“Notwithstanding these weighty authorities, we do not hesitate to assert, that in farming on such a scale as will remunerate a person in the middling rank, his devoting himself to constant bodily labour is not only unnecessary, but decidedly injurious. It is admitted, we suppose, that, in our country, upon an extent of 150 to 200 acres, the tasks of planning, arranging, inspecting, and finding a proper market for the produce, afford very full occupation to a single individual. But in a Canadian farm, all these occupations are much more arduous and difficult. The business cannot be reduced into the same fixed routine; a greater variety of produce, both in grain and live stock, must be reared; servants, less steady, and oftener changed, require much stricter superintendance; markets are not found without more difficulty, and at a greater distance. To perform all these functions carefully and well, on a property of this extent, must, we apprehend, keep the owner’s hands very full. To attempt to combine with them the daily task of a common labourer, seems to ensure their being executed in an imperfect and slovenly manner, and consequently the whole concern greatly mismanaged. The newly-arrived emigrant is indeed told that the other is the approved mode, and that if he wishes to thrive in the country he must follow its customs. The fundamental principles of rural economy, however, cannot be changed by the interposition of the Atlantic. The original settlers in Upper Canada were mostly of the less opulent class, who could cultivate their lots only by the labour of their own hands. A few of them, who, by extraordinary exertion, have risen to some degree of wealth, retain still probably their primitive habits and maxims, and represent their success as connected with the hard personal labours which they then underwent. These are held forth as the models to be followed by the young cultivator. But a general rule cannot be founded on a few cases where peculiar activity and energy were displayed. With an average allotment of these qualities, such as we are generally entitled to expect, the union of the intellectual and directing with the manual and operative department, can rarely succeed. We are convinced that a person of competent judgment, devoting himself wholly to the former, would raise on the same ground a considerably larger produce than one who, exhausted by daily toil, should follow only in a rough way the mechanical routine observed among his neighbours. He would thus create a surplus applicable to his own profits; and we are convinced that it is only by the exertions of such a class that any improvement can be expected in the system of Canadian culture, which is admitted on all hands to be at present exceedingly defective. [Illustration: _Davis’ Clearing._ (Eastern Township.)]