The Express.
London, England, 1860-04-26 00:00:00

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61
Meantime, there Mat an
supply of various elements of 'food "less
important than the corn we get from abroad, and
supernally butchers' meat. We shall witness each
Ashincrease of mutton (and wool of course) as
litre(' e YooNo himself 'would not have believed;
and beef and veal, butter and Assn, will augment
in proportion. Already we see the operation f
free trade ideas on the growth,of grass itself. t
a admitted now that, genesally speaking, the
profitable use of grace is to cut it fresh for farrn-
yard diet ; and that the least profitable use is to
make hay of ft ; grazing being an intermediate
course between the two. This experience has been
gained just while it was discovered in the United
States that the hay crop atone of the free states
exceeds in annual value the entire production of
the slave states, including cotton, sugar, tobacco,
and everything that is grown and sold. The
thankfutness for free trade at this moment is
largely occasioned by the increasing supply of
foreign and artificial food for stock, and of
manures by which production at home can be
forced. Instead of thinking it a simple misfor-
tune when flocks and herds are 'tarred to death, or
brought so low as to be doomed to dysentery with
the first spring feeding, we now mark such destruc-
tion se an evidence of want of skill or capital, seeing
that sound management has kept up the condition
of stock by means of resources provided by com-
merce. The purchases may be expensive, but not
so courtly as buying the stock after they have eaten
op everything. As soon as it is apprehended that
ear turnips are failing, like the potatoes, there are
'Nap of new and various crops which may more
ar Isis fill up the gap in came of a turnip rot.
The story of the feeding of our sheep this
titer, and especially of the rearing of our lambs
mass didivaltiea, would be an instructive lawn
to anybody in any country who dreads dearth
from the supercemion of any artificial system of
production of articles in general demand.
Throughout the worst weeks of the worst season
we always see farmers employing their best ener-
gies to get renewals of their leases, or the promise
of new farms. They can turn their occupation to
account in many ways that their fathers never
dreamed of. By applying different soils to their
natural uses, or enriching them above the limit of
variations ; by producing what is possible, whoa
they cannot obtain what is hest ; by seeking tram'
abroad whatever is needed to create profit at
bow., and by referring society to growers abroad
ter what they cannot raise profitably at home,
farmers are learning to achieve prosperity as mer-
chants achieve it, by the very principle of their
calling. They may be perversely called a shop.
keeping part of the sordid British nation for this
exertion of their faculties ; but they need not
mind this, any more than the old merchant
princes of Venice and Genoa would have regarded
it. They are giving us more and more meat and
vegetables, while we get quite as much corn as
ever ; and it is honourable at once to their can-
dour and their sagacity that they owe, and admit
that they owe, their prosperity and their power to
withstand adversity to Free Trade.