Mules are almost as little known in the north of France as in England. In. the central and southern parts they are reared very generally. Poultry, in France, is both larger in size and more abundant than in England.
Even in the north and north-east of France, the farms are of small extent. To occupy 200 acres, or to pay a rent of a•year, places one in the foremost rank of farmers. Larger possessions are common in pasture districts, that department of agriculture admitting, in France, as in Eng land, of a greater concentration of capital, and ex tension of business than in the case of tillage. But such districts are rare, and in by far the greater part of France, the farms under tillage, if farms they can be called, are of 50, 40, SO, and often so small as 20 or 10 acres, there being, it is computed, no less than three million of such petty occupancies in the king dom. In the south of France, the system of ntelairie is still prevalent, nearly on the same footing as in Lombardy and Tuscany. That such insignificant occupancies are adverse to all enlarged ideas of farming, is sufficiently obvious; and to their many disadvantages there can be opposed only this single benefit —that no spot of tolerable soil is neglected, even the space given by us to hedges being reserved for culture.
The beneficial effect of long leases is as little un derstood in France as it unfortunately is in a great part of England. The common method is to let land for periods of three, six, or nine years. The pea santry, though very illiterate, are by no means a slow or phlegmatic race. They exhibit, as French men in general do, no small share of sprightliness and activity in the individual, with very little con cert or combination in the mass. They are content to hand down the family occupancy from father to son, without any idea of altering their mode of life. The dwellings of the farmers, and still more of the cottagers, are, like those of our forefathers half a cen tury ago, the outside having frequently a pool of water in its vicinity, while the inside is miserably bare of furniture. Their implements are equally rude, and discover but too clearly that the price of iron is be yond their reach. Their harrows have wooden teeth ; and even the ploughs, in some backward dis tricts, are almost entirely of wood. The cart in common use is an awkward medium between a cart and a waggon, being as long as the latter, and not broader than the former. The singularity, to an Englishman, is to see a vehicle of great length and burden supported by a single pair of wheels. Corn and hay, in France, are not stocked, but housed. The winnowing machine is, in a measure, unknown; the threshing machine altogether. Threshing often takes place in the open air, and is, in general, per formed by the flail. In the south of France, the an. tiquitated mode of treading out the corn by horses and mules is still prevalent.
The diet of the French peasantry is very simple: Bread and cyder, with soup, pease, cabbage, or other vegetables, form its chief ingredients in the northern provinces, while, in the central and southern, the same aliments are in use, with the substitution of thin wine (yin de pays) for cyder, and of chesnuts for the pears and apples of the north. Bread is, still more than with our peasantry, the grand com ponent part of diet, and the article of which the price determines the comfort or distress of the lower orders for the year. Butcher meat is reserved for the tables of the middling and upper classes.
The landholders in France give almost no attention whatever to beautifying the country; its aspect is consequently monotonous, without plantations, seats, or cheerful cottages. The peasantry live in villages, frequently ill built and ill situated. The purchase of land, however, is the favourite mode of investing money in France. It sells, in general, for 25 years purchase, while the public funds seldom fetch above 16 or 18. The French have little confidence in go vernment stock ; and, in fact, very little knowledge of its nature. There is at Paris a society similar to the Board of Agriculture in England, and forming, like it, a central point for corresponding with the different agricultural societies in the kingdom. It holds a sitting twice a month, and a public meeting annually, for the distribution of prizes. The French have also (since 1819)a corn law, permitting imports and exports only when the home market shall be above or below a specific rate. This law, somewhat similar to ours in form, is materially different in its operation, the limitation prices being very low, and the landed interest, in France, having no power to create an artificial enhancement. The Revolution, by breaking landed property into fragments, has de stroyed the ascendancy of its owners as a separate interest. The members of the French House of Commons are, in general, lawyers, merchants, or proprietaires, that is, owners of land and houses on a scale which we should account very small. Even in their House of Peers, the country interest is of little account. The chief difficulty the French go vernment have to. contend with, in regard to the corn trade, is the popular prejudice that freedom of export raises the home price. The south of France being in a great degree appropriated to the culture of the vine and olive, stands in need of an almost an nual import of corn. The north is very different ; yet the smallness of the farms, the use of bread in every meal of the day, and the want of agricultural capital, are great drawbacks on export. In the pre sent century, the only shipments of consequence have taken place in 1810 and 1814, both years of unusual abundance.