1820.]

Mr. URBAN,

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Cape of Good Hope, with considerable interest. His recommendations correspond with my own ideas in many respects; but, although I concur and accord with T. W. and the Government or Administration of this country, in the general plan of making a Colony there; yet it has very often struck me as very imperfect in the manner in which it continues to proceed; that they have taken no`steps, no measures for their being better acquainted with that country, although we have now had it in our possession for nearly twenty years. The Travels of Lieut. Patterson, of Vaillant, and of Mr. Barrow, are of no further information than to say, that it is a most extensive country, inhabited literally by nothing else than wild beasts, save here and there a few Dutch Boors; that the climate is capable of producing Wine, Wheat, and all the Necessaries of Life; that there are great tracts of country called Karroo, that produce nothing, and are perfectly sterile; and that they lie north of the coast from Algoa Bay, or end of Seldanah Bay, by the Cragee River, or near to the Drahensleen; and get wandering away to Graaf Rennett, as if it was at hand, or as near to the Cape Town, as Windsor or Oxford are near to the capital of England: Graaf Rennett is near 600 miles from the Cape Town.

The first thing that should have been set out with, as a temptation to those who might wish to emigrate there, should have been the publishing of a large Map of each division of that extensive country, for the information of those who had ideas of going there. This Map should have been done by our own Engineers: it would have been of double use, not only in making us acquainted perfectly with the boundaries of the course of the rivers, but we should have been generally informed, as to its geological productions, where the valuable mines lie, their possibility of being brought down to the coast and conveyed to Great Britain, &c. &c. And this survey would have not only employed our young engineers, who are wasting their time in coffee

:

every one going there, to pick out the situation suitable to his own ideas, and corresponding with his line of life, or profession, whether a vineplanter, à corn farmer, a grazier, miller, or any other profession or calling; one of the necessary liuks of the chain for the formation of a Colony.

The various productions of so extensive a country as the Cape of Good Hope, must naturally be great. We are informed that there is iron in such productive yielding as to be equal to the highest produce of the mines of Sweden; that they yield nearly 80 per cent. This is equal to the greatest produce of that country. Now, as that article abounds within our own colony, is it not worth while to have it pointed out where it lies, the probability of its being brought down to the coast, the making of a road, or, if there can be any chance of its conveyance by water, if only a part of the way? These things point out (what I have before observed) the great call and necessity of having a large and accurate set of Maps of that Colony immediately published.

It will be further of great utility in pointing out the great line of Roads, and the several changes necessary to be made; for in all countries in the state in which the Cape is, the roads lie without interest as to the several productions. They have been made and followed, for the convenience of a very few, without recourse to the general service of a great population and commerce.

Would it not be doing this country an essential service, if the Universities of Oxford or Cambridge were to send some of their learned travelling fellows out there, to inves tigate the natural productions of that great country? We could depend more on their information than on the many travellers sent by France; Denmark, or Germany. Besides, it is a reflection on Great Britain to have such valuable countries as the Cape, and Demerara, and to be ignorant of their produce and value, whether as to science or commerce. It was always the first thing the French Government began with, on taking pos

session

Mr. URBAN,

THE

G. A.

Jan. 9.

HE multiplication of small Farms with a view to affording the publick a better and cheaper supply of Poultry, and the smaller agricultural articles, baving long been a popular sentiment amongst us, I have the pleasure of announcing to you that a New Agricultural System, divested of the disadvantages to which small farms are subject under the established agricultural regime, bas been conceived and arranged; and is now in a forward state of preparation for bringing before the public, with a view of ascertaining their sentiments upon it. As the narrow limits allotted to each miscellaneous article in a Magazine do not admit of going into defails of a comprehensive subject, the essence of it may be briefly stated to be, that by affording a larger scope of employment to human labour, to be advantageously excited through newly invented mechanical means, in lieu of having recourse to the usual expedient of employing agricultural horses in the tillage of the soil, the great excess of it now in the market may be turned to a beneficial account, both, as to enabling the individuals themselves to acquire the comforts of life through the means of their industry; and relieving the public from the present heavy pressure of their poorrates proportionally; and, at the same time, affording a more abundant supply of provisions to the public markets, from the double cause of thus converting to the use of the bu man species that portion of the produce of the earth which has hitherto been consumed by useful but devouring agricultural horses; joined to the enlarged production of the soil, which will infallibly be caused, according to the laws of nature, by the clements of luxuriant vegetation, water, sun, mandre, and the pulverization of the soil,-being advantageously brought into chemical action, in unison with each other. These constitute the leading features of its various recom

mendations, as the public generally are concerned in the question.

