The reader new to the subject must have been struck with the powerful impression made upon all the witnesses to whom I have referred, by what a Swiss statistical3 writer calls the “almost superhuman industry” of peasant proprietors5.1 On this point at least, authorities are unanimous. Those who have seen only one country of peasant properties, always think the inhabitants of that country the most industrious6 in the world. There is as little doubt among observers, with what feature in the condition of the peasantry this preeminent7 industry is connected. It is the “magic of property” which, in the words of Arthur Young, “turns sand into gold.” The idea of property does not, however, necessarily imply that there should be no rent, any more than that there should be no taxes. It merely implies that the rent should be a fixed10 charge, not liable to be raised against the possessor by his own improvements, or by the will of a landlord. A tenant11 at a quit-rent is, to all intents and purposes, a proprietor4; a copyholder is not less so than a freeholder. What is wanted is permanent possession on fixed terms. “Give a man the secure possession of a bleak12 rock, and he will turn it into a garden; give him a nine years’ lease of a garden, and he will convert it into a desert.”
The details which have been cited, and those, still more minute, to be found in the same authorities, concerning the habitually14 elaborate system of cultivation15, and the thousand devices of the peasant proprietor for making every superfluous16 hour and odd moment instrumental to some increase in the future produce and value of the land, will explain what has been said in a previous chapter2 respecting the far larger gross produce which, with anything like parity17 of agricultural knowledge, is obtained from the same quality of soil on small farms, at least when they are the property of the cultivator. The treatise18 on “Flemish Husbandry” is especially instructive respecting the means by which untiring industry does more than outweigh19 inferiority of resources, imperfection of implements20, and ignoranCe of scientific theories. The peasant cultivation of Flanders and italy is affirmed to produce heavier crops, in equal circumstances of soil, than the best cultivated districts of Scotland and England. it produces them, no doubt, with an amount of labour which, if paid for by an employer, would make the cost to him more than equivalent to the benefit; but to the peasant it is not cost, it is the devotion of time which he can spare, to a favourite pursuit, if we should not rather say a ruling passion.3
We have seen, too, that it is not solely21 by superior exertion22 that the Flemish cultivators succeed in obtaining these brilliant results. The same motive23 which gives such intensity24 to their industry, placed them earlier in possession of an amount of agricultural knowledge, not attained25 until much later in countries where agriculture was carried on solely by hired labour. An equally high testimony26 is borne by M. de Lavergne4 to the agricultural skill of the small proprietors in those parts of France to which the petite culture is really suitable. “In the rich plains of Flanders, on the banks of the Rhine, the Garonne, the Charente, the Rhone, all the practices which fertilize27 the land and increase the productiveness of labour are known to the very smallest cultivators, and practised by them, however considerable may be the advances which they require. In their hands, abundant manures, collected at great cost, repair and incessantly28 increase the fertility of the soil, in spite of the activity of cultivation. The races of cattle are superior, the crops magnificent. Tobacco, flax, colza, madder, beetroot, in some places; in others, the vine, the olive, the plum, the mulberry, only yield their abundant treasures to a population of industrious labourers. Is it not also to the petite culture that we are indebted for most of the garden produce obtained by dint29 of great outlay30 in the neighbourhood of Paris?”
§2. Another aspect of peasant properties, in which it is essential that they should be considered, is that of an instrument of popular education. Books and schooling31 are absolutely necessary to education; but not all-sufficient. The mental faculties32 will he most developed where they are most exercised; and what gives more exercise to them than the having a multitude of interests, none of which can be neglected, and which can be provided for only by varied33 efforts of will and intelligence? Some of the disparagers of small properties lay great stress on the cares and anxieties which beset34 the peasant proprietor of the Rhineland or Flanders. It is precisely35 those cares and anxieties which tend to make him a superior being to an English day-labourer. It is, to be sure, rather abusing the privileges of fair argument to represent the condition of a day-labourer as not an anxious one. I can conceive no circumstances in which he is free from anxiety, where there is a possibility of being out of employment; unless he has access to a profuse36 dispensation of parish pay, and no shame or reluctance37 in demanding it. The day-labourer has, in the existing state of society and population, many of the anxieties which have not an invigorating effect on the mind, and none of those which have. The position of the peasant proprietor of Continental38 Europe is the reverse. From the anxiety which chills and paralyses-the uncertainty39 of having food to eat-few persons are more exempt40: it requires as rare a concurrence41 of circumstances as the potato failure combined with an universal bad harvest, to bring him within reach of that danger. His anxieties are the ordinary vicissitudes42 of more and less; his cares are that he takes his fair share of the business of life; that he is a free human being, and not perpetually a child, which seems to be the approved condition of the labouring classes according to the prevailing43 philanthropy. He is no longer a being of a different order from the middle classes; he has pursuits and objects like those which occupy them, and give to their intellects the greatest part of such cultivation as they receive. If there is a first principle in intellectual education, it is this-that the discipline which does good to the mind is that in which the mind is active, not that in which it is passive. The secret for developing the faculties is to give them much to do, and much inducement to do it. This detracts nothing from the importance, and even necessity, of other kinds of mental cultivation. The possession of property will not prevent the peasant from being coarse, selfish, and narrow-minded. These things depend on other influences, and other kinds of instruction. But this great stimulus45 to one kind of mental activity, in no way impedes46 any other means of intellectual development. On the contrary, by cultivating the habit of turning to practical use every fragment of knowledge acquired, it helps to render that schooling and reading fruitful, which without some such auxiliary47 influence are in too many cases like seed thrown on a rock.
