52 QUESTIONS OF PRINCIPLE 



tion of book-keeping, they should not be apportioned to 

 the crops of that year. This is the suggestion ; the objec- 

 tions to it are that it is not always possible to adhere 

 rigidly to a rotation, that the acreages under the various 

 crops of the rotation are seldom equal, that labour costs are 

 varying from year to year at the present time, and that 

 even where none of these difficulties arise the cost of a fallow 

 in any year depends upon the weather, and the number of 

 workings consequently necessary, which will seldom be the 

 same in any two years. It may thus happen that the crops 

 in a drought year following a wet year will carry a very 

 small item for their share of fallows easily and cheaply 

 performed, whereas they should more accurately be saddled 

 with the expenses of a wet and difficult season. However, 

 cases may arise where the method might be applied, and the 

 simplification of the work which would result makes it 

 worthy of mention. 



Another suggestion may be noted which is designed to 

 eliminate the arbitrary apportionment of cleaning costs 

 and at the same time to reduce the labour of book-keeping 

 and to bring the work more within the scope of the farmer. 

 It is that no costing for arable fields or crops should be 

 attempted, but that one ' Arable-land Account ' should be 

 opened for them all. Thus, the arable land would be regarded 

 as a single department, and the total debits against it 

 would give the cost of the arable farming for the year, as 

 a whole, whilst the debits less credits would be the total 

 net profit. The advantages of this proposal are obvious ; 

 it may be argued that the difficulty of costing with accuracy 

 for crops is such that the whole rotation should be regarded 

 as the unit, and that it should be costed for as a whole, 

 and if this were done there would be an immense simplifica- 

 tion in the accounting. Further, that the loss of information 

 which would result as to the cost of particular crops would 

 not be a vital objection seeing that these costs contain 

 certain speculative elements. That these last are liable to 

 introduce errors of sufficient magnitude seriously to affect 

 the results cannot be admitted, but the real objection to 



