The value of specialization will seem to most people over-
emphasized ; but not the value of more good machinery, of mechanization. Here is an example from the mouth of a man of singularly wide experience in many countries :
" In the parish where I farmed in Essex is an estate consisting of 1,200 acres of land, a mansion, and two extensive farm houses. The property was sold last year at a figure reported as £1,500. It had been abandoned for some half a dozen years. At the sale fifteen wooden horse-ploughs were offered, and a tractor which had never been equipped for field work. The explanation of failure seemed to be painfully obvious : obsolete methods had failed to stand up against a more modernly conducted foreign competition, and the consequence was fifty deserted households in the village. As I have ploughed much of the land in the locality, I can say with confidence that if a practical use of machinery had been adopted in time, this attrition in a rural population would not have happened."
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