English people do not, I believe, realise how completely useless it is to speak any language with wrong accent. Let us read out the following example quickly to ordinary hearers, and how many will understand it? 'He was misled up to his démise by mendacíous evidence and illusóry promíses. The interpréter intérposed so that the juror éscăped uninjúred.'

How, then, did the Greeks meet this difficulty, and help the Romans and Orientals who desired to learn their language? They put accents on their words, a perfect novelty, and very probably one which the purists of the day beheld with disgust." But by this means, and without altering their spelling, they gave a practical guide to foreigners and greatly facilitated the spread of Greek throughout the world. Why not adopt the same device as regards English? I have known many a British traveller puzzled in Ireland because he was ignorant of the accents on our proper names. Why not therefore write Drogheda, Athenrý, Achónry, Athý, &c., and save trouble? And then why not gradually and tentatively distinguish by accents though and tough, plágue and ágúe, according to any system which may be found most simple and convenient? A paragraph at the opening of the Grammar would be sufficient to explain it. Whether we should ever require the elaborate distinctions of the Greeks, whether a rude unscientific attempt might not be more effective than the systems of grammarians, these are questions which need not be discussed till some trial has been made.

Here, then, is the sum of the whole matter. The civilised world is undergoing a terrible waste of time and labour in the now compulsory acquiring of many languages, and in the main even this labour is thrown away, because most people do not advance far enough to use any foreign language. Moreover the great proportion of such students want foreign languages not to study their literature-a high and refined pursuit-but for practical purposes, in order to communicate with various natives, and in order to learn what they have to say on scientific or practical subjects. It is obvious that the use of one common language in addition to the mother tongue of each people would produce an enormous saving of time, and tend to the nearer and better knowledge of the world's progress among them all. This position of the common language was once attained by Greek, then in a wider sense by Latin, both of which commanded not only the business transactions, but even the literature of the world for some centuries. Since the abandonment of Latin in favour of the tongue of each European nation within its own area, confusion has prevailed, until the political predominance of France for a time imposed French as the language of diplomacy upon Europe, and more recently until the mercantile predominance of England and

"There is, moreover, clear evidence that this novelty was gradually introduced, and took some time to prevail.

America has imposed English as the language of commerce upon the trading routes of the world. Nevertheless the other civilised nations of Europe hold fast to their respective tongues as a matter of jealous patriotism, and have even broken down the primacy of French in the field of diplomacy. Moreover France is waning in population and in power, while the English-speaking races are waxing. The attempt to settle the problem by inventing an arbitrary tongue has been ineffectual, and will never succeed in the face of practical languages, which are the natural growth of the human mind, spoken and understood already by many millions of men. Nor will a common system of signs like the Chinese be of much avail in trade, where speaking is far more important even among the educated minority than writing, an art which the majority of the world has never yet acquired. In spite, therefore, of many serious obstacles, English will gain the victory and become the world-language. Some of these obstacles, such as the jealousy of neighbouring nations, we cannot obviate; others, which consist in certain anomalies affecting our orthography and hindering the quick acquisition of English by foreigners, we should endeavour to diminish by practical common sense, by disregarding the pedant and the purist, and by encouraging such gradual and moderate licenses as may make English easier, without violating the traditions or the spirit of our great heritage.

J. P. MAHAFFY.

ENGLISH AND DUTCH DAIRY FARMING

AT a recent bye-election in the West of England an English politician was reported to have said as follows:

Land is the property of the people. You must never forget this one main principle of difference in property as between land and articles of manufacture. We can make boots and coats, build cathedrals, railways, canals, bridges, tunnels, all the other articles which we associate with the necessities of modern life, but no man ever made land. No man ever made an acre one foot longer or one foot broader. The land is the property of the nation, given to the people by the Great Creator for the purpose of toiling upon it and obtaining from it food and susten

ance.

This is fine logic to preach to agricultural labourers, but it will hardly hold water. It would perhaps surprise the speaker of the above words if he were told that land, as we understand it in civilised countries, is almost as much an article of manufacture as any of the articles above enumerated; yet such is the case.

It is the capitalist who has gradually given to the soil, on which dwell populous communities, its greatest fertility and productiveness, and has also given the means of housing its cultivators, its stock, and its produce.

Agriculture is an industry that requires, perhaps, more capital than any other the owner finds four-fifths of this capital, in the shape of houses, buildings, drainage, fences, roads, gates, soil improvements, &c. &c.; the occupier finds the remaining fifth, in .stock and implements.

There are also labourers' houses to be built, let as a rule at rents hardly sufficient to keep them in repair, or actually merged in the farm rental in the majority of cases.

