the consumption of each individual. Hence, in measuring the progress of agriculture in Great Britain, as we have done, by the mere increase of population, we are very considerably, indeed, within the mark. To attempt to prove by argument the fact that there has been a wonderful increase in the number of horses since 1760, is, perhaps, presuming too much on the patience of the reader. For every single horse used in posting, in stage coaches, in the conveyance of waggons, vans, &c. along the high-roads in 1760, there are now from twelve to twenty, or more. In some districts there has been a decrease in the number of horses employed in teams; but even in these the total number of horses has been much increased. In Lancashire, the West Riding of Yorkshire, and all the manufacturing districts, the increase in the number of horses has been almost as great as the increase of manufactures; and this also has been the case in London and in all the large towns. We are quite sure that we are within the mark when we say that there are at this moment in Edinburgh, Glasgow, and Dundee, upwards of twenty-five horses for every one that belonged to them in 1760. And the improvement in the keeping of horses has been quite as great as the increase of their number. Mr Charles Smith estimated the consumption of oats by horses in 1760 at 2,461,500 quarters. But no one can be so ill informed as to suppose that this estimate is in any degree applicable to the present times. On the contrary, we are well satisfied, from extensive enquiries made amongst those best informed as to such matters, that the consumption of oats by horses in Great Britain at this moment, is certainly above ten if it do not exceed twelve millions of quarters. But taking it at ten millions only, it follows, that about five millions of quarters more of British corn, after allowing for the entire imports from Ireland, and for the cessation of the exports, are now appropriated to the feeding of horses than in 1760. Hence it appears that the improvement and extension of the agriculture of Great Britain since |