§3. It is not on the intelligence alone, that the situation of a peasant proprietor exercises an improving influence. It is no less propitious48 to the moral virtues49 of prudence51, temperance, and self-control. Day-labourers, where the labouring class mainly consists of them, are usually improvident52: they spend carelessly to the full extent of their means, and let the future shift for itself. This is so notorious, that many persons strongly interested in the welfare of the labouring classes, hold it as a fixed opinion that an increase of wages would do them little good, unless accompanied by at least a corresponding improvement in their tastes and habits. The tendency of peasant proprietors, and of those who hope to become proprietors, is to the contrary extreme; to take even too much thought for the morrow. They are oftener accused of penuriousness53 than of prodigality54. They deny themselves reasonable indulgences, and live wretchedly in order to economize55. In Switzerland almost everybody saves, who has any means of saving; the case of the Flemish farmers has been already noticed: among the French, though a pleasure-loving and reputed to be a self-indulgent people, the spirit of thrift56 is diffused57 through the rural population in a manner most gratifying as a whole, and which in individual instances errs58 rather on the side of excess than defect. Among those who, from the hovels in which they live, and the herbs and roots which constitute their diet, are mistaken by travellers for proofs and specimens59 of general indigence60, there are numbers who have hoards61 in leathern bags, consisting of sums, in five franc pieces, which they keep by them perhaps for a whole generation, unless brought out to be expended62 in their most cherished gratification the purchase of land. If there is a moral inconvenience attached to a state of society in which the peasantry have land, it is the danger of their being too careful of their pecuniary63 concerns; of its making them crafty64, and “calculating” in the objectionable sense. The French peasant is no simple countryman, no downright “paysan du Danube;” both in fact and in fiction he is now “le rusé paysan.” That is the stage which he has reached in the progressive development which the constitution of things has imposed on human intelligence and human emancipation65. But some excess in this direction is a small and a passing evil compared with recklessness and improvidence66 in the labouring classes, and a cheap price to pay for the inestimable worth of the virtue50 of self-dependence68, as the general characteristic of a people: a virtue which is one of the first conditions of excellence69 in the human character — the stock on which if the other virtues are not grafted70, they have seldom any firm root; a quality indispensable in the case of a labouring class, even to any tolerable degree of physical comfort; and by which the peasantry of France, and of most European countries of peasant proprietors, are distinguished71 beyond any other labouring population.
§4. Is it likely that a state of economical relations so conducive72 to frugality73 and prudence in every other respect, should be prejudicial to it in the cardinal74 point of increase of population? That it is so, is the opinion expressed by most of those English political economists75 who have written anything about the matter. Mr. M’Culloch’s opinion is well known. Mr. Jones affirms,5 that a “peasant population raising their own wages from the soil, and consuming them in kind, are universally acted upon very feebly by internal checks, or by motives76 disposing them to restraint. The consequence is, that unless some external cause, quite independent of their will, forces such peasant cultivators to slacken their rate of increase, they will, in a limited territory, very rapidly approach a state of want and penury77, and will be stopped at last only by the physical impossibility of procuring78 subsistence.” He elsewhere6 speaks of such a peasantry as “exactly in the condition in which the animal disposition80 to increase their numbers is checked by the fewest of those balancing motives and desires which regulate the increase of superior ranks or more civilized81 people.” The “causes of this peculiarity”, Mr. Jones promised to point out in a subsequent work, which never made its appearance. I am totally unable to conjecture83 from what theory of human nature, and of the motives which influence human conduct, he would have derived84 them. Arthur Young assumes the same “peculiarity” as a fact; but, though not much in the habit of qualifying his opinions, he does not push his doctrine85 to so violent an extreme as Mr. Jones; having, as we have seen, himself testified to various instances in which peasant populations such as Mr. Jones speaks of, were not tending to “a state of want and penury”, and were in no danger whatever of coming into contact with “physical impossibility of procuring subsistence.”
