“The extreme yields of the very highest English farming are even exceeded in Guernsey, and in that respect the evidence of the greater productiveness of small farming over large is overwhelming. The Channel Islands not only feed their own population, but are large exporters of provisions as well. “Small farms being thus found to be more advantageous, it is but an easy step to peasant proprietors.” Stop a moment, Mr. Spectator. The step is easy, indeed;—so is a step into a well, or out of a window. There is no question whatever, in any country, or at any time, respecting the expediency of small farming; but whether the small farmer should be the proprietor of his land, is a very awkward question indeed in some countries. Are you aware, Mr. Spectator, that your ‘easy step,’ taken in two lines and a breath, means what I, with all my Utopian zeal, have been fourteen years writing on Political Economy, without venturing to hint at, except under my breath;—some considerable modification, namely, in the position of the existing British landlord?—nothing less, indeed, if your ‘step’ were to be completely taken, than the reduction of him to a ‘small peasant proprietor’? And unless he can show some reason against it, the ‘easy step’ will most assuredly be taken with him. Yet I have assumed, in this Fors, that it is not to be taken. That under certain modifications of his system of Rent, he may still remain lord of his land,—may, and ought, provided always he knows what it is to be lord of anything. Of which I hope to reason farther in the Fors for November of this year. FORS CLAVIGERA. LETTER XLVI. Florence, 28th August, 1874. I intended this letter to have been published on my mother’s birthday, the second of next month. Fors, however, has entirely declared herself against that arrangement, having given me a most unexpected piece of work here, in drawing the Emperor, King, and Baron, who, throned by Simone Memmi beneath the Duomo of Florence, beside a Pope, Cardinal, and Bishop, represented, to the Florentine mind of the fourteenth century, the sacred powers of the State in their fixed relation to those of the Church. The Pope lifts his right hand to bless, and holds the crosier in his left; having no powers but of benediction and protection. The Emperor holds his sword upright in his right hand, and a skull in his left, having alone the power of death. Both have triple crowns; but the Emperor alone has a nimbus. The King has the diadem of fleur-de-lys, and the ball and globe; the Cardinal, a book. The Baron has his warrior’s sword; the Bishop, a pastoral staff. And the whole scene is very beautifully expressive of what have been by learned authors supposed the Republican or Liberal opinions of Florence, in her day of pride.