B.— CHEMISTRY. 73 
‘Materials’ were followed in the calculations. There can be little doubt 
_ that the decision of the Government to recover a larger proportion of the 
grain for human food in milling wheat, and to restrict the use in brewing 
and distilling of materials capable of use as food, arose from the suggestions 
put forward by this Scientific Committee. 
" The chemical examination of the enormous quantities of food, together 
_ with the inspection of the packing and the testing of materials used for 
_ the purpose, forwarded overseas from this country for the Army in the 
_ war was entrusted to the Government Laboratory. Chemists were estab- 
lished at the various receiving depots, and all goods delivered by contractors 
_ were inspected, and, if considered necessary, sampled and analysed as to 
_ their conformity with specification. The chemist reported upon each 
_ delivery before the Army authorities proceeded to issue it. 
‘ The Medical Research Council, now under a Committee of the Privy 
Council, deals with subjects coming within the province of biochemistry, 
and the organic chemist has here an opportunity for preparing substances 
which the knowledge now available indicates as likely to be of value in 
combating, for example, diseases due to parasites in the bloodstream. 
Agriculiure. 
The connection of the State with scientific agriculture goes back to the 
beginning of the nineteenth century. The period from 1770 to 1820 was 
_ one of great activity in agricultural development. -It was then that several 
of the oldest agricultural societies were formed, and the Chair of Agriculture 
and Rural Economy founded in Edinburgh University. 
The first Board of Agriculture was formed in 1793, and it was to this 
Board that Humphry Davy, himself one of its members, delivered during 
_ the years 1802-1812 the courses of lectures which were afterwards published 
under the title of the ‘ Elements of Agricultural Chemistry.’ Davy in his 
introductory remarks dealing with the object of the lectures sets out 
clearly what he understood by Agricultural Chemistry—it ‘has for its 
object all those changes in the arrangement of matter connected with the 
growth and nourishment of plants; the comparative values of their 
produce as food; the constitution of soils; the manner in which lands 
are enriched by manure, or rendered fertile by the different processes of 
cultivation.’ This statement sets forth the position to-day, and in the 
progress that has been made towards the attainment of these objects the 
chemist has played an important part. 
_ Although Davy quotes the results of his chemical work on a series of 
' gfasses, no great advance was made for many years, and when it did come 
‘it was at the instance of private enterprise. To John Bennet Lawes, the 
in 1834 and have continued uninterruptedly until to-day. Joseph Henry 
| Gilbert joined Lawes in 1843, and the association of the two was not broken 
borne entirely by funds supplied by Lawes. When Gilbert died in 1901, 
Sir A. D. Hall became director, and he was succeeded in 1912 by the present 
director, Sir John Russell. 
__ The next experimental station in England was that founded by the 
Royal Agricultural Society on the Duke of Bedford’s estate at Woburn 
