276 DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE, Etc., FOR IRELAND. 



resulted in freedom from pleuro-pneumonia* for over eight years and 

 from foot and mouth disease for about seventeen years, though the 

 latter has more than once made its appearance in Great Britain durin^ 

 this time. Swine fever and sheep scab are the diseases which now 

 cause most trouble, and the estimates for the year 190 1-2 include a 

 sum of £i2,oon for expenses in connection with the suppression of 

 swine fever. Other duties of the Privy Council which have been trans- 

 ferred to the Department are connected with the supervision of the 

 transit of animals both by land and sea, and with the carrying out of 

 the Destructive Insect Act and the Fertilisers and Feedings Stuffs Act. 

 The former Act was intended to prevent the introduction and spread 

 of the Colorado beetle, which is very destructive to the crops. The 

 latter Act was aimed at securing the purity of substances sold either 

 for enriching the land or for feeding animals, and the Department is 

 authorised to prosecute in cases of fraud and adulteration. 



In addition to these transferred powers the Department also pos- 

 sess important powers under the Sale of Food and Drugs Acts, 1875 

 to 1899. Under the Sale of Food and Drugs Act, 1899, which came 

 into operation on the ist January, 1900, the Department are em- 

 powered in relation to any matter appearing to them to affect the 

 general interests of agriculture in the country, to direct their officers to 

 procure for analysis samples of any article of food, and the result of 

 any such analysis is to be communicated to the Local Authority, whose 

 duty it thereupon becomes to take proceedings as if they had caused 

 the analysis to be made. 



The same Act further provides that if the Department, after com- 

 munication with a Local Authority, are of opinion that such Local 

 Authority has failed to execute or enforce any of the provisions of the 

 .Sale of Food and Drugs Act in relation to any article of food, and that 

 their failure affects the general interest of agriculture in the country, 

 the Department may empower one of their ofhcers to execute and 

 enforce those provisions at the expense of the Local Authority. 



The Department are authorised to make regulations for determining 

 what deficiency in any of the normal constituents of genuine milk, 

 cream, butter, or cheese, or what addition of extraneous matter in any 

 samples of these substances shall raise a presumption that the milk, 

 cream, butter, or cheese is not genuine or is injurious to health. 



The officers of the Department are also empowered to inspect the 

 register required to be kept by manufacturers of, or wholesale dealers 

 in margarine or margarine cheese ; and to inspect any process of 

 manufacture of those substances, and to take samples for analysis. 



2. The powers and duties of the Inspectors of Irish Fisheries. These 

 inspectors were first appointed in 1869, when they took over the duties 

 of various Commissioners in relation to fisheries, and they have been 

 chiefly concerned with the administration of the rather complicated 

 fishery laws, which are contained in some eighteen statutes, ranging 

 from 1 842- 1 898. Under the i6th section of the Act, an annual sum of 



* The Contagious Diseases (Pleuro-Pneumonia) Act, came into operation on ist September, 

 1890, and the disease was completely eradicated in two years. During this time over 10,000 

 cattle were slaughtered, the act compensation for which amounted to over ^'70,000. 



