DECEMBER 443 



to be responsible to everybody for everything that happens, whether 

 he is to blame for it or not. 



Yet there is a great deal to be learned from this fearsome 

 occupation. For instance, he who has gone through that mill 

 will know how futile are the schemes which from time to time 

 have been advanced of carrying out agricultural enterprises 

 on a large scale by means of companies. I cannot conceive a 

 great farm, or group of farms, being successfully worked by a Board 

 of directors, meeting, say, once a month or a fortnight, to pass 

 resolutions already prepared by the secretary or one or two ruling 

 spirits. 



Another piece of knowledge to be acquired in Board-rooms 

 and this is my immediate concern is that you can call nothing a 

 profit until all previous trading losses are worked off. Of course 

 if this test is applied to my farm accounts, the profit shown for 

 1898 vanishes utterly in the total loss which I have incurred since 

 I began to farm. (See pages 38-40.) Moreover, there must be 

 deducted from this sum of 422/. 15.$-. ^d. rent on say 250 acres at 

 i/. an acre, and interest on 2,ooo/. capital at 4 per cent, amounting 

 to 8o/. plus management expenses let us say ao/., or in all 

 35o/. This leaves a total of 72/1 i$s. 4^., upon which the farmer 

 would be supposed to exist, that being the living profit left after 

 the satisfaction of outgoings and charges. As a matter of fact, 

 however, he would not be able to exist thereon, because it would 

 scarcely be possible to draw out of the farm account every farthing 

 returned as profit. To begin with, it is, immediately at any 

 rate, available only to the extent of the cash balances in the bank ; 

 the rest being represented by corn taken at a valuation but not 

 yet sold. Even when it is sold the farmer could scarcely put the 

 whole proceeds into his pocket and spend them, inasmuch as a 

 certain sum must be left to meet unexpected expenses, enough to 

 ' veer and haul on,' as sailors say. Thus, in practice, out of this 42 2/. 

 shown as profit I shall be fortunate if 300/1 can be transferred to 

 the estate account. 



It will be seen therefore, that after all the gingerbread, although 



