profits, and this he can do in any year more uniformly and certainly than any other class of his co-farmers.

To become a farmer of this mixed husbandry, a man must be acquainted with every kind of farming practised in the country. He actually practises them all. He prosecutes, it is true, each kind in a rather different manner from that practised in localities where the particular kind is pursued as the only system of farming; because each branch of his farming must be conducted so as to conduce to the welfare of the whole, and by studying the mutual dependence of parts, he produces a whole in a superior manner. This multiplicity of objects requires from him more than ordinary attention, and much more than ordinary skill in manageNo doubt, the farmers of some of the other modes of farming become very skilful in adapting their practice to the situations in which they are actually placed, but his more varied experience increases versatility of talent and quickness of discernment; and, accordingly, it will be found that the farmers of the mixed husbandry prove themselves to be the cleverest and most intelligent agriculturists of the country.

The field of their operations, on both sides of the Tweed, has long been acknowledged to be not only the most highly cultivated portion of the kingdom, but that which contains the most valuable breeds of livestock; and as the mixed husbandry cannot be carried on within very narrow limits, there, large farms exist. Less than 500 acres is too limited an extent. Live-stock and grain culture being equally attended to, each comprises a large proportion of the stocking, and the capital required to furnish both is considerable, though perhaps less than the last named system, in which the entire stock are purchased every year. The rents of both systems are about the same; and though both kinds are determined by no peculiarity of soil and locality like the others, the mixed is adapted by a happy form of constitution to most circumstances.

12. OF CHOOSING THE KIND OF FARMING.

" Choice, being mutual act of all our souls, makes merit her election."

TROILUS AND CRESSIDA.

These are the various kinds of farming pursued in this kingdom; and if there be any other, its type may, no doubt, be found in the mixed system just described. One of these systems must be adopted by the aspirant pupil for his profession. If he succeed to a family inheritance, the kind of farming he will follow will depend on that pursued by his

predecessor, which he will learn accordingly; but if he is free to choose for himself, and not actually restricted by the circumstances of peculiar locality, or soil, or inheritance, then I would advise him to adopt the mixed husbandry, as containing within itself all the varieties of farming which it is requisite for a farmer to know.

If he is at liberty to take advice, I can inform him that the mixed husbandry possesses advantages over every other; and practically thus:-in pastoral farming, the stock undergoes minute examination, for certain purposes, only at distantly stated times; and owing to the wide space over which they have to roam for food in pastoral districts, comparatively less attention is bestowed on them by shepherds and cattle-herds. The pastoral farmer has thus no particular object to attract his attention at home between those somewhat long intervals of time; and in the mean while time is apt to hang heavy on his hands. The carse farmer, after the labours of the field are finished in spring, has nothing but a little hay-making and much bare-fallowing in summer, to occupy his mind until the harvest.-Dairy-farming affords little occupation for the farmer in winter.-The farmer in the vicinity of large towns, has almost nothing to do in summer, from turnip-seed to harvest.—Mixed-husbandry, on the other hand, affords abundant and regular employment at all seasons. Cattle and sheep feeding, and marketing grain, pleasantly occupy the short days of winter. Seed-sowing of all kinds affords abundant employment in spring. The rearing of live stock, sale of wool, and culture of green crops, fill up the time in summer until harvest; and autumn, in all circumstances, brings its own busy avocations at the ingathering of the fruits of the earth. There is, strictly speaking, not one week of real leisure to be found in the mixed system of farming;-if the short period be excepted, from assorting the lambs in the beginning of August to putting the sickle to the corn,-and that period is curtailed or protracted, according as the harvest is early or late.

If the young farmer is desirous of attaining a knowledge of every kind of farm work,-of securing the chance of profit every year,—and of finding regular employment at all seasons in his profession, he should determine to follow the mixed husbandry. It will not in any year entirely disappoint his hopes. In it, he will never have to bewail the almost total destruction of his stock by the rot, or by the severe storms of winter, as the pastoral farmer sometimes has. Nor can he suffer so serious a loss as the carse farmer, by his crop of grain being affected by the inevitable casualties of blight or drought, or the great depression of prices for a succession of years. Were his stock greatly destroyed or

much deteriorated in value by such casualties, he might have the grain to rely on; and were his grain crops to fail to a serious extent, the stock might insure him a profitable return. It is scarcely within the bounds of probability, that a loss would arise in any year from the total destruction of live-stock, wool, and grain. One of them may fail, and the prices of all may continue depressed for years; but, on the other hand, reasonable profits have been realized from them all in the same year. Thus, there are safeguards against a total loss, and a greater certainty of a profitable return from capital invested in the mixed, than in any other kind of husbandry at present known.

13. OF SELECTING A TUTOR-FARMER FOR TEACHING FARMING.

"These are their tutors, bid them use them well."

