present century has witnessed of our yeoman and "statesman" into renters of farms (page 131, and again page 188). He regards the combination of capital with labour as most desirably exhibited in the union of landlord and tenant, as in England, where each party has an interest in the land tilled. In other countries the cultivator, who either has not the means of doing justice to the land, or who is saddled with an obligation to pay interest on the shares possessed in it by his co-heirs (a frequent cause of embarrassment in France), must borrow to carry him through; and thence his chance of bettering his condition becomes next to hopeless.

The general propensity of French cultivators to get into debt is admitted by our author. But if possessors of capital are willing to lend upon the security of land, there is every reason why they should be encouraged to do so. Check borrowing by the straitened farmer, and you check production. And if you ask why the farmer does not sell, and why the capitalist does not buy, this same land, the answer is obvious-such is the mode, clumsy, if you please to call it so, in which capital and labour are in the habit of co-operating in France. The capitalist prefers to lend rather than cultivate, and the owner clings to possession on any terms. But, as M. Lavergne remarks, land in England is also enormously indebted, only that it is the landlord, and not the cultivator, who borrows. Every one conversant with English provincial affairs, is aware of the vast extent to which estates are mortgaged. But, he adds, "this is less matter of regret in a rich country, such as England, where the debtors have commonly other sources of

income on which to eke out their living." Still, the fact ought to be borne in mind when we talk so compassionately of the landed property of France being "crippled with debts." We earnestly commend to our reader's attention the whole chapter "Sur les Débouchés," where ample and instructive explanations abound of the various differences in the economic condition of the two countries.

As a relief to the foregoing somewhat dry though instructive speculations, concerning the best modes of holding property in land, and the various conditions under which it may be cultivated, we enter upon what we may describe as the picturesque portion of M. Lavergne's "Essai," entitled Essai," entitled "Country "Country Life." But under this general and familiar head there is unpacked and rolled out before us, to our no small surprise, a whole shipload of literary merchandize. And in the face of such a mass of facts and erudite researches, so extensive a knowledge of the works of our poets, such intimate acquaintance with the springs of national life, and the sources of English social peculiarities, how, we should like to know, is a reviewer to approach the task of furnishing even an outline of this truly comprehensive chapter? We feel that it is beyond our capabilities, yet we must attack it.

It is, first of all, our duty to apprise the reader that he will be carried as far back as the "Saxons and Normans" for the origin of that peculiar characteristic for which the English are famed-viz., a passion for country life; he will therefore be prepared for a pretty extensive journey over the field of illustrative historical gleanings. And he will do wisely to be

prepared; for we ourselves, not having been so, were nearly run out of breath in toiling after the author through this maze of black-letter lore. Only think, too, of coming unexpectedly upon a passage so grandiose as this, when we imagined ourselves to be dealing with a quiet treatise upon the "hum-drum topic of farming!"—

"When the barbarian multitudes came swarming down upon the Roman Empire, from every quarter, they spread themselves over the face of the country," &c. &c.

Then we have William the Conqueror and Doomsday Book, Henry VIII., Charlemagne, Queen Elizabeth, Cambrian Bards, Magna Charta, and the like imposing persons and things. They file off, however, after having opened the piece with a certain amount of solemn parade, and leave us to the company of English gentlemen, and we may add English ladies, for they naturally form one of the features of "country life," as agreeably depicted in this chapter.

The bearing of the rural habits of our gentry upon the political machine is skilfully sketched, and compared with the opposite tastes of the modern French noblesse, who usually prefer spending the winter in towns. We say prefer, although we do not think that they would like towns better, having the same inducements set before them as are present with English country gentlemen; but their political world is and has been so organized for the last hundred and fifty years, that rural existence has long been, in great part, stripped of its charm and interest for French gentlemen of independent fortune.

M. Lavergne has penetrated the crust of English

society, thereby acquiring an insight into our provincial mind, such as is exceedingly rare with foreigners. He of course notes, and indeed goes so far as to admire, the complicated but unseen network of powers which forms the internal administration of this unique country. He quotes the anecdote of Queen Elizabeth sending back to their "demesnes" her nobles who came thronging to court, with a metaphor signifying that they would be of more use and importance there than in the capital; and he remarks that neither Henri Quatre nor his grandson would have done as much. The rulers of France, with their narrow, selfish aims, took the most effective course to disgust the territorial aristocracy with provincial life, when they deprived them, step by step, of all local authority and influence, and laid the foundation of the system of carrying on internal government by an army of officials: a system of which we have lived to see the many disastrous consequences.

But we must return to M. Lavergne's description of English life, and the contrast it presents to that of the Continental" classes aisées." "Such as the Palace of Chatsworth is, on the grand scale of residences, such is the abode of each private gentleman, only on a lesser footing. The smallest squire must have his park,' or park-like enclosure. The number of these sort of residences is enormous, beginning with such as contain some few acres only, and mounting up to others of more than a thousand in extent. . . It is easy to perceive how much this habit-so universal with the English-of passing their lives in the country, affects the prosperity of the land itself. Whereas in France it is the produce of the fields which serves to

maintain the opulence of our cities, in England it is the industrial towns which sustain the progress of husbandry. They enrich the farmer by the demand they furnish, and farming flourishes accordingly. Again, the self-love of the occupier of a country seat will not permit him to neglect the appearance of his farming establishment. Ostentation, in rural England, finds a vent in fine teams, substantial farm buildings, handsome cattle, and the like. A 'crack home farm' may, in fact, stand as the equivalent of a splendid 'hotel,' luxuriously furnished, in Paris." (page 155.)

We pass over the comparison between the burthens borne by the land in both countries, although it is set forth with candour, and will be found instructive; our limits force us to select among the topics treated in the "Essai," and we prefer touching upon the chapter headed "Political Institutions."

Though short, it is perhaps the one which, by the extent of its range of information, its historical illustrations, and intelligent commentary, offers the liveliest interest to the student of social economy, of any in the book. How one is led to reflect upon the waves which advance and recede in the course of human affairs; and what striking differences may we not discern in the groups of facts which command the approval of the actual generation of the day, to be contemned and avoided by that of another!

Like all foreign interpreters of the causes of our advance in material wealth, M. Lavergne naturally ascribes the largest share in its development to our exemption from internal discord and ruinous revolutionary wars. "The eighteenth century, so disastrous throughout for us, exhibits England in a state of con