M.—AGRICULTURE. 235 
During these hard years there was a growing struggle between town 
and country. The Industrial Revolution, which had been going on for 
some sixty years, was now producing epoch-making results. Village 
industries were moving into the towns, thus narrowing the range and 
activities of village life and taking away many of the skilled craftsmen. 
The Revolution affected political as well as economic conditions. The 
towns had no desire to be governed by the landowners, and were seeking 
adequate representation in Parliament; agitation for the Reform Bill 
was proceeding at an alarming pace, and might have led to civil war, 
but, as usual in England, common sense prevailed, and in May 1832 Lord 
Grey was recalled by the King, the Reform Act was passed, and the 
government of the country passed out of the hands of landowners into 
those of the middle classes, whose interests were then largely urban. 
England ceased to be an agricultural country, and became definitely 
industrial and commercial. The towns had won. 
This new orientation of the national life was the dominating factor in 
1832, when our hundred-year survey begins. Henceforward the trend of 
legislation was to be always in favour of the towns whenever their interests 
conflicted with those of the countryside. The new powers were exercised 
at once. The rate-aided wage was abolished in 1834 when the new Poor 
Law system was set up. Agitation was started for the repeal of the Corn 
Laws. Farmers thought the end was coming. 
There was, however, a hopeful feature. The towns were growing and 
requiring more food; importations from overseas were not serious; 
labour was abundant and cheap, and there was more and more tendency 
for the unemployed to move to the towns, thereby reducing the farmers’ 
rates. The path of prosperity lay open to those who could produce 
more food. 
Science now began to come into the picture. It was introduced in 
England by Sir Humphry Davy, whose lectures at the Royal Institution 
_ from 1802 to 1812 on Agricultural Chemistry had attracted widespread 
attention. He dealt particularly with manures and soils, and discussed 
the problem, then much agitating farmers, why some soils were so much 
more favourable to crop production than others; he also introduced a 
method of soil analysis which was speedily taken up by chemists. The 
Bath and West, our oldest agricultural society, founded at Bath in 1777, 
seb up an agricultural laboratory in 1806—the first in this country—and 
appointed Dr. Archer as unpaid ‘Chemical Professor to the Society.’ 
Within a few months, however, death, to quote the Society’s records,? 
* put a period to the exercise of his private virtues and public exertions,’ 
and Cadwallader Boyd was appointed as chemist to analyse soils, lime- 
stones and other things for their members—the first appointment of this 
kind I have been able to find. But for all the scientific advocacy of soil 
analysis one cannot see how the data of these days would help the perplexed 
farmer. The methods showed the percentages of silica, alumina, lime, 
magnesia, carbonic acid and ‘vegetable fibres and extract,’ but no 
interpretations were possible. It is not surprising that no important 
results were achieved. 
* Bat Society’s Papers, 1807, vol. ii, pp. xiii and 275. 