TAMING OF THE SHREW,

After resolving to follow farming as a profession, and determining to learn the mixed, as the best system of husbandry, it now only remains for the young farmer to select a farmer who practises it, with whom he would wish to engage as a pupil. The best kind of pupilage is to become a boarder in a farmer's house, where he will not only live comfortably, but may learn this superior system of husbandry thoroughly. There is no better mode than this known at present of learning practical farming. The choice of locality is so far limited, as it must be in a district in which this particular system is practised in a superior manner. The largest district in which it is so practised, as I have already intimated, comprehends Berwickshire, Roxburghshire, and Northumberland. There, many farmers are to be found who accept pupils, amongst whom a proper selection should be made, as it would be highly injudicious to engage with one who is notoriously deficient in the requisite qualifications. The qualifications are numerous. He should have the general reputation of being a good farmer; that is, a skilful cultivator of land, a judicious breeder, and an excellent judge of stock. He should possess agreeable manners, and have the power of communicating his thoughts with ease. He should occupy a good farm, consisting, if possible, of a variety of soils, and situate in a tolerably good climate, neither on the top of a high hill, nor on the confines of a large moor or bog, but in the midst of a well cultivated country. These circumstances of soil and locality should be absolute requisites in a farm intended to be made the resi

dence of pupils. The top of a hill, exposed to every blast that blows, or the vicinage of a bog, overspread with damp vapour, would surround the farm with a climate in which no kind of crop or stock could arrive at a state of perfection; while, on the other hand, a very sheltered spot in a warm situation, would give the pupil no idea of the vexations experienced in a precarious climate. His inexperience in these things will render him unfit to select for himself either a qualified farmer, or a suitable farm; but friends are never awanting to render assistance to young aspirants in such emergencies, and if their opinion is formed on a knowledge of farming, both of the farm and the personal qualifications of the farmer they are recommending, some confidence may be placed in their recommendations. And for the pupil's personal comfort, he should choose a residence where there are no very young children.

As a residence of one year must pass over ere the pupil can witness the course of the annual operations of the farm, his engagement at first should be made for a period of not less than a year; and at the expiry of that period he will, most probably, find himself inadequate to the task of managing a farm. The entire length of time he would require to spend on a farm, must be determined by the paramount consideration of his having acquired a competent knowledge of his profession.

14. OF THE PUPILAGE.

"A man loves the meat in his youth that he cannot endure in his age."

MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.

Having settled these preliminaries with the tutor-farmer, the pupil should enter the farm-the first field of his anticipations and toils in farming-with a resolution to acquire as much professional knowledge, in as short a time, as the nature of the business which he is about to learn, will admit of.

The commencement of his tuition may be made at any time of the year; but since farming operations have a regular beginning and ending every year, it is obvious that the most proper time to begin to view them is at the opening of the agricultural year, that is, in the beginning of winter. It may not be quite congenial to the feelings of him who has perhaps been accustomed to pass his winters in a town, to participate for the first time in the labours of a farm on the eve of winter. He would naturally prefer the sunny days of summer. But the beginning of win

ter being the time at which every important operation is begun, it is essential to their being understood throughout, to see them begun, and in doing this, minor inconveniences should be willingly submitted to, to acquire an intimate knowledge of a profession for life. And, besides, to endeavour to become acquainted with complicated operations, after the principal arrangements for their accomplishment have been completed, is purposely to invite wrong impressions of them.

There is really nothing disagreeable to personal comfort in the business of the farm in winter. On the contrary, it is full of interest, inasmuch as the well-being of living animals then comes home to the attention more forcibly than the operations of the soil. The totally different and well marked individual characters of different animals, engage our sympathies in different degrees; and the more so, perhaps, of all of them, that they appear more domesticated when under confinement than at liberty to roam about in quest of food and seclusion. In the evening, in winter, the hospitality of the social board await the pupil at home, or at a friend's house, after the labours of the day are over. Neighbours interchange visits at that social season, when topics of conversation, common to all societies, are varied by remarks on professional occurrences and management, elicited by the modified practices of the different speakers, from which the pupil may pick up much useful information. Or should society present no charms to him, the quieter companionship of books, or the severer task of study, is at his command. In a short time, however, the many objects peculiar to the season which present themselves in the country in winter, cannot fail to interest him.

The very first thing to which the pupil should direct his attention on entering the farm, is to become well acquainted with its physical geography, that is, its position, exposure, extent;-its fences, whether of wall or hedge;-its shelter, in relation to rising grounds and plantations;-its roads, whether public or private ;-its fields, their number, names, sizes, relative positions, and supply of water;-the position of the farm-house and steading or farm-stead. Familiar acquaintance with all these particulars will enable him to understand more readily the orders given by the farmer for the work to be performed in any field. It is like possessing a map of the ground on which certain plans of operations are about to be undertaken. A plan of the farm would much facilitate an introduction to this familiar acquaintance. The tutor-farmer should be provided with such a plan to give to each of his pupils, but if he have it not, the pupil himself can set about constructing one which will answer his purpose well enough.