That there should be discrepancy86 of experience on this matter, is easily to be accounted for. Whether the labouring people live by land or by wages, they have always hitherto multiplied up to the limit set by their habitual13 standard of comfort. When that standard was low, not exceeding a scanty87 subsistence, the size of properties, as well as the rate of wages, has been kept down to what would barely support life. Extremely low ideas of what is necessary for subsistence, are perfectly88 compatible with peasant properties; and if a people have always been used to poverty, and habit has reconciled them to it, there will be over-population, and excessive subdivision of land. But this is not to the purpose. The true question is, supposing a peasantry to possess land not insufficient89 but sufficient for their comfortable support, are they more, or less, likely to fall from this state of comfort through improvident multiplication90, than if they were living in an equally comfortable manner as hired labourers? All à priori considerations are in favour of their being less likely. The dependence of wages on population is a matter of speculation91 and discussion. That wages would fall if population were much increased is often a matter of real doubt, and always a thing which requires some exercise of the thinking faculty92 for its intelligent recognition. But every peasant can satisfy himself from evidence which he can fully93 appreciate, whether his piece of land can be made to support several families in the same comfort as it supports one. Few people like to leave to their children a worse lot in life than their own. The parent who has land to leave, is perfectly able to judge whether the children can live upon it or not: but people who are supported by wages, see no reason why their sons should be unable to support themselves in the same way, and trust accordingly to chance. “In even the most useful and necessary arts and manufactures,” says Mr. Laing,7 “the demand for labourers is not a seen, known, steady, and appreciable94 demand: but it is so in husbandry” under small properties. “The labour to be done, the subsistence that labour will produce out of his portion of land, are seen and known elements in a man’s calculation upon his means of subsistence. Can his square of land, or can it not, subsist79 a family? Can he marry or not? are questions which every man can answer without delay, doubt, or speculation. It is the depending on chance, where judgment95 has nothing clearly set before it, that causes reckless, improvident marriages in the lower, as in the higher classes, and produces among us the evils of over-population; and chance necessarily enters into every man’s calculations, when certainty is removed altogether; as it is, where certain subsistence is, by our distribution of property, the lot of but a small portion instead of about two-thirds of the people.”
There never has been a writer more keenly sensible of the evils brought upon the labouring classes by excess of population, than Sismondi, and this is one of the grounds of his earnest advocacy of peasant properties. He had ample opportunity, in more countries than one, for judging of their effect on population. Let us see his testimony. “In the countries in which cultivation by small proprietors still continues, population increases regularly and rapidly until it has attained its natural limits; that is to say, inheritances continue to be divided and subdivided96 among several sons, as long as, by an increase of labour, each family can extract an equal income from a smaller portion of land. A father who possessed97 a vast extent of natural pasture, divides it among his sons, and they turn it into fields and meadows; his sons divide it among their sons, who abolish fallows: each improvement in agricultural knowledge admits of another step in the subdivision of property. But there is no danger lest the proprietor should bring up his children to make beggars of them. He knows exactly what inheritance he has to leave them; he knows that the law will divide it equally among them; he sees the limit beyond which this division would make them descend98 from the rank which he has himself filled, and a just family pride, common to the peasant and to the nobleman, makes him abstain99 from summoning into life, children for whom he cannot properly provide. If more are born, at least they do not marry, or they agree among themselves, which of several brothers shall perpetuate100 the family. It is not found that in the Swiss Cantons, the patrimonies101 of the peasants are ever so divided as to reduce them below an honourable102 competence103; though the habit of foreign service, by opening to the children a career indefinite and uncalculable, sometimes calls forth104 a super-abundant population.”8
There is similar testimony respecting Norway. Though there is no law or custom of primogeniture, and no manufactures to take off a surplus population, the subdivision of property is not carried to an injurious extent. “The division of the land among children,” says Mr. Laing,9 “appears not, during the thousand years it has been in operation, to have had the effect of reducing the landed properties to the minimum size that will barely support human existence. I have counted from five-and-twenty to forty cows upon farms, and that in a country in which the farmer must, for at least seven months in the year, have winter provender105 and houses provided for all the cattle. It is evident that some cause or other, operating on aggregation106 of landed property, counteracts107 the dividing effects of partition among children. That cause can be no other than what I have long conjectured108 would be effective in such a social arrangement; viz. that in a country where land is held, not in tenancy merely, as in Ireland, but in full ownership, its aggregation by the deaths of co-heirs, and by the marriages of the female heirs among the body of landholders, will balance its subdivision by the equal succession of children. The whole mass of property will, I conceive, be found in such a state of society to consist of as many estates of the class of 10001., as many of 100l., as many of 10l., a year, at one period as another.” That this should happen, supposes diffused through society a very efficacious prudential check to population; and it is reasonable to give part of the credit of this prudential restraint to the peculiar82 adaptation of the peasant-proprietary system for fostering it.
