412 



The Review of Reviews. 



models of systematised catllc-raising to save the 

 ;£^20,ooo,ooo annually which go for milk pro- 

 ducts (including pigs, which are raised on milk 

 waste) to Denmark alone. In no more promising 

 a region than the East of Scotland remarkable 

 results have been produced. At Craigentinny, 

 near Edinburgh, experiments have been made 

 which may be summed up in Ronna's words : 

 " The growth of rye grass is so activated that 

 it attains its full development in one year instead 

 of in three to four years. Sown in August, it 

 gives a first crop in autumn, and then, begin- 

 ning with next spring, a crop of four tons to the 

 acre is taken every month, which represents in 

 the fourteen months more than fifty-six tons (of 

 green fodder) to the acre." 



The extensive use of such methods woukl 

 enable eight milch cows to be fed per acre in 

 place of requiring three acres for one cow's 

 food. Methods such as these would justify 

 taking land for pasturage and increase the milk- 

 ing herds of this country eighteen-fold. As- 

 suming that it would suflfice to double or even 

 to treble the number of cows, an enormous 

 amount of land would be available for wheat and 

 other crops. Area has no relation to dairy 

 produce, food has everything. It is of no ad- 

 vantage in terms of milk yield for cows to walk 

 about fields; the scientific dairy industrial will 

 tell us that the greatest yields are secured by 

 stabled cattle, properly and scientifically fed. 



QUALITY OV sou. OF SMALL IMPORTANCE. 



And this is not only true of dairying. The 

 tw'O fundamental facts to be borne in mind, since 

 they change everything, are that quality of soil 

 is only of minor importance, and that the surface 

 needed for producing given amounts of food- 

 stuffs is aot fixed, but should ever become 

 smaller and smaller as scientific methods 

 become more and more competent to increase 

 the yield. To-day nearly three acres of the 

 cultivatabic area are required to grow the food 

 for each person, and British agriculture provides 

 home-grown food for only 130 inhabitants per 

 square mile, although 378 persons per square 

 mile is the population figure. Even with the 

 methods and knowledge of to-day, however, to 

 quote one authority. 



Six hundred person? would c.islly live on n square 

 mile, and that, with cultural methods already used on a 

 large scale, 1,000 human beings — not idlers — living on 

 1,000 acres could easily, without any kind of overwork, 

 obtain from that area a luxurious vegetable and animal 

 food, as well as the flax, wool, silk and hides necessary 

 for their clothing. As to what may be obtained under 

 still more perfect methods — also known, but not yet tested _ 

 on a large scale — it is better to abstain from any fore- 

 cast, so unexpected are the recent achievements of 

 intensive culture. 



" GOD MADE THE SEA, WE MAKE THE LAND. 



To-day the motto of the agriculturist is a 

 modification of the old Dutch boast, and he 

 should ever have before him the words, " God 

 made the sea, we make the land." Science has 

 done away with the old shibboleth of rotation 

 of crops and limited yields, and it is as illogical 

 and as criminal not to use scientific methods to 

 produce food as it would be to-day to perform 

 a serious surgical operation without anaes- 

 thetics or antiseptics. Soil is now not rich or 

 poor, save as a matter of detail ; it is so many 

 square feet of potentially suitable soil, made or 

 improved to suit the requirements of the district. 

 Rotation of crops, of course, only exists in order 

 to restore to the soil the richness in certain ele- 

 ments depleted by certain crops in order to again 

 plant the same crop on the same piece of land. 

 But if we know sufficiently what the chemical 

 proportion should be, we can always secure it by 

 a system of artificial or natural manures to meet 

 the case. 



Our means of obtaining from the soil what- 

 ever we want, under any climate and upon any 

 soil, have lately been improved at such a rate 

 that we cannot foresee yet what is the limit of 

 productivity of a few acres of land. 



SOIL-MAKING. 



In scientific market gardening, the soil is 

 always made, whatever it originally may have 

 been. In the gardens of Paris, where 5,000 

 persons work on 2,125 acres, and not only 

 supply 2,000,000 Parisians, but countless 

 Londoners, soil is made to such an extent that 

 every year sees hundreds on hundreds of cubic 

 vards of made soil sold by the market gardeners. 

 And these men are only, with all their ceaseless 

 toil, seeking to achicye a nourishing soil and a 

 desired equal temperature and moisture of the 

 air and soil. All this empirical art is devoted to 

 the achievement of these two aims. But both 

 can also be achieved in another and much easier 

 way. The soil can be improved by hand, but it 

 need not be made by hand. .\nv soil, of any 

 desired composition, can be made bv machinerv. 

 We already have manufactures of manure, 

 engines for pulverising the phosphorites, and 

 even the granites of the Vosges ; and we shall 

 sec manufactures of lonm as there is a demand 

 for ihom. 



GROWING CROPS ON ASPHALT PAVEMENTS. 



It is no exaggeration to say that the Paris 

 gardener has shown that it is possible to defy 

 the soil — " he would grow the same crops on an 

 asphalt pavement " — but also possible to defy the 

 climate. In this country we have good natural 

 conditions, far superior to those in most of the 

 countries whence we draw our food supplies. In 



