10 



INTRODUCTION 



our disposal, simplifying our work and enabling us to make it 

 more exhaustive than would otherwise have been possible. Our 

 special thanks are also due to Mr R. A. Anderson, Secretary of 

 the I.A.O.S., who acted as the guide of one of the sections of the 

 Commission in Ireland. He has since devoted much time and 

 put himself to great trouble, obtaining facts and figures in- 

 dispensable tu this Report. Nor must we forget specially to 

 thank Mr J. Wood, once a Lecturer in the West of Scotland 

 Agricultural College, and now an Inspector in the Department of 

 Agriculture in Ireland, who was delegated by Sir Horace Plunkett 

 to act as the guide of the other section. We are also indebted 

 to Dr Herbert G. Smith, Sir Horace's private secretary, for much 

 valuable assistance ungrudgingl}'^ given. We received kindness 

 and help from all sections of the Irish people, Nationalist and 

 Unionist, Catholic and Protestant. We have endeavoured to 

 acknowledge our indebtedness to them in the Itinerary. If we 

 have omitted any, we can only plead that our helpers were so 

 numerous that it has been difficult to remember all. 



We have only to add that the facts and figures in every section 

 of this Report, so far as they relate to Ireland, have been verified 

 by Irish experts whose assistance we gratefully acknowledge. 



June 1907. 



THE VICKKKGAL LODGK, DUBLIN 



