AMERICAN AGRICULTURAL.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume I, Issue 68, 4 December 1880, Page 4

AMERICAN AGRICULTURAL.

The report of Messrs. Pell and Bead upon American agriculture, which has just appeared, states some facts which discontented New Zealand farmers (if there are any) would do well to ponder. The new feature of the report (to me at least) is that in the future the cattle trade between America and England is likely to develop in the direction of store rather than fai cattle. The former pack into less room at sea, suffer less from the voyage, and, if fattened upon choice English pasture, will then turn out first-class beef. They think, too, that hardy American cattle, who live under such perfectly healthy conditions, would be a most useful mirtare with pampered and handfed English stock, in improving home breeds. But the special point in the report which strikes me is the advantage which the New Zealand farmer has over his American competitor in growing "wheat for export. The average yield of wheat in America for several years has been 12 bushels per acre, or less than half the New Zealand average. The freight at present from the farm in the West of Liverpool amounts to 17s to 18s per quarter, •which, 1 suppose is 60 to 80 per cent, more than the cost of bringing wheat by sailing ship from New Zealand to London. The New Zealand farmer, in his seaboard colony, is nearer the English market than he would be in Chicago or Nebraska. With double the average yield, and lower freights, why should he not grow wheat more extensively for the export than at present? The New Zealand farmer needs only to take the matter up on a larger scale and with more spirit, and introduce American machinery more largely with American economy of labor, and I see no reason why millions of acres more in the colonj canzioh he hroughb inbo wheat bo he exchanged for English gold. I hardly ever saw an American farmer hold the plough-handles in the way still so prevalent in New Zealand. He sits on his plough like a coachman, and drives over the field as he turns up the sod. I think I could plough la this fashion as easily as I can drive this quill ! I once heard an American who had spent 12 months in New Zealand, say with enthusiasm, "If we only had that colony we would mato a garden of it," I tuinfc be was not far wrong.

Throughout the whole of the report of Messrs. Pell and Bead on American Agriculture are noticed the aptitude and readiness with which the machinery is obtained by the farmer at all parts of the United States, and good machinery and improved implements are much more common than in this country. "It may be true, " we are told, " that ' a good workman never finds fault with his tools,' but it is truer still that a Yankee laborer is too sensible ever to work with a. bad one." The farm laborer, as a class, is said to hardly exist in the States, unless it is among 1 the coloured people of the Middle and Northern States. These appear to be settled, domesticated, and contented to stick to one industry. In many respects agriculture suits them ; they are fond of animals, and the animals seem fond of them. On this' head the Commissioners tell a curious story. At a large sale of shorthorns in Kansas city a negro expressed to them that he might not be separated from the bull he was tending, and that fcbe purchaser of the \>m\\ ■would allow him to go with it. With the whites employed on arable land the case is very different. In the large farms of the West the bothy system is carried out, and buildings are put up in which the summer men mess and sleep. In •winter they are off to the towns and cities, and it is seldom the same faces are seen two years running on the farm. Mounted overseers or foremen are also engaged for the season at better pay, and these men, long-witted and keen-eyed, leave very little on trust to the ordinary hands. Although

wages appear high, the hours of labor in spring and autumn are long, and winter is a period of almost complete cessation from work for man and beasfc on an American farm. — Otago "Witness.