CORRESPONDING SOCIETIES. 215 
Secretary, Mr. F. T. Mott, presenting in the following year a valuable report 
which appeared in the Report of the Association for 1887 (pp. 97-130) and a further 
report the next year (Report for 1888, pp. 124-132). In the first report there 
are tables (I) giving particnlars of 211 provincial museums under headings 
extending across two pages, (II) an approximate estimate of the number of 
specimens contained in these museums, and (III) a list of collections of special 
interest indicating the museums in which they are preserved. A large portion 
of this report is occupied with ‘ Discussion of Details’ under thirty-six heads. 
The second report considers ‘the ideal to which provincial museums should 
endeavour to attain,’ and suggests ‘practical methods for approaching that 
ideal.’ It is not too much to say that these reports are invaluable, not only to 
those who have the management of museums, but also to all scientific workers 
who wish to know where, apart from our national museums, the materials for 
study in their own branch of science are to be found. 
The Hertfordshire County Museum at St. Albans—the only one with which 
I am connected—was not then founded, but I may mention that it is visited 
largely by children from the Board Schools in the neighbourhood, who take 
an intelligent interest in the exhibits, quickly find out accessions, and collect 
and bring to the Curator objects they wish to know the names of, presenting 
to the Museum any worthy of acceptance. To young children there is one 
drawback in a museum, which has been felt at St. Albans: they wish to handle 
the specimens, rightly judging that by so doing they can learn more about 
them than by merely looking at them. Every museum should, if possible, have 
duplicates of the commoner objects, accurately named, to lend to schools. 
The last Section, M, AcricuLruRE, is at the present day the most important 
of all, at least economically. It ought, I think, to be extended to include 
Forestry. But what, it may be asked, have the members of our Corresponding 
Societies in general to do with agriculture or forestry? Perhaps not much 
collectively, but they will have a great deal to do individually when more 
labour is available on the conclusion of the present war. We must no longer 
look down upon our farmers. One consequence of our present fiscal system is 
that the social status of our workers is now generally in an ascending scale 
from producers, through manufacturers, to merchants, being in relation to 
the amount of money each class makes; but we must reverse this, even to the 
extent of placing our tenant-farmers on a social level with professional men, 
such as doctors. The medical profession, rightly, stands high; doctors look 
after our health, but we are dependent upon farmers for our life. We cannot 
exist without food; we cannot get food except by the tillage of land, and it 
is going to be, as it once was, chiefly by the tillage of our own land. Many 
of our soldiers, after living much in the open air, improved greatly in physique, 
will not go back to office work. We must welcome them to the land; give 
them a real hearty welcome, and not an empty one, for their comfort will 
have to be looked after and their companionship will have to be sought, not 
avoided. Of course the necessary raising of the social status of our farmers 
cannot come altogether from without; it implies a higher education, and that 
implies a longer school-life, followed, if possible, by special training in an 
agricultural college ;* and this again implies a sufficiency of income. There 
are not many of our landowners who can afford materially to reduce the rent 
of their farms; their tenants will have to pay higher wages to their labourers, 
and they must earn an increased income. Thus we are led to the conclusion 
that there must be a better husbandry, implying an education in which 
chemistry and biology wi!l play an important part; a more economic distribu- 
tion of the products of the farm, which might be achieved by co-operation ; 
and that we must be content to pay more for our food by import duties keeping 
up the cost of supplies from abroad to that of production and distribution at 
home. The extent of arable land has greatly decreased. From the address of 
the President of this Section at the Manchester meeting of the Association in 
1915, Mr. H. R. Rew, we learn that the acreage under wheat in England and 
Wales has been reduced nearly half since 1808, while the population has nearly 
“ There should be a Chair of Agriculture and Forestry at each of our 
Universities supported by the State; or of Rural Economy, as at Oxford. 
