THE EiANF) WE LIVE ON. 



"Quid Faciat L^tas Segetes." — Virgil. 



By J. C. BRUNNICH, F.I C. 



Presidential Address read before the Royal Society of Queens- 

 land on January 29th, 1909. 



So short and yet so comprehensive is the quotation from 

 Virgil's immortal Georgic : " What makes the crops rejoice ? " 

 that no better motto could be found for my address, deahng 

 with the land we live on, the crops of this land, and the 

 help which arts and sciences should and must give to agri- 

 culture, in order to utilise our inheritance of land to 'pro- 

 duce crops, which will rejoice both in quality and in 

 quantity. 



The subject of the address has been, on account of 

 its importance, the favourite theme of many writers. The 

 late Victorian Agricultural Chemist, Mr. A. N. Pearson, 

 read a paper before the Australasian Association for the 

 Advancement of Science in January, 1900, on " The 

 Scientific Directing of a Country^ s Acfriculture,''^ in which 

 he chiefly directed attention to tlie great advantage of 

 manuring and improved tillage in order to obtain heavier 

 crops, and drew attention to the necessity of soil survey, 

 establishment of experimental farms, and the systematic 

 examination of products. 



My friend, Mr. F. B. Guthrie, the Chemist of the New 

 South Wales Department of Agriculture, delivered in 1906 

 a lecture on " The Application of Science and Scientific 

 Methods to Agriculture,^'' under the auspices of the vSydney 

 University Extension Board, in which he gave a short 

 historical review of the evolution of scientific agriculture, 

 and the recent results achieved by the aids of science. Mr. 

 H. W. Potts, the Principal of the Hawkesbury Agricultural 

 College, in his address on " The Outlook for Agriculture,'' 



