OF AGRICULTURE. 107 



It is thus apparent that the comparison with 

 France is not so much in favour of this country 

 as it is said to be ; and it will be still less fav- 

 ourable when we come, in our next chapter, to 

 horticulture. 



The comparison with Belgium is even more 

 striking the more so as the two systems of 

 culture are similar in both countries. To begin 

 with, in Belgium we also find an average crop of 

 over thirty bushels of wheat to the acre ; but the 

 area given to wheat is five times as big as in Great 

 Britain, in comparison to the cultivable area, 

 and the cereals cover two-fifths of the land avail- 

 cereals (124 under wheat, and 26 under wheat mixed with rye), 

 33 under vineyards, 83 under oichards, green crops, and 

 various industrial cultures, and the remainder is chiefly under 

 permanent pasture or bare fallow. As to cattle, we find in 

 Great Britain, in 1910, which was an average year, 7,037,330 

 head of cattle (including in that number about 1,400,000 

 calves under one year), which makes twenty-two head per each 

 100 acres of the cultivable area, and 27,103,000 sheep that is, 

 eighty-four sheep per each 100 acres of the same area. In 

 France we find, in the same year, 14,297,570 cattle (nineteen 

 head per each 100 acres of cultivable area), and only 17,357,640 

 sheep (twenty-one sheep per 100 acres of the same). In other 

 words, the proportion of horned cattle is nearly the same in 

 both countries (twenty-two head and nineteen head per 100 

 acres), a considerable difference appearing in favour of this 

 country only as to the number of sheep (eighty-four as against 

 twenty-one). The heavy imports of hay, oil-cake, oats, etc., 

 into this country must, however, not be forgotten, because, 

 for each head of cattle which lives on imported food, eight 

 sheep can be grazed, or be fed with home-grown fodder. As 

 to horses, both countries stand on nearly the same footing. 



