ance, where
162 are reckoned to the same extent of country. But in Massachusetts
estates are very rarely divided; the eldest son takes the land, and the
others go to seek their fortune in the desert. The law has abolished
the rights of primogeniture, but circumstances have concurred to
re-establish it under a form of which none can complain, and by which no
just rights are impaired.

[Footnote c: In New England the estates are exceedingly small, but they
are rarely subjected to further division.]

A single fact will suffice to show the prodigious number of individuals
who leave New England, in this manner, to settle themselves in the
wilds. We were assured in 1830 that thirty-six of the members of
Congress were born in the little State of Connecticut. The population of
Connecticut, which constitutes only one forty-third part of that of
the United States, thus furnished one-eighth of the whole body of
representatives. The States of Connecticut, however, only sends five
delegates to Congress; and the thirty-one others sit for the new Western
States. If these thirty-one individuals had remained in Connecticut,
it is probable that instead of becoming rich landowners they would
have remained humble laborers, that they would have lived in obscurity
without being able to rise into public life, and that, far from becoming
useful members of the legislature, they might have been unruly citizens.

These reflections do not escape the observation of the Americans any
more than of ourselves. "It cannot be doubted," says Chancellor Kent
in his "Treatise on American Law," "that the division of landed estates
must produce great evils when it is carried to such excess as that
each parcel of land is insufficient to support a family; but these
disadvantages have never been felt in the United States, and many
generations must elapse before they can be felt. The extent of our
inhabited territory, the abundance of adjacent land, and the continual
stream of emigration flowing from the shores of the Atlantic towards
the interior of the country, suffice as yet, and will long suffice, to
prevent the parcelling out of estates."

It is difficult to describe the rapacity with which the American rushes
forward to secure the immense booty which fortune proffers to him.
In the pursuit he fearlessly braves the arrow of the Indian and the
distempers of the forest; he is unimpressed by the silence of the woods;
the approach of beasts of prey does not