THE FARMER'S MAGAZIKE. 



MAY, 1858. 



PLATE I. 



rORTRAlT OF MR. SAMUEL JuNAS, 



PLATE IL 

 VICTORIA; A Short-horn Cow. 



MR. SAMUEL JONAS. 



There are few better representatives of his order 

 than Mr, Sam. Jonas, of Ickleton. A shrewd 

 judge and a spirited man of business, with every 

 ability to carry out his intentions, he brings the 

 character of the British farmer quite up to the 

 standard of our own times. "With something of 

 the old school in his bearing and appearance, there 

 is no one more alive to the advancement and im- 

 provement the art of agriculture must achieve. It 

 is, indeed, from the experience of such men that 

 we gather the only reliable test of the progress we 

 are making. Theorists may write, and amateurs 

 may talk, but it is the practical man who works. 

 He flourishes or falls with the pursuit ; and makes 

 it his first duty to see what he can adopt and what 

 he shall avoid. The farmer shuts himself up no 

 longer in his own home and to his own prejudices. 

 On the contrary, you find him all the world over ; 

 a farmer still, learning and sifting out all he can 

 for the advantage of his profession. 



" Sam Jones," as he is famiharly termed, is one 

 of these — known all the world over. You see him 

 at all our great meetings, busthng about either as 

 one in authority, or in some other way quite as 

 much interested in what is going on. It is not for 

 himself alone either that he is speaking or working. 

 On many an occasion ere this he has been one of 

 the best champions of his class. There is moreover 

 an independence of action and earnestness of pur- 

 pose in what he does that is always sure to tell. 

 Whether it be at a local meeting in his own county, 



OLD SERIES] 



or on a grand field-day in Hanover- square, there is 

 no farmer speaks up for his fellows with more 

 effect than Mr. Jonas. He occupies no ambiguous 

 position, but is thoroughly identified with those he 

 professes to feel for. And so when he says, the 

 farmers " must have this," or " they wont have 

 that," the Council know it is no idle boast or vain 

 prayer they are now hearing of. 



Mr. Jonas— like his relative Mr. Jonas Webb — 

 is a native of Suffolk. He was born at Great 

 Thurlow, in that county, on the '27th of September, 

 1802, so that he is now in the fifty -sixth year of his 

 age. It is, however, with the county of Cambridge 

 that, until very recently, he has been more identi- 

 fied, having farmed for a number of years at 

 Ickleton. His doings even as a public man are all 

 more or less associated with this district. He 

 wrote, for instance, the Prize Essay on the farming 

 of Cambridgeshire, lor the "Journal of the Uoyal 

 Agricultural Society"— the farming of his own 

 county, as it was then called. This i)aper was an 

 especial favourite with the late Mr. Pusey, the then 

 Editor of the Journal, and often cited by him as 

 an example of what such an essay should be. 



More in connection— at least by its boundaries — 

 with his present residence, Mr. Jonas was instru- 

 mental in forming the Safl'ron Walden Agricultural 

 Society, of which it is almost needless to add he is 

 a zealous supporter. His sideboard gives evi- 

 dence with what success as an exhibitor. 



Of the great national Society of the kingdom he 

 c c '[voT. xr.vni.— No. 5. 



