72 SCIENTIFIC SURVEY OF NORWICH AND DISTRICT 
affected the agricultural practices of the county, which are still pre- 
dominantly arable. 
It is difficult to visualise Norfolk as anything but an arable county, for 
its soils are light and its climate is dry and sunny. Harvest weather is 
usually good, and the after-harvest cleaning of the stubbles is made easy 
by the continued fine weather. Thus the conditions are more favourable 
to arable than to pastoral farming. 
The county possesses no minerals or other natural resources ; the land 
is its only asset. In this respect it is not unlike Denmark and other near 
continental countries, whose agricultural produce is the only possible 
export. ‘Thus Norfolk exports meat, milk, grain, vegetables and fruit, 
and fish, and manufactures nothing of importance, except silks, shoes and 
tonic wine in Norwich, that is not directly concerned with agriculture. 
Colman’s Mustard, Waverley Oats, Farmers’ Glory Breakfast Food, 
agricultural implements at North Walsham, Great Ryburgh, Diss and 
other small towns, and fertilisers at King’s Lynn, are all products of the 
land or are required by the land, and thus Norfolk depends upon agri- 
culture for its welfare, probably more than any other English county. 
The whole atmosphere is agricultural ; small-holdings are numerous and 
highly developed ; there is an active Agricultural Education Sub-Com- 
mittee of the Norfolk County Council; most of the County Councillors 
are either directly or indirectly interested in agriculture; the large 
landowner is an important person in rural sociology and continues to lead 
his tenants by the example of his own practice. Most Norfolk landowners 
are farmers. 
There need be no surprise, then, in recalling that Norfolk has produced 
so many outstanding men in the history of agriculture. Coke of Holkham, 
‘Townshend of Rainham, noted landowners, whose enterprise and teachings 
have influenced the agriculture of the world; Joseph Arch, George 
Edwards (the first farm labourer to be knighted), who between them did 
so much to champion the cause of the agricultural worker ; T. B. Wood, 
Professor of Agriculture at Cambridge, and now John Hammond, also of 
Cambridge, are men of agricultural science whose influence is national. 
From the time of Kett, and perhaps earlier, Norfolk men have been 
politically minded. ‘There was a Farmers’ Federation before the days of 
the National Farmers’ Union, and recently a new party—the Agricultural 
Party—was formed in Norfolk and seriously considered contesting a 
number of important constituencies at the last General Election. 
Over fifty years ago the Norfolk Chamber of Agriculture appealed for 
funds to initiate the series of agricultural experiments that culminated in 
the establishment of the present Norfolk Agricultural Station in 1908. 
The Stalham Farmers’ Club was founded in 1838, and with occasional 
periods of inactivity has met regularly since that date. Its influence on 
the farming of East Norfolk and on the public work of its members has 
been profound. Many other instances could be quoted of the interest 
in every walk of life of the Norfolk countryman in the famous agriculture 
of his county and of his determination in good times or bad to do, as 
A. G. Street puts it, ‘ his duty by the land.’ 
The geological and geographical aspects of the county of Norfolk are 
