294 



NATURE 



[October 28, 1920 



a sure shield in time of war against the menace of 

 submarines and starvation. Those, on the other hand, 

 who take the pessimistic view point to the many 

 examples of smallholders who "plough with pain 

 their native lea and reap the labour of their hands" 

 with remarkably small profit to themselves or to the 

 community. 



Before making any attempt to estimate the worth 

 of these rival opinions, it may be observed that the 

 war has brought a large reinforcement of strength to 

 the ranks of the optimists. A contrast of personal 

 experiences illustrates this fact. When in the early 

 days of the war I felt it my duty to consult certain 

 important county officials with the object of securing 

 their support for schemes of intensive food produc- 

 tion, I carried away from the conference one con- 

 clusion only : that the counties of England were of 

 two kinds, those which were already doing much and 

 were unable therefore to do more, and those which 

 were doing little because there was no more to be 

 done. In spite of this close application of the doc- 

 trine of Candide — that all is for the best in the best 

 of all possible worlds — I was able to set up some sort 

 of county horticultural organisation, scrappy, ama- 

 teurish, but enthusiastic, and the work done by that 

 organisation was, on the average, good ; so much so, 

 indeed, that when after the armistice I sought to 

 build up a permanent county horticultural organisation 

 I was met by a changed temper. The schemes which 

 the staff of the Horticultural Division had elaborated 

 as the result of experience during the war were 

 received and adopted with a cordiality which I like 

 to think was evoked no less by the excellence of the 

 schemes themselves than by the promi.se of liberal 

 financial assistance in their execution. Thus it came 

 about that when the time arrived for me to hand 

 over the Controllership of Horticulture to my suc- 

 cessor, almost every county had established a strong 

 county horticultural committee, and the chief counties 

 from the point of view of intensive cultivation had 

 provided themselves with a staff competent to demon- 

 'strate not only to cottagers and allotment holders, but 

 also to smallholders and commercial grow-ers, the best 

 inethods of intensive cultivation. 



By means of county stations the local cultivator mav 

 learn how to plant and maintain his fruit plantation 

 and how to crop his vegetable quarters, what stock to 

 run, and what varieties to grow. Farm stations — with 

 the research stations established previously by the 

 Ministry : Long .Ashton and East Mailing for fruit 

 investigations; the Lea Valley Growers' .Association 

 and Rothamsted for investifjation of soil problems and ■ 

 pathologv ; the Imperial College of Science for research 

 in plant physiology, together with a couple of stations, 

 contemplated before the war, for local investigation 

 of vegetable cultivation ; an alliance with the Roval 

 Horticultural Society's Research Station at VVisley, 

 and with the John Innes Horticultural Institute for 

 research in genetics ; the Ormskirk Potato Trial 

 Station ; a Poultry Institute ; and, most important of 

 all from the point of view of education, the establish- 

 ment at Cambridge of a School of Horticulture — con- 

 stitute a horticultural organisation which, if properlv 

 co-ordinated and (dare I say it?) directed, should 

 prove of suDreme value to all classes of intensive cul- 

 tivators. To achieve that result, however, somethins; 

 more than a permissive attitude on the part of the 

 Ministrv is required, and in completing the design of 

 it I had hoped also to remain a part of that organisa- 

 tion long enough to assist in securing its functioning 

 as a living, plastic, resourceful, directive force — a 

 horticultural cerebrum. Thus developed, it is mv con- 

 viction that this instrument is capable of bringing 



NO. 2661, VOL. 106] 



horticulture to a pitch of perfection undreamed of at 

 the present time either in this country or elsewhere. 



In my view, horticulture has suffered in the past 

 because the fostering of it was only incidental to the 

 work of the Ministry. In spite of the fact that it had 

 not a little to be grateful for — as, for example, the 

 research stations to which I have referred — horticul- 

 ture had been regarded rather as an agricultural side- 

 show than as a thing in itself. My intention, in which 

 I was encouraged by Lord Ernie, Lord Lee, and Sir 

 Daniel Hall, was to peg out on behalf of horticulture 

 a large and valid claim and to work that claim. The 

 conception of horticulture which 1 entertained was 

 that comprised in the "petite culture "of the French. 

 It included crops and stock, fruit and vegetables, 

 flower and bulb and seed crops, potatoes, and pigs and 

 poultry and bees. 1 held the view, and still hold it, 

 that the small man's interests cannot be fostered by 

 the big man's care; that horticulture is a thing 'in 

 itself, and requires constant consideration by horti- 

 culturists and not occasional help from agriculturally 

 minded people, however distinguished and capable. 

 I hold that education — sympathetic and systematic — is 

 an instrument the power of which, for our purpose, 

 is scarcely yet tried ; is, in fact, of almost infinite 

 potency. 



The truth is that great skill and sure knowledge 

 exist among small cultivators side bv side with much 

 ignorance and moderate practical ability. Herein lies 

 the opportunity of the kind of education which I 

 have in mind. But for any such intensive system of 

 education to prevail the isolation both of cultivators 

 and of Government Departments must be abolished. 

 There is only one way to prepare the ground for the 

 intensive cultivation of education, and that is to 

 secure the full co-operation of officials and cultivators. 

 If this be not done, the official must continue to bear 

 with resignation the unconcealed hostility of those he 

 wishes to assist. That a state of confidence and co- 

 operation may be established is proved by the record 

 of the Horticultural .'\dvisory Committee which was 

 set up by Lord Ernie during my Controllership. The 

 Committee consisted of representatives of all the 

 many branches of horticulture — fruit-growers, nursery- 

 men, market gardeners, growers under glass, sales- 

 men, researchers, and so forth. That Committee 

 became, as it were, the Deputy-Controller of Horti- 

 culture. To it all large questions of policy were 

 referred, and to its disinterested service horticulture 

 owes a great debt. That its existence has been 

 rendered permanent by Lord Lee is of good augury- 

 for the future of intensive cultivation. 



It may be asked : What are the subjects in which 

 growers require education ? To answer that question 

 fully would require an address in itself. .Among 

 those subjects, however, mention may be made of a 

 few : the extermination or top-grafting of unthrifty 

 fruit, the proper spacing and pruning of fruit-trees, 

 the use of suitable stocks, systematic orchard-spraving, 

 the use of thrifty varieties of bush fruit and the 

 proper manuring thereof, the choice of varieties suit- 

 able to given soils and districts and for early cropping, 

 the better grading and packing of fruit. Of all 

 methods of instruction in this last subiect the best is 

 that provided by fruit exhibitions. Those interested 

 in the promotion of British fruit-growing will well 

 remember the object-lesson in good and bad packing 

 provided by the first Eastern Counties Fruit Show, 

 held at Cambridge in iqiQ. That exhibition, organised 

 bv the East .Anglian fruit-growers with the assistance 

 of the Horticultural Division of the Ministry of -Agri- 

 culture, demonstrated three things — first, that fruit of 

 the finest quality is being grown in East .Anglia ; 