“In some parts of Switzerland,” says Mr. Kay,10 “as in the canton of Argovie for instance, a peasant never marries before he attains109 the age of twenty-five years, and generally much later in life; and in that canton the women very seldom marry before they have attained the age of thirty. . . . Nor do the division of land and the cheapness of the mode of conveying it from one man to another, encourage the providence67 of the labourers of the rural districts only. They act in the same manner, though perhaps. in a less degree, upon the labourers of the smaller towns. In the smaller provincial110 towns it is customary for a labourer to own a small plot of ground outside the town. This plot he cultivates in the evening as his kitchen garden. He raises in it vegetables and fruits for the use of his family during the winter. After his day’s work is over, he and his family repair to the garden for a short time, which they spend in planting, sowing, weeding, or preparing for sowing or harvest, according to the season. The desire to become possessed of one of these gardens operates very strongly in strengthening prudential habits and in restraining improvident marriages. Some of the manufacturers in the canton of Argovie told me that a townsman was seldom contented111 until he had bought a garden, or a garden and house, and that the town labourers generally deferred112 their marriages for some years, in order to save enough to purchase either one or both of these luxuries.”
The same writer shows by statistical evidence11 that in Prussia the average age of marriage is not only much later than in England, but “is gradually becoming later than it was formerly,” while at the same time “fewer illegitimate children are born in Prussia than in any other of the European countries.” “Wherever I travelled,” says Mr. Kay,12 “in North Germany and Switzerland, I was assured by all that the desire to obtain land, which was felt by all the peasants, was acting113 as the strongest possible check upon undue114 increase of population.”13
In Flanders, according to Mr. Fauche, the British Consul115 at Ostend,14 “farmers’ sons and those who have the means to become farmers will delay their marriage until they get possession of a farm.” Once a farmer, the next object is to become a proprietor. “The first thing a Dane does with his savings116,” says Mr. Browne, the Consul at Copenhagen,15 “is to purchase a clock, then a horse and cow, which he hires out, and which pays a good interest. Then his ambition is to become a petty proprietor, and this class of persons is better off than any in Denmark. Indeed, I know of no people in any country who have more easily within their reach all that is really necessary for life than this class, which is very large in comparison with that of labourers.”
