TEACHING THE CULTIVATORS 57 



knowledge is whetted by " eating." It is " he that hath " 

 that craves for more to be given to him. That surely is a recom- 

 mendation of the practice. 



Belgium took up the practice of appointing konsulenten (agro- 

 nomes de I'fitat) only in 1885 ; and the Netherlands did so only in 

 1893, and then only for dairy purposes (zuivelconsulenten). As in 

 Denmark, the institution of konsulenten was, however, found so 

 serviceable that by 1900 ten had been appointed, one for each 

 province, and the number has now increased to twelve, being one 

 for each of the eleven provinces, and two for one of them, namely, 

 North Brabant. In addition two more special consulenten were 

 appointed in 1909, to give advice on the rearing of live stock (veeteels). 

 There are now, in addition to the consulenten named, also landbouw- 

 consulenten, for agriculture generally, and tuinbouwconsulenten, for 

 horticulture, so that advice is available for every branch of modern 

 agricultural learning. 



Germany has seen no reason for appointing special Jconsulenten — 

 its wanderlehrer are more of the type of our lecturers on agriculture 

 sent out by the Education Department ; only there are considerably 

 more of them — because, like Sweden — which ranks first in this 

 particular branch of organisation — it is strong in what are known as 

 "control societies" — or else "control committees" of general pur- 

 poses societies — which to a certain extent perform the same services 

 as the konsulenten, although on behalf, not of the State, but of local 

 societies, which maintain them. In Denmark, likewise, local societies 

 act on their own authority and account, appointing konsulenten, 

 who act for their particular district of the society only, whereas the 

 konsulenten appointed by the State or with the Government's 

 approval and pecuniary assistance (given generally to the extent 

 of three-fifths of the entire cost), act indifferently for the whole 

 kingdom. The " control societies " mentioned — which are also to 

 be met with in Norway and in Switzerland — are extremely useful 

 bodies. We have replicas of them only in the shape of " cow testing " 

 societies or committees. But the " control " bodies do much more 

 than merely test cows' yields of milk. They advise on the 

 feeding, stabling, general treatment, handling of the animals, the 

 selection of the cheapest and most appropriate rations of food, and 

 on agriculture in general, capturing the confidence of members by 

 their homely and familiar ways, and the stamp of expertness which 

 their selection by their society gives them. Apart from these 

 bodies, it ought to be borne in mind that the German system of 

 agricultural education, for all grades of cultivators, if not precisely 



