1864. | ' Agriculture. 441 
If we except the journals of our agricultural societies by which 
agricultural progress is brought directly under the notice of readers, 
these annual shows are the only educational influence which these 
societies exert. It has only lately been brought under the notice of 
the Royal Agricultural Society of England that one of the objects for 
which, according to its charter, it was incorporated, is the promotion of 
the better education of those who live by the cultivation of the land ; 
and that except indirectly, as by journals and exhibitions, nothing what- 
ever has yet been done by it in discharge of its duty in the matter. 
A committee of inquiry into the subject is now sitting, which will, we 
hope, result in some more definite and systematic attempt than has yet 
been made to bring the great influence and large income of the Na- 
tional Society to bear upon this subject. What seems to be wanted, 
and what is within the competency and indeed the duty of the Society 
to effect, is not any such stimulus of general middle class education as 
our Universities and the Society of Arts are presenting by their annual 
examinations of students, nor any such guidance and assistance as the 
Government offers by its Inspectors and endowments of schools; but 
help, both in guidance and in stimulant, to professional agricultural 
schools, and the establishment of these in greater number than they 
now exist. The Royal Agricultural College at Cirencester is indeed, 
we think, the only one of the kind in Great Britain. It is, as we 
believe, owing to a culpable neglect of the seventh object specified 
in the Charter of the Royal Agricultural Society of England, as 
among the purposes of its incorporation, that that institution is not 
in a more flourishing condition than it now presents, and also that 
many of similar character have not been established in our principal 
agricultural counties. 
There is an able review of recent agricultural progress drawn up 
by Mr. Thompson, M.P., in the current number of the ‘Journal of 
the Agricultural Society.’ It proves that the importation of guano 
and of bones, the manure manufacture, the more general application 
of steam-power in agriculture, and the influence of the National Agri- 
cultural Society, have together added greatly to the fertility of English 
soil. There is, however, a singular exception to this increased pro- 
duce, which needs to be more urgently pointed out to agriculturists than 
it has yet been. The quantity of mutton sent to market appears to be 
hardly more now than fifteen or twenty years ago. The number of sheep 
and carcases sent to the London market does not appear to have mate- 
rially increased during that time. With wool at the extraordinary 
price which it has of late commanded—2s. to 2s. 6d. per 1b.—mutton 
at a price unknown ten or fifteen years ago, and a climate which over 
most of the island has all along impressed observers with the idea 
that succulent and grass growth, sheep food in fact, is a much more 
natural produce of our soil than seeds and grain and ripened produce, 
it seems impossible to doubt that our flocks and herds must multiply, 
and our farm management be more immediately directed to this end 
than it has been. 
It does not necessarily follow from this that our grain produce 
would be diminished. The increased manure derived from the con- 