But the experience which most decidedly contradicts the asserted tendency of peasant proprietorship117 to produce excess of population, is the case of France. In that country the experiment is not tried in the most favourable118 circumstances, a large proportion of the properties being too small. The number of landed proprietors in France is not exactly ascertained119, but on no estimate does it fall much short of five millions; which, on the lowest calculation of the number of persons of a family (and for France it ought to be a low calculation), shows much more than half the population as either possessing, or entitled to inherit, landed property. A majority of the properties are so small as not to afford a subsistence to the proprietors, of whom, according to some computations, as many as three millions are obliged to eke120 out their means of support either by working for hire, or by taking additional land, generally on metayer tenure121. When the property possessed is not sufficient to relieve the possessor from dependence on wages, the condition of a proprietor loses much of its characteristic efficacy as a check to over-population: and if the prediction so often made in England had been realized, and France had become a “pauper warren,” the experiment would have proved nothing against the tendencies of the same system of agricultural economy in other circumstances. But what is the fact? That the rate of increase of the French population is the slowest in Europe. During the generation which the Revolution raised from the extreme of hopeless wretchedness to sudden abundance, a great increase of population took place. But a generation has grown up, which, having been born in improved circumstances, has not learnt to be miserable122; and upon them the spirit of thrift operates most conspicuously123, in keeping the increase of population within the increase of national wealth. In a table, drawn124 up by Professor Rau,16 of the rate of annual increase of the populations of various countries, that of France, from 1817 to 1827, is stated at 63/100 per cent, that of England during a similar decennial period being 1 6/10 annually125, and that of the United States nearly 3. According to the Official returns as analysed by M. Legoyt,17 the increase of the population, which from 1801 to 1806 was at the rate of 1.28 per cent annually, averaged only 0.47 per cent from 1806 to 1831; from 1831 to 1836 it averaged 0.60 per cent; from 1836 to 1841, 0.41 per cent, and from 1841 to l846, 0.68 per cent.18 At the census126 of l851 the rate of annual increase shown was only 1.08 per cent in the five years, or 0.21 annually; and at the census of 1856 only 0.71 per cent in five years, or 0.14 annually. so that, in the words of M. de Lavergne, “la population ne s’accro?t presque plus en France.”19 Even this slow increase is wholly the effect of a diminution127 of deaths; the number of births not increasing at all, while the proportion of the births to the population is constantly diminishing.20 This slow growth of the numbers of the people, while capital increases much more rapidly, has caused a noticeable improvement in the condition of the labouring class. The circumstances of that portion of the class who are landed proprietors are not easily ascertained with precision, being of course extremely variable; but the mere9 labourers, who derived no direct benefit from the changes in landed property which took place at the Revolution, have unquestionably much improved in condition since that period.21 Dr. Rau testifies to a similar fact in the case of another country in which the subdivision of the land is probably excessive, the Palatinate.22
I am not aware of a single authentic128 instance which supports the assertion that rapid multiplication is promoted by peasant properties. Instances may undoubtedly129 be cited of its not being prevented by them, and one of the principal of these is Belgium; the prospects130 of which, in respect to population, are at present a matter of considerable uncertainty. Belgium has the most rapidly increasing population on the Continent; and when the circumstances of the country require, as they must soon do, that this rapidity should be checked, there will be a considerable strength of existing habit to be broken through. One of the unfavourable circumstances is the great power possessed over the minds of the people by the Catholic priesthood, whose influence is everywhere strongly exerted against restraining population. As yet, however, it must be remembered that the indefatigable131 industry and great agricultural skill of the people have rendered the existing rapidity of increase practically innocuous; the great number of large estates still undivided affording by their gradual dismemberment, a resource for the necessary augmentation of the gross produce; and there are, besides, many large manufacturing towns, and mining and coal districts, which attract and employ a considerable portion of the annual increase of population.
§5. But even where peasant properties are accompanied by an excess of numbers, this evil is not necessarily attended with the additional economical disadvantage of too great a subdivision of the land. It does not follow because landed property is minutely divided, that farms will be so. As large properties are perfectly compatible with small farms, so are small properties with farms of an adequate size; and a subdivision of occupancy is not an inevitable132 consequence of even undue multiplication among peasant proprietors. As might be expected from their admirable intelligence in things relating to their occupation, the Flemish peasantry have long learnt this lesson. “The habit of not dividing properties,” says Dr. Rau,23 “and the opinion that this is advantageous133, have been so completely preserved in Flanders, that even now, when a peasant dies leaving several children, they do not think of dividing his patrimony134, though it be neither entailed135 nor settled in trust; they prefer selling it entire, and sharing the proceeds, considering it as a jewel which loses its value when it is divided.” That the same feeling must prevail widely even in France, is shown by the great frequency of sales of land, amounting in ten years to a fourth part of the whole soil of the country.. and M. Passy, in his tract44 “On the Changes in the Agricultural Condition of the Department of the Eure since the year 1800,”24 states other facts tending to the same conclusion. “The example,” says he, “of this department attests136 that there does not exist, as some writers have imagined, between the distribution of property and that of cultivation, a connexion which tends invincibly137 to assimilate them. In no portion of it have changes of ownership had a perceptible influence on the size of holdings. While, in districts of small farming, lands belonging to the same owner are ordinarily distributed among many tenants138, so neither is it uncommon139, in places where the grande culture prevails, for the same farmer to rent the lands of several proprietors. In the plains of Vexin, in particular, many active and rich cultivators do not content themselves with a single farm; others add to the lands of their principal holding, all those in the neighbourhood which they are able to hire, and in this manner make up a total extent which in some cases reaches or exceeds two hundred hectares” (five hundred English acres). “The more the estates are dismembered, the more frequent do this sort of arrangements become: and as they conduce to the interest of all concerned, it is probable that time will confirm them.”
