112 The Need for Eperimental Farms. 



discussing with a farmer the changes required by the 

 times, and a need for a thorough knowledge of grasses, 

 he pointed to an old pasture, and said, " I know as much 

 as most of them, and yet I could not tell you the names 

 of one of these grasses." " We are awfully ignorant," 

 said another to me when I was alluding to that or some 

 other farming subject. And the class to which 1 belong, 

 the landlord class, are in much the same position as 

 their tenants ; rather worse, indeed, for the agricuKural 

 ignorance of the landlords consists of what theologians 

 denounce as the worst form of ignorance — a desire not 

 to know — as I have previously shown in the early pages 

 of this book. When, lastly, we turn to the factor or 

 land agent, we shall find that he is simply an estimable 

 gentleman who goes round with a bag, and when he 

 has filled it he has not the slightest idea whether he has 

 done so with the legitimate interest of the soil, the 

 capital of the tenant, or the capital of the landlord, or a 

 mixture of all three. Nor does he appear to think it his 

 duty to make any inquiries on the subject. For many 

 years past he has filled it very largely with the capital 

 of the landlord; and, indeed, this must have been so, or 

 we should not have heard such numerous complaints of 

 exhausted soil. This is simply another term for depleted 

 landlords' capital, which, I need hardly explain, consists 

 mainly of soil. Now, to make any progress in our 

 agriculture in such a way as to enable it to grapple 

 successfully with these difficult times, we must, first of 

 all, take into account the mental condition of the three 

 great classes engaged in laud, and its management and 

 cultivation, and adapt our educational methods in such 

 a way that the classes in question may not be called 

 upon for any form of intellectual exertion. In other 

 words, you must teach not so much by books and 

 lectures as by practical illustration in the field, and such 

 illustration must not consist of experimental plots, but 

 of farms of moderate size, conducted on the lines that 

 any farmer could imitate, though, of course, attached to 



