REMEDIES SUGGESTED. 65 



can press into our service for growing wheat, when the critical 

 time comes. Now in view of such contingency, in the 

 presence of which all other considerations must necessarily 

 go by the board, we are potentially— unless the human 

 factor in the problem should fall into default — quite suffi- 

 ciently prepared. Under Mr. Lloyd George's, Mr. Prothero's 

 and Sir T. W. Russell's driving we have in 1917 made ready 

 a round million of acres beyond what we had before (only 

 300,000 acres in England) — which is after all a fairly sub- 

 stantial addition to the earlier 1,900,000 acres — for autumn 

 sowing. That is a gain for which Mr. Lloyd George rightly 

 took credit — but not nearly sufficient gain. And it has a 

 warning for us of which, while talking of " pushing " the 

 cultivation of wheat, we might do well to take note. After 

 Sir T. W. Russell had scored his great success in Ireland 

 with the ploughing up of pasture for tillage, it was discovered 

 that milk was running dangerously short, and the trouble 

 was, how to make good the deficiency. As much as 650,000 

 acres had been ploughed up. But, as a consequence, no less 

 than 450,000 head of live stock had had to be got rid of, 

 among them 21,000 dairy cows. And the question was, 

 whether, for food production, the last state of the country 

 was not, as a result, worse than the first — especially as no 

 one knew what sort of crops would actually grow upon the 

 ploughed-up land, whereas everybody was well aware 

 what was the practical value of 21,000 dairy cows and 

 450,000 head of live stock, for the production and mainten- 

 ance of which Irish soil and Irish climate seemed especially 

 made. "There is many a man," says a French proverb, 

 " who has exchanged his one-eyed horse for a bUnd one." 

 And when the matter came to be looked further into, it 

 was discovered that, supposing that the 650,000 acres were 

 to produce good crops, there was no space available in 

 which to garner those crops ! The clever men at the head 

 of Irish Agriculture had reversed Swift's famous judgment 

 of " Irish sense " and " Irish wit "—when there was some- 

 thing maturing that was " worth defence," there was no 

 " magazine " to put it into. However, Mr. Prothero has 

 since spoken of " three million acres " that we may make 



