1 68 EXPERIMENTAL GARDEN 



the influence of Liebig, with whom he was on terms of intimate 

 correspondence, and that both by the example of his early 

 experiments in the Botanic Garden and by his enthusiastic 

 exposition of the principles of the science in his lectures, 

 he imbued one of his pupils, John Bennet Lawes, with so 

 bright a desire to further agricultural progress by exact field 

 experiments, that the fame of the latter's hereditary estate of 

 Rothamsted will endure through the ages. 



But although this pioneer work yielded so rich a harvest 

 elsewhere, it is sad to have to record that, with Dr. Daubeny's 

 death, the practical exercise of the oldest of the Arts became 

 dormant in Oxford. Mr. Gamlen informs me that Professor 

 Lawson used the plot for the culture of Strawberries ; but I 

 have not been able to find that the Professor published any 

 account of the results. 



Then, Sibthorpian Professors of Rural Economy were only 

 elected for three years, and any one man was debarred, by the 

 1883 scheme, from holding the chair for more than six ; and, 

 as they were not allowed any funds for working allotments, 

 the utility of Daubeny's experimental plot was reduced to a 

 minimum. But it looked well in the advertisements to be 

 able to state that "the Professor shall have the use of the 

 Garden appropriated for making experiments in the subject of 

 his Professorship." The University was not in the least in- 

 terested in the art of getting better and more abundant 

 vegetable produce from the land, and finally seized an 

 opportunity of letting the experimental plot and cottage for 

 ;i2 per annum,* and later, in 1901, of selling it for about 

 ;8oo to Mr. W. F. Cross ; and thus, with the approval of 

 the Board of Agriculture (?), a valuable lesson has been given 

 to would-be benefactors interested in experimental agriculture. 



The cottage and plot are at the end of Fairacres Road 



* The transaction, we are glad to record, did not meet with universal 

 satisfaction. The little house was known in the Magdalen Common Room 

 as " Swindledon Villa." 