“In some places,” says M. de Lavergne,25 “in the neighbourhood of Paris, for example, where the advantages of the grande culture become evident, the size of farms tends to increase, several farms are thrown together into one, and farmers enlarge their holdings by renting parcelles from a number of different proprietors. Elsewhere farms as well as properties of too great extent, tend to division. Cultivation spontaneously finds out the organization which suits it best.” It is a striking fact, stated by the same eminent8 writer,26 that the departments which have the greatest number of small c?tes foncières, are the Nord, the Somme, the Pas de Calais, the Seine Inférieure, the Aisne, and the Oise; all of them among the richest and best cultivated, and the first-mentioned of them the very richest and best cultivated, in France.
Undue subdivision, and excessive smallness of holdings, are undoubtedly a prevalent evil in some countries of peasant proprietors, and particularly in parts of Germany and France. The governments of Bavaria and Nassau have thought it necessary to impose a legal limit to subdivision, and the Prussian Government unsuccessfully proposed the same measures to the Estates of its Rhenish Provinces. But I do not think it will anywhere be found that the petite culture is the system of the peasants, and the grande culture that of the great landlords: on the contrary, wherever the small properties are divided among too many proprietors, I believe it to be true that the large properties also are parcelled out among too many farmers, and that the cause is the same in both cases, a backward state of capital, skill, and agricultural enterprise. There is reason to believe that the subdivision in France is not more excessive than is accounted for by this cause; that it is diminishing, not increasing; and that the terror expressed in some quarters, at the progress of the morcellement, is one of the most groundless of real or pretended panics.27
If peasant properties have any effect in promoting subdivision beyond the degree which corresponds to the agricultural practices of the country, and which is customary on its large estates, the cause must lie in one of the salutary influences of the system; the eminent degree in which it promotes providence on the part of those who, not being yet peasant proprietors, hope to become so. In England, where the agricultural labourer has no investment for his savings but the savings bank, and no position to which he can rise by any exercise of economy, except perhaps that of a petty shopkeeper, with its chances of bankruptcy140, there is nothing at all resembling the intense spirit of thrift which takes possession of one who, from being a day labourer, can raise himself by saving to the condition of a landed proprietor. According to almost all authorities, the real cause of the morcellement is the higher price which can be obtained for land by selling it to the peasantry, as an investment for their small accumulations, than by disposing of it entire to some rich purchaser who has no object but to live on its income, without improving it. The hope of obtaining such an investment is the most powerful inducements, to those who are without land, to practise the industry, frugality, and self-restraint, on which their success in this object of ambition is dependent.
As the result of this enquiry into the direct operation and indirect influences of peasant properties, I conceive it to be established, that there is no necessary connexion between this form of landed property and an imperfect state of the arts of production; that it is favourable in quite as many respects as it is unfavourable, to the most effective use of the powers of the soil; that no other existing state of agricultural economy has so beneficial an effect on the industry, the intelligence, the frugality, and prudence of the population, nor tends on the whole so much to discourage an improvident increase of their numbers; and that no existing state, therefore, is on the whole so favourable both to their moral and their physical welfare. Compared with the English system of cultivation by hired labour, it must be regarded as eminently141 beneficial to the labouring class.28 We are not on the present occasion called upon to compare it with the joint142 ownership of the land by associations of labourers.
