president's address SECTION G. 159 



Some years n^o, when the butter industry in the south of Ireland 

 had fallen off to a tjreat extent and was threatened with extinction, 

 the Education Board of that country started the Munster Dairy 

 School, at which special instruction was given during two sessions 

 per annum to the daughters of the surrounding farmers. Several 

 hundred young girls ar, once went through this course of instruction, 

 and the result was soon seen in the immense improvement in the 

 quality of the butter made and in the restoration of the Cork butter 

 trade, while the improvement in the value of Munster farms is 

 computed at an immense sum. 



In the same way it would probably be found in Australia that 

 special schools for the study of dairying, viticulture, fruit-growing, 

 and other minor industries would be of immense service in bringing 

 those branches of agriculture up to the position which they must 

 eventually hold in this country. 



At the majority of the farm schools so established general agri- 

 culture would doubtless be taught, or, in other words, the mixed 

 farming which would be most suitatile to the surrounding district. 

 Boys would get a knowledge of stock, of all the principal opera- 

 tions of the farm, rotation of crops, draining, use of artificial 

 manures, farm implements, the blacksmithing and carpentry 

 needed on the farm, the use of an engine and other necessary 

 machinery, and many other things which they might not be able 

 to learn on their fathers' farms. 



I imagine that I can hear the criticism that farmers' sons could 

 learn all these things at home as well as at a farm school. Perhaps 

 so, if our best farmers could find the leisure and opportunity to 

 personally instruct their sons in all the operations of the farm, and 

 at the same time teach them the "why" and "wherefore" of each 

 of these operations. But we know that the old saying about " the 

 shoemaker's children being often worst shod" holds good also with 

 education. Children of the best educated parents do not always 

 get the best education from them. 



But even granting that our best farmers may find the time and 

 opportunity to instruct their sons methodically and practically in 

 the science of their calling, must we not make provision for those 

 boys in the towns and cities who wish to leave such a life and learn 

 farming as a calling, as well as for the sons of farmers who have 

 not themselves had the advantage of a good farm training and 

 hope to give their sons better advantages than they themselves 

 have ever had. It is a recognised fact that farmers' sons, as a 

 rule, begin their business in life with a general education inferior 

 to that of men in other walks of life corresponding in the social 

 scale with their own. They are removed from school earlier than 

 those destined for mercantile pursuits, or even those intended for 

 clerical work, and hence a young farmer often begins his business 

 with a small liberal education and with none at all of a technical 

 character concerning his future work. He is, therefore, but little 



