1162 REPORT—1885. 
arable cultivation and permanent pasture were practically equal (23,462,184 and 
23,680,416 acres respectively), in 1884 they differed by nearly 34 millions of 
acres (22,173,771 and 25,667,206 acres respectively). ‘This change has been ac- 
companied by a diminution of the rural population, though at the same time the 
total population underwent a marked increase. Thus, the census returns of 1871 
gave the number of agricultural labourers in England and Wales as 962,348; ten 
years later the number had fallen to 870,798, a decrease of 91,550, representing a 
deficit of 9°5 per cent. on the number in 1871. The number of farmers in England 
and Wales underwent at the same time a similar decrease of about 10 per cent. 
Part, perhaps much, of the decrease in the farming population may be due to the 
more extended use of machinery, for the number of proprietors of agricultural 
machines let for hire, and of the attendants upon them, increased from 55 in 1851, 
to 1,441 in 1861, to 2,160 in 1871, and to 4,260 in 1881. 
Perhaps the boldest course to take with regard to the state of agriculture is to 
look upon the depression as normal and permanent, and then to discover, if possible, 
how this new order of things may best be faced. A further fall in rents seems 
inevitable, unless landowners prefer the alternative of cultivating the land them- 
selves, It is desirable that the producer and the consumer should be brought into 
closer relationship, for the middleman is thriving well at the expense of both. A 
perfect and rigid system of quarantine is desirable for the better protection of live 
stock from imported disease. Our home dairy practice requires to be raised to a 
distinctly higher level; at present Denmark is ahead of us in butter-making, and 
Canada in cheese-making. But in each country named the Government has 
fostered these industries by the advancement of technical education; our own 
Government is quite apathetic in the matter. The losses inflicted on crops and 
live stock by the ravages of insect, fungoid, and other pests, are stupendous, but 
this country possesses no organisation by means of which farmers could be instructed, 
warned, and advised on such matters. or these and allied purposes an efliciently 
equipped Department of Agriculture would prove of incalculable value. 
After a brief description of the United States Department of Agriculture, and 
of the Department of Agriculture of Manitoba, the paper concluded by advocating 
the equipment of a Department of Agriculture for the United Kingdom, placed 
under the control of a responsible Minister of Agriculture, or of Agriculture and 
Commerce. Such a department could probably reach and influence the individual 
farmer in a manner which, for efficiency, no existing agency has been able to 
approach; it could diffuse valuable and necessary information of a simple and 
easily assimilable character, which would in time become embodied in the general 
practice of those by whom it would he received ; it could collect and rapidly digest 
information from all the agricultural districts of the United Kingdom, and then 
issue, in the form of bulletins, timely warning on many matters which in the 
absence of such warning might have led to loss; and it could, under energetic and 
intelligent management, raise the entire agricultural industry of this kingdom to a 
higher level than it has ever yet attained. In the diminution of preventible losses 
alone such a department would prove invaluable. The agricultural functions now 
variously exercised by the Board of Trade, the Science and Art Department, and 
the Veterinary (or Agricultural) Department of the Privy Council, might well be 
transferred to it, but such a department would utterly fail of its object were it 
allowed to sink to the level of a mere record office. Itshould be an active, living, 
and progressive organisation, and the results it would then achieve would probably 
in a very few years amply justify the fact of its establishment and the cost of its 
maintenance, 
4. On recent Changes in Scottish Agriculture. By Major P. G. Craicie. 
The author claimed the right of Agriculture in its present depression to what- 
ever aid science can afford. Intelligent use has been made in Scotland already of 
the teaching of scientific experiments, But before the help of any specific science 
is invoked in any new direction, it is indispensable that the facts and figures of 
the agricultural situation should be more clearly appreciated than they are by 
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