As enlarging the sum of agricul tural comforts and happiness, according to the multiplication of these kinds of tenures, it is to be observed, as relates to the tenant, that a double produce being obtained from the same land, at a double expence of cultivation, will yield him three times the profit it formerly did; which may be thus briefly explained:-Taking the old calculation that a farm ought to produce three rents, the one for the Jandlord, another for the expences of its cultivation, and the third for the maintenance of the tenant's family;" if we take this gross produce as being 301. this gives 107. to each item; but this being doubled produces 60l.: so that allotting to the landlord his 107. and allowing 201. as the doubled expence of cultivation, these two sums being added together make but 307. leaving the remaining 301. as the profit to improved cultivation, instead of his former 107, upon the old plan.

To realize these ideas will be the grand object of our endeavours, which we propose to attain by three distinct means: first, by a superior cultivation of the soil, as before expressed ; secondly, by a quicker succession of crops, and by an improved method of making the most of them; and thirdly, by breeding and feeding, by improved methods, a more profitable description of stock than sheep and oxen, namely, pigs, poultry, rabbits, pigeons, and even game, if legislative countenance be given thereto, off the land. Upon which last head, as it differs from the established agricul tural opinions almost universally dif fused throughout the land, we propose to join issue with them upon the question, whenever they think proper to give notice of trial.

How greatly the landed interest of the country is interested in the esta blishment of these measures will be manifest enough, on merely a slight consideration of them; for as it is the characterick of all the different kinds of small stock enumerated, that their natural fecundity is such that a few well- selected parent pairs of each would soon multiply their species into any extent of stock which it might be desirable to keep: the expence of this, therefore, would be so 'small, compared with that of stocking a farm

of

1820.]

of the same size with the larger aniuals, and furnishing it also,with all the necessary paraphernalia of dead stock,waggons,carts, harness, ploughs, drays, and agricultural horses, that the competition for the occupancy of these farmis, where the returns are also so comparatively quick, will be brought within the reach of thousands who were before excluded from aspiring to the tenantcy of even a small corn and cattle farm, from the want of the necessary capital to manage it. The interests of the soil will also be consulted in these arrangements beyond all former example ; for here will not only be the greatest part of the heavy green crops proposed to be raised consumed upon the land, which will therefore furnish abundant manure accordingly for reproduction in future years; but this quantity, great as it is already from its own resources, will be constantly in the way of being augmented by the addition of the rich articles brought in from other lands, for the purpose of fattening off the stock for market; a principle which will render corn farms tributary to them in this important article for procuring heavy crops from the soil; which will be again assisted by another of still more importance; as the irrigation water proposed to be plentifully supplied, and constantly at hand, to use at discretion, will of itself be in the nature of another standing manure heap constantly furnishing its contents. So that with all these inherent and extrinsic advantages, aided by the further consideration, that the outskirts of an estate may virtually be rendered of the value of homestead land, by being converted into poultry farms. What is true as to the competition likely to be excited by inviting circumstances for their tenantry, will also be so for the purchase of them upon the same principles, whenever the party may wish to convert them into money. Nor have the interests of the capitalists also been forgotten amongst these numerous arrange ments of combinations, as novel as they are important; but on the contrary, a wide field for speculation will be opened to his view, by which he will be enabled to employ the telescope of his understanding to deterinine for himself how far he may, or may hot, employ his money to greater

37

annual advantage, in investing it in the new species of hydro-landed property proposed to be created, than either the funds, mortgages, or personal securities will yield him. Suffice it for the present to state generally, that if the lands in Great Britain and Ireland were improved so as to average only a shilling per acre in water rent, for money laid out upon them to pay the monied men advancing it five per cent. for their money invested therein; this would absorb about sixty millions pounds sterling, laid out in their permanent improvement, and the enrichment of their respective neighbourhoods, in the first instance: but as the money thus disbursed is not annihilated, but only changes hands by being thrown into circulation, by being paid to labourers and artificers as the wages of labour and the purchase of materials; and as the annual revenue accruing to the monied interest thereby created, and, figuratively speaking, springing out of the earth, would be three millions sterling, it follows that when the first year's interest was received, there would then be 63 millions of money in the monied market, looking out for objects on which advantageously to employ itself: in the next year something more than 66 millions; and so on, progressively, according to the nature of compound interest: so that one batch of improvements, as of the estates in a whole parish together, for instance, will necessarily be the precursor of succeeding ones.

