Annual General Meeting, December 6, 1911. xli 



taken such a very enthusiastic interest in agriculture. Since his Grace had 

 mentioned the generout^ gift which His Majesty had made to the Scottish 

 National Fat Stock Show, he should like to mention that he had the honour of 

 winning that cup for the first time. 



The motion was then carried by acclamation, all the Members standing. 



Thanks to Acting-President. 



Mr. John Evens (Burton, Lincoln) said he had the honour and the pleasure 

 to propose to the meeting the following resolution — a vote of thanks to Sir 

 Ailwyn Fellowes for his services as Acting- President. He knew not why he 

 had been asked to propose that, except, perhaps, the fact that he was a tenant- 

 farmer and during the rush and advance of the present day, when estates were 

 being sold on all sides, and belongeil, though he hoped not, to a body of people 

 fast becoming extinct. If he might say so, he thought that His Majesty the 

 King had been fortunate, and that the Society had been more than fortunate, 

 in securiug as Acting- President for the past j'ear Sir Ailwyn Fellowes. And 

 why 1 Because by his genial courtesy he had won the esteem of all the Members 

 of the Society, but better than that the farmers in that room did not forget, the 

 farmers of England did not forget, and he trusted never would forget, the 

 services that had been paid to agriculture by their Acting- President. They 

 remembered with pleasure the deep interest he had always taken in the affairs 

 of the Society, and they acknowledged with thanks the practical business ability 

 he had brought to the affairs of the Society It was with the greatest pleasure 

 that he moved the vote of thanks to Sir Ailwyn Fellowes. 



Mr. Alfred Amos (Wye) said he was privileged to second the vote of 

 thanks, and it was with great pleasure that he did so. He did not know why 

 he had been selected to do this, but perhaps it was in order that he might 

 have an opportunity of mentioning a matter in which he was interested. He 

 wanted the Royal Agi-icultural Society to arrange so that all agricultural 

 colleges could send students to compete for the National Diploma in Agriculture. 

 He had been at a governors' meeting of the South-Eastern Agricultural College 

 the other day, and when he asked why they had not sent any students up for 

 this in the past, he was told that the date was so inconvenient. He did hope 

 that the matter would be taken seriously into consideration, and that the 

 Society would endeavour to give all the colleges an opportunity to compete for 

 that diploma. Agricultural education, he believed, was capable of doing an 

 enormous anaount of good, and those colleges must depend upon the men they 

 turned out rather than the pounds, shillings, and pence that they had left at 

 the end of the year. The methods of agricultural colleges would be methods 

 that agriculturists themselves insisted upon their being. 



Returning to the motion which he had the pleasure of seconding, he must say 

 that it augured well vvlien one Minister of Agriculture invited a past Minister 

 of Agricufture to accept the Presidency of a departmental committee such as 

 that which had been appointed to inquire into the question of foot-and-mouth 

 disease. 



The Secretary then put the motion, which was carried with great 

 enthusiasm. 



Sir Ailwyn Fellowes, in response, said he was deeply grateftil to his 

 friend Mr. Evens and to Mr. Amos for the kind words that they had used in 

 proposing and seconding the vote of thanks to himself as Acting-President of 

 that Society. Before saying a word about that, he would like to refer to the 

 question which Mr. Amos had raised, as to which he made the following explan- 

 ation. The National Agricultural Examination Board in April, 1909, received 

 a deputation from the Agricultural Education Association with regard to the 

 examination for the National Diploma in Agriculture. In a statement then 

 put forward it was said that the Association liad been in communication with 

 the various agricultural training centres in England concerning the date of tlie 

 examination, and the result was that the numbers for and against a change of 