At the present time rent is little more than a fair interest asked by the capitalist for the amount of money he has tied up on the land he owns; nothing is more untrue than that it is the land as land only (i.e. raw land) in respect of which the owner receives rent; the fact is that very little rent, if any, is paid in respect of land as land only.

The estimated expenditure by owners on the agricultural land of

Great Britain since the beginning of the century is about 700,000,000l., while the net income receivable, after paying all outgoings and expenses, is little more than 35,000,000l.; it is, therefore, not too much to say that the owners get little more than a moderate interest on the capital invested by themselves and their predecessors even during the present century. How many landowners are there in England at the present time who would not gladly accept as the price of their estates the amount expended upon them during the last thirty or forty years?

When the colonial farmer settles upon a tract of land which Government may have granted to him for nothing, or for a small sum of money, he has to borrow, at high rates of interest, sufficient money to build his house, drain, clear, irrigate, plant, fence, and otherwise develop the land, and construct a farm out of a wilderness; he, in fact, in many instances eventually pays a higher rent than the European farmer in the interest on these loans; and in addition there is this difference: in the older countries bad times are met by a reduction of rent, and consequently a diminution in the rate of interest paid on the capital invested in the land; in the newer countries, when times go against the farmer, and he makes no profit, the capitalists, fearing their money is in danger, will no longer lend without higher interest. This is shown especially in America by the numbers of heavily mortgaged and derelict farms. Thus it often happens that while European farmers, and especially English farmers, are in many instances paying 21. or 31. per cent. per annum in respect of the capital invested in their farms, colonial farmers are not infrequently paying 21. or 31. per cent. per month.

During the last two hundred years land has been changed in Europe from comparative waste into flourishing fertility, almost entirely at the owners' expense and with undoubted advantage to the community at large.

In no part of Europe has the effect of capital been so strongly marked as in that delightful and practical country which occupies the central portion of the north-west corner of the European continent. Little Holland, as she has been aptly called, has been to a large extent reclaimed from the sea, marsh and lake, at an enormous cost, and a large sum has to be annually spent in keeping up her protective works.

Anyone who will take the trouble to visit this small but flourishing State cannot fail to be struck with the immense amount of capital and labour which has been, and is being, expended in order to make her what she is. She is inhabited by an enterprising and pertinacious race, closely allied to ourselves, whose industry and good sense have stamped their features on the land; go where you will, all is order, neatness, and punctuality.

The means of locomotion are excellent and varied, both by land

and water. In addition to the main lines of railway the country is intersected by canals, on which steamers and trekschuits constantly ply; it has excellent roads, and is further covered by a network of light railways, by which one can go anywhere in ease and comfort at a very moderate cost.

The advantages of these latter institutions to the agricultural population cannot be overestimated, affording, as they do, a cheap and easy method of conveying agriculturists and their produce to the nearest market towns. Anybody who is sceptical as to the advantages of light railways has only to visit Holland for a few days to be convinced of their usefulness and excellence. No doubt from its flatness this country is peculiarly adapted to their construction, but we believe that there are many large districts in England which would offer almost equal facilities, and which would be very greatly helped and improved by their construction, if only the Board of Trade could relax its restrictions.

The system of dairy farming in Holland differs in many respects from our own, and in many respects it is superior. The temptation of sending milk to large cities, which is doing so much to deteriorate many of the English dairy districts, does not exist to the same extent for the Dutch farmers.

They have to turn their milk into dairy products, such as cheese and butter, and they have looked about to see what is the most economical and best way of accomplishing this end; in consequence they have adopted what in England is still practically in its infancy, viz. co-operative farming.

All over Holland and Friesland are to be found numerous cheese and butter factories, conducted on the very best principles, and turning out goods which compare very favourably with what we can ourselves produce. The Friesland butter, though it has been severely competed with by Denmark, has on the whole held its own, being of uniform make and possessing good keeping qualities.

The mode usually adopted in starting a factory is as follows: A certain district of, say, fifteen to twenty farms, of from fifty to 120 acres, is mapped out, and a factory is erected on the most central and convenient spot for all, usually in close proximity to a canal or light railway (often both); the money for building the factory is either borrowed or subscribed for by the farmers. Each person delivers daily to the factory the amount of milk yielded by his dairy cows, and takes back his proportion of whey, skim and butter milk, on which he feeds his calves and pigs.

A manager is appointed, whose fixed salary includes the wages of his subordinates, and he and his assistants make the cheese or butter, as the case may be, and he markets the same. At the end of every three months the accounts are balanced, the expenses are deducted from the gross receipts, and the balance of profit is divided amongst