TIMOTHY TELEGRAPH.

Mr. URBAN, Jan. 10. T is with mental endowments, as with other rich gifts of providence; the inhabitant of the lusuriant Southern climes, where Nature has done every thing in the way of vegetation, indolently lays bold on this very plea of fertility which should animate his exertions, as a reason for doing nothing himself; so that the soil, which teems with such encou raging abundance, leaves the favoured possessor idle, and comparatively poor while the native of the less genial region, supplying by his labours the deficiencies of his lot, overtakes his more favoured competitor; by substituting industry for opulence, he improves the riches of his native land beyond that which is blessed

with warmer suns, and thus viudicates Providence from the charge of partial distribution.”

On such a subject, the season which now presents itself, affords topics for enlargement :-In taking a brief survey of the various climates of the earth, we find the doctrine verified wherever we stray; the volcanic eruptions themselves are not exempt from the effects of that diffusion of good which Providence every where Scatters with unsparing bounty-the barren land is taught to smile by exciting the necessarily increased efforts of cultivation; and when we return home, and contemplate around us the competitions of poverty and industry; opulence and power; we see them so wisely intermingled, and so benevolently exercised, that one seems but to hold his extended opportunities, as a trust, for the more limited means of subsistence or enjoyment. The more severe the changes of weather may be, the more have we seen the spirit of beneficence prevail; compassion no longer remains quiescent as a sentiment to adorn the modern system of sympathetic education, but is happily exemplified in deeds of charity old dependencies, which during the past tranquillity of ease and prosperity have been noticed only with complacency, have now been sought out, and aided by effectual relief-even former auimosities have been forgotten, and given place to Christian conciliation-and the hand, hitherto withdrawn, has been stretched forward with promptitude, and loaded with the proffered gift! The commemoration of the nativity and the epoch of a new year, has been greeted in every Society and Club with voluntary contributions for its poorer members-and the festivities of the rich and power ful have been accompanied with appropriate comforts to the dependent cottagers!

:

Whenever we can apply any of these stations to ourselves, we reap some satisfaction in the hope that we have extended our usefulness in society as well as our best efforts: That all should succeed so effectually as to obliterate the claim of the pour, or to remove for ever the cry of the destitute, is a chimerical notion, which will never be realised in human affairs;-for on the contrary,

the difference will ever be the means of calling forth the otherwise dormant charities of our nature, and placing us in a condition of trial and probation of the talents entrusted to our management; and the more judicious be the extension of the use, the more extensive and powerful will be the government acquired: I say judicious, because an indiscriminate use of the talents committed to man, is an act of charity disapproved by the parabolic example of Him who was made ruler of a certain number of cities in proportion to the number of talents which he had gained with the trust confided to him: But although these seasonable benevoleuces are to be much commended, yet they are the transient occurrences of the time-something more is requisite to keep up the spring of active society, and to occupy the minds and hands, and fill with joy the chambers of the industrious; for disaffection and murmur are the froward offspring of want of employment. The great difficulty of answering to this imperious call has not yet been subdued; public works' are the chief resources, and many. may be invented, if they are not absolutely necessary, as a means of sup plying the present "aching void;" one suggestion has already been of fered by the Regent for clearing Dartmoor, and another by the Irish labourers of draining some of the bogs in Ireland-others may be found of improving and making new roads

of securing embankments-ofdraining low and watery lands-making useful openings of streets in a crowded metropolis-cutting down hills, and filling up vallies in public roads opening communications by canals, &c. and numberless other sources of employment which would be highly acceptable to the national and local welfare, and amply occupy the laborious, and pay them all for their toil-it may be fairly alleged, that "no absurdity is more gross, than that of there being no track of employment. Is there a parish in the Kingdom where the arable land is clean, at least kept clean? we know of noue."-Gent. Mag. LXXXIX. ii. p. 535.

Besides all these resources of employment, individuals may, besides their own fair proportion of the rate

for