INTRODUCTION. ix 



Three of the papers (Chapters V. to VII.) deal 

 with the subject of agricultural co-operation and 

 the reduction of the middle profits which, largely 

 in consequence of their unorganised state, handicap 

 the producers of food. At the time when these 

 were written the gospel of co-operation had, by 

 Sir Horace Plunkett's persistence, begun to find 

 acceptance in Ireland, but, except in rare instances, 

 it fell on deaf ears in the English rural districts. 

 Since then the patient work of the Agricultural 

 Organisation Society has slowly fructified, the 

 State has lent assistance, and progress in this 

 direction, at any rate, may be reported. 



Memory, in reviewing the associations of these 

 papers, conjures phantoms. Many " agricultural 

 worthies " — to use the old-fashioned term — who 

 have passed away are recalled. Clare Sewell 

 Read, mordant and pessimistic, who possessed as 

 perhaps no one before or since has done the confi- 

 dence of his fellow-farmers ; Albert Pell, witty and 

 incisive in his speech and writings ; Jasper More, 

 whose casual manner veiled an intimate knowledge 

 of rustic psychology; Thomas Duckham, whose 

 courage in the advocacy of cattle disease legislation 

 was perhaps insufficiently appreciated ; Charles 

 Howard, sound of judgment and kindly of heart ; 

 John Tread well, shrewd and practical, with his 

 proud reminiscences of " Dizzy " ; Samuel 

 Rowlandson, the embodiment of caution in spite 

 of his ' advanced ' political views ; William 