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determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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territorial
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| adj.领土的，领地的 | |
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statistical
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| adj.统计的，统计学的 | |
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proprietor
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| n.所有人；业主；经营者 | |
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proprietors
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| n.所有人，业主( proprietor的名词复数 ) | |
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industrious
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| adj.勤劳的，刻苦的，奋发的 | |
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preeminent
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的 | |
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eminent
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| adj.显赫的，杰出的，有名的，优良的 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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tenant
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| n.承租人；房客；佃户；v.租借，租用 | |
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bleak
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| adj.(天气)阴冷的；凄凉的；暗淡的 | |
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habitual
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| adj.习惯性的；通常的，惯常的 | |
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habitually
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| ad.习惯地，通常地 | |
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cultivation
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| n.耕作，培养，栽培（法），养成 | |
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superfluous
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| adj.过多的，过剩的，多余的 | |
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parity
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| n.平价，等价，比价，对等 | |
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treatise
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| n.专著；(专题)论文 | |
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outweigh
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implements
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| n.工具( implement的名词复数 )；家具；手段；[法律]履行（契约等）v.实现( implement的第三人称单数 )；执行；贯彻；使生效 | |
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solely
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| adv.仅仅，唯一地 | |
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exertion
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| n.尽力，努力 | |
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motive
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| n.动机，目的；adv.发动的，运动的 | |
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intensity
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| n.强烈，剧烈；强度；烈度 | |
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attained
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| （通常经过努力）实现( attain的过去式和过去分词 )； 达到； 获得； 达到（某年龄、水平、状况） | |
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26
testimony
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| n.证词；见证，证明 | |
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fertilize
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| v.使受精，施肥于，使肥沃 | |
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incessantly
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| ad.不停地 | |
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29
dint
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| n.由于，靠；凹坑 | |
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outlay
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| n.费用，经费，支出；v.花费 | |
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31
schooling
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| n.教育；正规学校教育 | |
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faculties
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| n.能力( faculty的名词复数 )；全体教职员；技巧；院 | |
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varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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beset
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| v.镶嵌；困扰，包围 | |
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precisely
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| adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地 | |
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profuse
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| adj.很多的，大量的，极其丰富的 | |
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reluctance
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| n.厌恶，讨厌，勉强，不情愿 | |
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38
continental
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| adj.大陆的，大陆性的，欧洲大陆的 | |
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uncertainty
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| n.易变，靠不住，不确知，不确定的事物 | |
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exempt
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| adj.免除的；v.使免除；n.免税者，被免除义务者 | |
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concurrence
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| n.同意；并发 | |
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vicissitudes
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| n.变迁，世事变化；变迁兴衰( vicissitude的名词复数 )；盛衰兴废 | |
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prevailing
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| adj.盛行的；占优势的；主要的 | |
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tract
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| n.传单，小册子，大片(土地或森林) | |
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stimulus
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| n.刺激，刺激物，促进因素，引起兴奋的事物 | |
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impedes
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| 阻碍，妨碍，阻止( impede的第三人称单数 ) | |
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auxiliary
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| adj.辅助的，备用的 | |
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propitious
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| adj.吉利的；顺利的 | |
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49
virtues
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| 美德( virtue的名词复数 )； 德行； 优点； 长处 | |
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virtue
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| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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51
prudence
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| n.谨慎，精明，节俭 | |
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52
improvident
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| adj.不顾将来的，不节俭的，无远见的 | |
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53
penuriousness
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54
prodigality
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| n.浪费，挥霍 | |
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55
economize
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| v.节约，节省 | |
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56
thrift
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| adj.节约，节俭；n.节俭，节约 | |
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diffused
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| 散布的，普及的，扩散的 | |
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58
errs
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| 犯错误，做错事( err的第三人称单数 ) | |
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59
specimens
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| n.样品( specimen的名词复数 )；范例；（化验的）抽样；某种类型的人 | |
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indigence
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| n.贫穷 | |
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61
hoards
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| n.（钱财、食物或其他珍贵物品的）储藏，积存( hoard的名词复数 )v.积蓄并储藏（某物）( hoard的第三人称单数 ) | |
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62
expended
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| v.花费( expend的过去式和过去分词 )；使用（钱等）做某事；用光；耗尽 | |
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63
pecuniary
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| adj.金钱的；金钱上的 | |
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64
crafty
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| adj.狡猾的，诡诈的 | |
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65
emancipation
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| n.（从束缚、支配下）解放 | |
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66
improvidence
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| n.目光短浅 | |
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67
providence
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| n.深谋远虑，天道，天意；远见；节约；上帝 | |
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68
dependence
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| n.依靠，依赖；信任，信赖；隶属 | |
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excellence
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| n.优秀，杰出，(pl.)优点，美德 | |
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70
grafted
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| 移植( graft的过去式和过去分词 )； 嫁接； 使（思想、制度等）成为（…的一部份）； 植根 | |
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71
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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72
conducive
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| adj.有益的，有助的 | |
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73
frugality
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| n.节约，节俭 | |
