STATISTICAL SURVEY OF IRISH AGRICULTURE. 



305 



statement it would appear that 30,608 acres of land went from under the 

 plough in 1 90 1, as compared with the preceding year, while 16,793 acres 

 seem to have been added to the area under grass. These figures imply that 

 13,815 statute acres of land went out of cultivation in the year 1901. It is, 

 however, possible that the recorded increase of 17,425 acres in "Bog, 

 Waste, Barren Mountain," is, in part, due to a not unnatural divergence of 

 opinion amongst the Enumerators in the different years as to what kind of 

 Icind exactly should be described as " Barren Mountain." A tract of moun- 

 tain-side which carried a few score sheep in one year may not happen 

 to be grazed at the time of enumeration in a succeeding season, with 

 the result that it is entered on the statistical forms in a different column on 

 each occasion. Such indeterminate grazing areas are, doubtless, a source of 

 error in comparative classification ; but every effort is made by carefully- 

 worded instructions, by queries to the Enumerators for purposes of veri- 

 fication, and in other ways, to minimise the possibilities of serious error. 

 Moreover, errors of classification of the kind referred to would probably 

 tend to correct each other when a long series of years is taken into con- 

 sideration.* 



* With reference to the question whether waste land is increasing or decreasing in Ireland, 

 the following from Part I. of Dr. Grimshaw's "Facts and Figures about Ireland" (Hodges, 

 Figgis & Co., Limited, Dublin, 1893), may be of interest. On the showing of these figures (to 

 which have been added those for 1901), it would seem that a very large amount of waste land 

 has been reclaimed during the past sixty years. 



Division of Land in 1841, '51, '61, '71, "81, 'gi. and igor. 



Note, — The information for 1841 and 1851, respectively, has bsen obtained from the Census 

 Report for those years ; and that for the subsequent periods from the Agricultural Statistics. 



t The difference between the total area entered for 1891 and igoi and that given for the 

 other years is owing to the adoption in i8gi of revised areas for some counties, and the 

 inclusion of some reclaimed slob lands in the County of Wexford, 



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