340 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Jan. 



FARMING IN ENGLAND. 



BY DR. GEORGE B. LORING. 



The farming of England is so often presented to the student 

 and observer of agriculture, that I have examined its condition 

 during the year 1889, with the view of laying it before the 

 Massachusetts Board of Agriculture, not only for instruction, 

 but for the purpose of comparison with that in which the 

 members of the Board have a personal interest. In doing 

 this, I have availed myself of the best authority to be found 

 in the kingdom. 



One of the most important steps in the direction of 

 encouraging and improving the agriculture of England dur- 

 ing the last year, has been the enactment of a law providing 

 for a board of agriculture and a secretary, who has been 

 elevated to the rank of a cabinet minister. It is gratifying 

 to know that the example set more than forty years ago by 

 Massachusetts, under the influence of Colonel Wilder and the 

 teaching of Mr. Colman, has been adopted by the nation to 

 which we have long turned for instruction ; and that the 

 foundation of a department of agriculture by the federal gov- 

 ernment has attracted the attention of that people who pride 

 themselves on the perfection of their civil system. The 

 establishment of this department, with its most accomplished 

 and efficient head, seems to have given a great stimulus to 

 the legislative encouragement of agriculture in England. 

 The Board itself is composed of some of the most influential 

 agriculturists and statesmen in the United Kingdom ; and 

 the act organizing it has been followed by most useful laws 

 and propositions in parliament, with regard to land-holding 

 and transfers, and by liberal grants for the encouraging of 

 various branches of the industry. 



