enty-five years from now the race of cattle and horses will
have diminished in France by one half."

"Monsieur Grossetete is right," remarked Gerard. "So that the work
you are undertaking here, madame," he added, addressing Veronique, "is
really a service done to the country."

"Yes," said the _juge de paix_, "because Madame has but one son, and
the inheritance will not be divided up; but how long will that condition
last? For a certain length of time the magnificent culture which you are
about to introduce will, let us hope, belong to only one proprietor, who
will continue to breed horned beasts and horses; but sooner or later the
day must come when these forests and fields will be divided up and sold
in small parcels. Divided and redivided, the six thousand acres of that
plain will have a thousand or twelve hundred owners, and thenceforth--no
more horses and cattle!"

"Oh! as for those days"--began the mayor.

"There! don't you hear the _What is that to me?_ Monsieur Clousier
talked of?" cried Monsieur Grossetete. "Taken in the act! But,
monsieur," resumed the banker, gravely addressing the dumfounded mayor,
"those days have really come. In a radius of thirty miles round Paris
the land is so divided up into small holdings that milch cows are no
longer seen. The Commune of Argenteuil contains thirty-eight thousand
eight hundred and eighty-five parcels of land, many of which do not
return a farthing of revenue. If it were not for the rich refuse of
Paris, which produces a fodder of strong quality, I don't know how
dairymen would get along. As it is, this over-stimulating food and
confinement in close stables produce inflammatory diseases, of which the
cows often die. They use cows in the neighborhood of Paris as they do
horses in the street. Crops more profitable than hay--vegetables, fruit,
apple orchards, vineyards--are taking the place of meadow-lands. In a
few years we shall see milk sent to Paris by the mail-coaches as they
now send fish. What is going on around Paris is also going on round all
the large cities of France; the land will thus be used up before many
years are gone. Chaptel states that in 1800 there were barely two
million acres of vineyard in France; a careful estimate would give
ten million to-day. Divided _ad infinitum_ by our present system of
inheritance, Normandy will lose half her production of horses and
cattle; but she will have a monopoly of milk in Paris, for her climate,
happily, forbid