The Globe. MONDAY, JULY 13, 1874.

Globe, Volume I, Issue 37, 13 July 1874, Page 2

The Globe. MONDAY, JULY 13, 1874.

It is questionable whether some of the agents employed by the different colonies, to give information to the agricultural labourers of Great Britain do not make a very grave mistake when they allow their imaginations to run away with them, and indulge in the flights of fancy that they undoubtedly do iu their lectures. We are reminded more particularly of this when wo find a Scotchman lecturing to Scotchmen, and telling them that oats in Canterbury weigh 50lbs a bushel. That a ftjw exceptional bushels might be found which would average this weight we are inclined to believe, but that anything like a fair proportion of the crops yearly grown, will come up to this weight by at least Slbs per bushel we must deny. It is well-known that the crop in question is one of the most dangerous to grow in this province, as one night of the high winds, which are so prevalent when oats are nearly ripe, will do an infinity of damage. It was only last season that a well-known farmer had a magnificent crop of oats on one field (some 50 acres), he absolutely refused to sell at the rate of GO bushels the acre, and that same evening the ‘nor-wester’ set in. When he could reap the crop, he got barely 25 bushels per acre, and had moreover to pay the men employed at binding no less than fifteen pence per hour. No doubt the latter fact would'seem an inducement to labourers at home to emigrate, but then they are apt to forget that harvesting only lasts for a few months iu the year, and that farmers would prefer to engage competent men, at good wages for all the year round, than to have to employ people who will rush off the moment any temporary work causes a rise in the price of labor for a month or two. It is easy enough to maho unthinking laborers who are not posted iu the latest accounts from the viyioua English colonies believe that each and every one of them is a veritable land of Goshen, and we shall probably obtain a greater number of immigrants by this policy, but in addressing a Scotch audience of laborers and mechanics, the lecturer is speaking to a class that as a rule are better educated than acorrespondingaudience composed of the same elements would be in England or Ireland, and this being the case it is by no moans improbable that some amongst the listeners may be well acquainted with the resources aud position of the particular part of the Australasian colonies, on the benefits of wdiich the lecturer is expatiating. Once introduce mistrust into the minds of the better educated of the class we refer to, by making exaggerated statements, and farewell to the idea of getting the best of that class to face the long sea voyage necessary to reach any part of the Australasian provinces. If the lecturers would confine themselves to a simple statement of facts, though the numbers that were persuaded by their arguments to emigrate, might not be so large, as is the case just at present, yet we should get a corresponding gain in the quality of the slupments, and one good hard working laborer is worth three of some of the latest class of immigrants that have been sent out.