17 



CHAPTER IT. 



Agriculture as a Subject Defective Treatment of it Proper Function of the 

 Agricultural Teacher Study of the Soil. 



I HAVE endeavoured to show that agriculture may be re- 

 garded as a subject capable of being taught, that is, capable 

 of being treated of in the school or lecture-room, always 

 bearing in mind that the pursuit of agriculture is eminently 

 practical, and therefore, although capable of being treated of 

 soundly in the school-room, it would be a mistake to imagine 

 that either as regards its practice or its theory it can be 

 taught by word of mouth alone. 



Looking at the subject of agriculture as a whole, I find 

 that it is composed firstly of the processes of agriculture 

 which are capable of description and explanation. Secondly, 

 of varieties in practice, as between north and south, east and 

 west, county and county, which may be properly spoken of 

 as " comparative agriculture," in itself a subject worthy of 

 attention. Thirdly, the history of agricultural progress. 

 Fourthly, the axioms or established facts known to be true 

 by all thoroughly good farmers. Fifthly, the statistics of 

 agriculture, upon which I will not at present enlarge. 

 Sixthly, the economics of agriculture, which take us into the 

 domain of political economy, a subject treating extensively of 

 rent, tenure of land in various parts of the world, and the 

 relations which subsist between the landlord, the tenant, the 

 labourer, both towards each other and to the community at 

 large. I have sketched out in broad lines the topics or sections 



c 





