In proportion to the power, the wealth, and the refources of thefe nations, is the intereft which the world in general takes in the maxims of political economy by which they have been governed. To examine how far the fyftem of that œconomy has influenced agriculture, manufactures, commerce, and public felicity, is certainly an inquiry of no flight importance; and fo many books have been compofed on the theory of thefe, that the public can hardly think that time mifemployed which attempts to give THE PRAC

TICE.

The furvey which I made, fome years paft, of the agriculture of England and Ireland (the minutes of which I published under the title of Tours), was such a step towards understanding the state of our husbandry as I fhall not prefume to characterise;

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there are but few of the European nations that do not read these Tours in their own language; and, notwithstanding all their faults and deficiencies, it has been often regretted, that no fimilar defcription of France could be reforted to, either by the farmer or the politician. Indeed it could not but be lamented, that this vaft kingdom, which has fo much figured in hiftory, were likely to remain another century unknown, with refpect to those circumstances that are the objects of my enquiries. An hundred and thirty years have paffed, including one of the most active and confpicuous reigns upon record, in which the French power and resources, though much overftrained, were formidable to Europe. How far were that power and thofe refources founded on the permanent basis of an enlightened agriculture? How far on the more infecure support

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of manufactures and commerce?

How far have wealth and power and exterior fplendour, from whatever caufe they may have arifen, reflected back upon the people the profperity they implied? Very curious inquiries; yet refolved infufficiently by those whofe political reveries are fpun by their fire-fides, or caught flying as they are whirled through Europe in post-chaises. A man who is not practically acquainted with agriculture, knows not how to make thofe inquiries; he scarcely knows how to difcriminate the circumftances productive of mifery, from thofe which generate the felicity of a people; an affertion that will not appear paradoxical, to those who have attended closely to these subjects. At the fame time, the mere agriculturist, who makes fuch journies, fees little or nothing of the connection between the practice in the fields, and the refources of the em

pire; of combinations that take place between operations apparently unimportant, and the general intereft of the state; combinations fo curious, as to convert, in fome cafes, well cultivated fields into. fcenes of mifery, and accuracy of husbandry into the parent of national weakness. These are subjects that never will be understood from the fpeculations of the mere farmer, or the mere politician; they demand a mixture of both; and the investigation of a mind free from prejudice, particularly national prejudice; from the love of system, and of the vain theories that are to be found in the clofets of fpeculators alone. God forbid that I fhould be guilty of the vanity of fuppofing myself thus endowed! I know too well the contrary; and have no other pretenfion to undertake fo arduous a work, than that of having reported the agriculture of England with some lit

tle

tle fuccefs. Twenty years experience, fince that attempt, may make me hope to be not lefs qualified for fimilar exertions at prefent.

The clouds that, for four or five years past, have indicated a change in the political sky of the French hemifphere, and which have fince gathered to fo fingular a ftorm, have rendered it yet more interesting, to know what France was previously to any change. It would indeed have been matter of astonishment, if monarchy had rifen, and had set in that region, without the kingdom having had any examination profeffedly agricultural.

The candid reader will not expect, from ' the registers of a traveller, that minute analysis of common practice, which a man. is enabled to give, who refides fome months,

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