388 



THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



Mr. M'Cann, if he likes, may take up the Weights and 

 Measures' movement ; and Mr. Bright may declaim 

 against the injustice of the Game Laws. The honourable 

 member for the agricultural interest is perfectly indif- 

 ferent to what they may say. What is the price of 

 manures, the sale of corn, or the damage done by rab- 

 bits and hares to him or his constituents ? 



It would certainly seem to be little or nothing. But 

 is this quite fair ? What can be the use of farmers con- 

 tinually meeting and considering points they desire to 

 have adjusted, if no attention is paid to them by those 

 whose first duty it is to see their supporters righted? 

 The progress of agriculture will come in many ways to 

 something like a dead lock, until the agriculturists 

 themselves are a little more demonsti'atively repre- 

 sented. The Royal Agricultural Society may do its 

 ■work, and the Central Farmers' Club its share of it ; 

 but to do any good the work must not stop here. There 

 are many matters more than ripe for a settlement. 

 The most energetic even gradually tire of considering 

 them ; and it is simply a point now as to who should 

 go on with them. We say unhesitatingly that the mem- 

 bers for rural districts should evince far more readiness 

 to do so than they lattei'ly have done. Only let a 



townsman have a grievance, and mark how anxious 

 his honourable friend is to help him out of it. Un- 

 fortunately we do not meet with so many volunteers. 



Would it be impertinent or out of place to put a few 

 such home questions as those we have refeiTed to at 

 this election ? Depend upon it, the farmers have 

 worked and will work comparatively in vain, unless they 

 can bring their efforts a little more to a focus. Do not let 

 them be too delicate or indifferent as to impressing the 

 wants of their own order just where and when they may 

 do so with some effect. The interests of landlord and 

 tenant are in the main identical ; and there is not a 

 subject we have here touched on but either of them 

 may go fairly into. A farmer of long experience and 

 much authority, as well as being the agent of a county 

 member, assures us these matters must bo looked to 

 and amended, or we shall have no proper agricultural 

 progress. What Mr. Smith said at the club, those who 

 hear or read him aright may say at the hustings. 

 If the farmers do not care to go into Parliament, at 

 least let them find somebody who will say a word now 

 and then for them. There are three or four important 

 points that have now only to be pushed in the House' 

 Let our care be to push only a good man up to the door. 



LONDON, OR CENTRAL FARMERS' CLUB. 

 THE PROGRESS OF AGRICULTURE. 



The usual Monthly Meeting of the Members took 

 place on Monday evening, April 4, at the Club-house, 

 Blackfriars. 



Mr. Thomas, of Bletsoe, was in the chair, supported 

 by Messrs. W. Bennett, C. T. James, H. Trethewy, 

 Robert Smith, S. Skelton, James Thomas, G. Wilsher, 

 J. B. Spearing, T. E. Pawlett, J. Tyler, E. Little, James 

 Wood, J. G. King, J. Howard, B. P. Shearer, F. 

 Dyball, C. J. Brickwell, L. A. Coussmaker, J. Cressing- 

 ham, J. Wood (Croydon), M. Reynolds, Norman Taylor, 

 W. Cheffins, H. Shotter, E. B. Acton, J. Parkinson, 

 W. Eve, G. Whistler, D. Christie, R. Palgrave, G. 

 Russell, P. F. Pell, E. B. Waite, E. Tattersall, S. 

 Sidney, J. M. Lansdell, &c., &c. 



The subject for discussion — " The Progress of Agri- 

 culture," was introduced by Mr. R.Smith, ofEmmett's 

 Grange, South Molton, Devon. 



After a few introductory remarks from the Chairman, 



Mr. Smith said : Gentlemen,— When we speak of 

 " the progress of agriculture," I feel that every link in 

 the chain of agricultural events forms a theme in itself, 

 alike expressive of the progress which the "art," the 

 "manufacture," and the "commerce" of agriculture have 

 made cluring many past centuries, and down to the pre- 

 sent time. Indeed, the subject grows upon me, when I 

 reflect that our island was once a " common waste," and 

 that the industry of man has redeemed it from century to 

 century as population increased. Thus agriculture has 

 been fostered from the earliest dates, and we live in a 

 century in which the art has made a degree of progress 

 hitherto unprecedented. Within tjje last few years, this 



subject has been treated by the late Philip Pusey, to 

 whom English agriculture stands much indebted, in 

 a paper in which he reviewed a period of eight years 

 preceding the year 1850. Mr. Wren Hoskyns has 

 given us a most valuable " Retrospect of English Agri- 

 culture during the fifteen years preceding 1856," be- 

 fore the Society of Arts. In April, 1858, a third 

 paper appeared, written by a member of this Club, 

 of which paper I will only say that it is fully 

 worthy of its author. Such records having preceded 

 the introduction of this evening's discussion, I find 

 it no easy task to bring before you a subject which 

 shall be clothed in novelties or embrace new matter. 

 But 1 have one advantage on my side, namely, the full 

 benefit of your fortified minds to aid me in discussion, 

 and thus simplify my mission to that of introducing the 

 subject to your notice. With a view to varying my 

 subject, and marking the interesting progress that has 

 been made from time to time, I will take as a starting 

 point a brief glance at our early history. — The progress 

 of British agriculture has long been a leading subject in 

 the history of our island, and has been dilated upon alike 

 by the historian, the politician, and the poet. It is com- 

 mon ground for every citizen ; it is a nation's question, 

 involving the supply of food for an increasing popula- 

 tion upon a given space of land — an island. Indeed, 

 the first want of man is food, and his natural resource 

 for it must be the ground. Hence the tillers of the soil 

 share no small responsibility in the general weal of our 

 national progress. Agriculture is the parent of manu- 

 factures and commerce ; hence it is not only the most 