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74
cardinal
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| n.(天主教的)红衣主教；adj.首要的，基本的 | |
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75
economists
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| n.经济学家，经济专家( economist的名词复数 ) | |
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76
motives
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| n.动机，目的( motive的名词复数 ) | |
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penury
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| n.贫穷，拮据 | |
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78
procuring
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| v.（努力）取得， （设法）获得( procure的现在分词 )；拉皮条 | |
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79
subsist
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| vi.生存，存在，供养 | |
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80
disposition
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| n.性情，性格；意向，倾向；排列，部署 | |
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81
civilized
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| a.有教养的，文雅的 | |
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82
peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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83
conjecture
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| n./v.推测，猜测 | |
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84
derived
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| vi.起源；由来；衍生；导出v.得到( derive的过去式和过去分词 )；（从…中）得到获得；源于；（从…中）提取 | |
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85
doctrine
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| n.教义；主义；学说 | |
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86
discrepancy
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| n.不同；不符；差异；矛盾 | |
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87
scanty
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| adj.缺乏的，仅有的，节省的，狭小的，不够的 | |
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88
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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89
insufficient
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| adj.(for，of)不足的，不够的 | |
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90
multiplication
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| n.增加，增多，倍增；增殖，繁殖；乘法 | |
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91
speculation
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| n.思索，沉思；猜测；投机 | |
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92
faculty
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| n.才能；学院，系；(学院或系的)全体教学人员 | |
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93
fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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94
appreciable
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| adj.明显的，可见的，可估量的，可觉察的 | |
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95
judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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96
subdivided
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| 再分，细分( subdivide的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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97
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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98
descend
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| vt./vi.传下来，下来，下降 | |
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99
abstain
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| v.自制，戒绝，弃权，避免 | |
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100
perpetuate
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| v.使永存，使永记不忘 | |
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101
patrimonies
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| n.祖传的财物，继承物，遗产( patrimony的名词复数 ) | |
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102
honourable
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| adj.可敬的；荣誉的，光荣的 | |
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103
competence
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| n.能力，胜任，称职 | |
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104
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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105
provender
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| n.刍草；秣料 | |
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106
aggregation
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| n.聚合，组合；凝聚 | |
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107
counteracts
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| 对抗，抵消( counteract的第三人称单数 ) | |
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108
conjectured
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| 推测，猜测，猜想( conjecture的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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109
attains
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| （通常经过努力）实现( attain的第三人称单数 )； 达到； 获得； 达到（某年龄、水平、状况） | |
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110
provincial
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| adj.省的，地方的；n．外省人，乡下人 | |
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111
contented
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| adj.满意的，安心的，知足的 | |
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112
deferred
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| adj.延期的，缓召的v.拖延，延缓，推迟( defer的过去式和过去分词 )；服从某人的意愿，遵从 | |
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113
acting
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| n.演戏，行为，假装；adj.代理的，临时的，演出用的 | |
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114
undue
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| adj.过分的；不适当的；未到期的 | |
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115
consul
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| n.领事；执政官 | |
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116
savings
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| n.存款，储蓄 | |
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117
proprietorship
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| n.所有（权）；所有权 | |
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118
favourable
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| adj.赞成的，称赞的，有利的，良好的，顺利的 | |
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119
ascertained
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| v.弄清，确定，查明( ascertain的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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120
eke
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| v.勉强度日，节约使用 | |
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121
tenure
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| n.终身职位；任期；(土地)保有权，保有期 | |
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122
miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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123
conspicuously
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| ad.明显地，惹人注目地 | |
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124
drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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125
annually
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| adv.一年一次，每年 | |
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126
census
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| n.(官方的)人口调查，人口普查 | |
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127
diminution
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| n.减少；变小 | |
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128
authentic
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| a.真的，真正的；可靠的，可信的，有根据的 | |
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129
undoubtedly
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| adv.确实地，无疑地 | |
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130
prospects
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| n.希望，前途(恒为复数) | |
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131
indefatigable
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| adj.不知疲倦的，不屈不挠的 | |
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132
inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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133
advantageous
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| adj.有利的；有帮助的 | |
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134
patrimony
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| n.世袭财产，继承物 | |
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135
entailed
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| 使…成为必要( entail的过去式和过去分词 )； 需要； 限定继承； 使必需 | |
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136
attests
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| v.证明( attest的第三人称单数 )；证实；声称…属实；使宣誓 | |
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137
invincibly
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| adv.难战胜地，无敌地 | |
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138
tenants
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| n.房客( tenant的名词复数 )；佃户；占用者；占有者 | |
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139
uncommon
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| adj.罕见的，非凡的，不平常的 | |
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140
bankruptcy
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| n.破产；无偿付能力 | |
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eminently
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| adv.突出地；显著地；不寻常地 | |
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142
joint
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| adj.联合的，共同的；n.关节，接合处；v.连接，贴合 | |
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