DETERMINATION OF METHOD 31 



fields which grow the crops than by the crops themselves. 

 It may happen that the barley crop of a farm is made up 

 of fields on which it follows a variety of crops, such as roots 

 and clover and wheat ; and, in its turn, it may be succeeded 

 by a variety of crops, such as clover, turnips, or a corn crop. 

 Whilst it is not impossible in such a case to obtain a correct 

 figure for the barley cost by means of a record based on the 

 expenditure for the crop as a whole, it will be obvious that 

 the liability to error would be reduced if the basis adopted 

 were one of fields, for, in the absence of absolute uniformity 

 in the rotation, the work of tracing values inherited or trans- 

 mitted from crop to crop would be facilitated. Moreover, 

 it happens frequently enough that at the time when the year's 

 record-keeping begins the farmer's plans for the coming 

 season's cropping are not definite, or, if arranged, it may be 

 that circumstances unforeseen will compel some alteration 

 in them. Thus, in the year 1919, many fields designed for 

 the root crop on an East Midlands farm were never sown 

 at all, owing to the drought, and the cost of all the workings 

 on them, which would have been mixed up in the ' Roots 

 Account ' under a system of record based on crops, was 

 readily transferred to the * Fallows Account ', under a system 

 of field records, when it was found that the fields could not 

 be cropped. Further, field records have a value of their 

 own, for they facilitate the compilation of unit labour 

 costs, both actual and comparative, and of other results 

 which cannot be arrived at satisfactorily under the alterna- 

 tive system. 



In the case of the farm live etock it is of equal importance 

 to secure the proper classification in the records. It is not 

 easy, sometimes, to arrange a division, say, of cattle, most 

 suitable for the accounts which, at the same time, will 

 fit in with the practice of feeding and management on the 

 farm, particularly on small farms. It happens, not infre- 

 quently, that classes of live stock, the feeding and tending 

 of which should be recorded separately for the purposes of 

 cost determination, are not distinguished by the farmer. 

 Probably his experience will one day confirm that of the 



