At any rate, let us not overrate the productivity of the exporting countries, and let us remember that the vine-growers of Southern Europe drink themselves an abominable _piquette_; that Marseilles fabricates wine for home use out of dry raisins brought from Asia; and that the Normandy peasant who sends his apples to London, drinks real cider only on great festivities. Such a state of things will not last for ever; and the day is not far when we shall be compelled to look to our own resources to provide many of the things which we now import. And we shall not be the worse for that. The resources of science, both in enlarging the circle of our production and in new discoveries, are inexhaustible. And each new branch of activity calls into existence more and more new branches, which steadily increase the power of man over the forces of nature. If we take all into consideration; if we realise the progress made of late in the gardening culture, and the tendency towards spreading its methods to the open field; if we watch the cultural experiments which are being made now--experiments to-day and realities to-morrow--and ponder over the resources kept in store by science, we are bound to say that _it is utterly impossible to foresee at the present moment the limits as to the_ maximum _number of human beings who could draw their means of subsistence from a given area of land_, or as to what a variety of produce they could advantageously grow in any latitude. Each day widens former limits, and opens new and wide horizons. All we can say now is, that, _even now_, 600 persons could easily live on a square mile; and that, with cultural methods already used on a large scale, 1,000 human beings--not idlers--living on 1,000 acres could easily, without any kind of overwork, obtain from that area a luxurious vegetable and animal food, as well as the flax, wool, silk, and hides necessary for their clothing. As to what may be obtained under still more perfect methods--also known but not yet tested on a large scale--it is better to abstain from any forecast: so unexpected are the recent achievements of intensive culture. We thus see that the over-population fallacy does not stand the very first attempt at submitting it to a closer examination. Those only can be horror-stricken at seeing the population of this country increase by one individual every 1,000 seconds who think of a human being as a mere claimant upon the stock of material wealth of mankind, without being at the same time a contributor to that stock. But we, who see in each new-born babe a future _worker_ capable of producing much more than his own share of the common stock--we greet his appearance.