per acre, caused by sowing good standing and heavy crop- 

 ping varieties, would amount in the aggregate to a very 

 large figure for England alone. 



There are many unenclosed patches of land and road- 

 sides in this Country where the herbage simply runs to waste 

 each year, and there would appear to be almost endless scope 

 for cottagers to keep a goat or two each in order to supply 

 themselves and their children with the requisite quantity of 

 milk. 



WASTE OF ENERGY. 



It almost staggers one to think of the unnecessary work 

 which has been allowed to go on from year to year in this 

 Country. Why should wheat for example be sent thirty, sixty, 

 or a hundred miles to be milled, and then brought back in 

 the form of flour, and milling offals, to almost the very spot 

 where it was grown ? Why should soft fruits be sent 

 on a long and wasteful journey to be made into jam, and then 

 brought back again for consumption in the same district? 

 Surely there is something wrong here ! 



This Country will never rise to its highest as long as 

 obvious waste of energy of this kind is permitted . Does 

 it not matter to the nation how much energy is wasted as 

 long as the person who handles it manages to get a living ? 

 Surely it does ! This waste of energy could be largely 

 overcome by the establishment of Factories and Storehouses 

 in roughly speaking each market district, where the raw 

 material from farms could be dealt with on the spot, and 

 only that food which was actually in excess of local require- 

 ments sent to other parts of the Country. 



WASTE OF TIME. 



It will surprise no one, if I refer to our system of weights 

 and measures under this head ; but the thing which does 

 surprise many is, how we should have clung to such an 

 illogical, cumbersome system for so long. The chief argu- 

 ments in its favour appear to be that (1) it is the system we 

 found when we entered the world and (2) it lends itself more 

 or less to the bartering system, where it is considered to be 

 necessary to meet one another half-way. 



15 



