London. It may be said that in growing plain vegetables the small
gardener would not be at such a disadvantage. I will reply (without
detailing all my observations) that I have seen the same gentleman-
gardener growing a two-acre plot of early radishes, and that he
completely spoilt early radishes for all the small gardeners.

The advocates of peasant-proprietors have thought cowkeeping hopeful
for small men. In my experience dairies of fifty or sixty cows have
an enormous advantage; they can have perfectly designed dairies; they
have enough cream to make butter daily throughout the year (which
saves much trouble, loss, and occasionally inferior butter); they can
maintain approximately a uniform supply. In short, they beat,
undersell, and displace the small cowkeepers wherever the large dairy
is moderately well managed.

The cottager or peasant-proprietor has, I believe, an advantage in
poultry of all kinds. When poultry are kept in very large numbers
they are more liable to disease, and the diseases are more
disastrous--sweeping off the whole large stock. Fowl and egg farming
is one of the most successful, perhaps the most successful point with
the French peasant-proprietors. To make birdfarming successful the
proper plan is to keep a moderate number of as many birds as
possible--fowls, "galeenies," ducks, geese, turkeys, large pigeons--
and to go in for eggs as well as fowls. I have not seen peasant-
proprietors in England attempting this, which seems to me one of the
most hopeful of experiments for them.

The second point urged by Mill, and still by some, is that peasant-
proprietors are better off than English labourers. With the present
price of agricultural labour in England this seems to be very