1920.] 



Notices of Books. 



Rothamsted Memoirs on Agricultural Science, Volume IX., 



1909-1916 — (Harpenden: Rothamsted Experimental Station, 1919,36a, net) 

 These Memoirs, recently published, consist wf a series of reprints of articles, 

 contributed by scientific workers at Rothamsted to various agricultural and 

 scientific papers (chiefly the Journal of Agricultural Science). They also 

 contain a report of an address delivered to the British Association for the 

 Advancement of Science by Dr. E. J. Russell. F.R.S., Director of the Station, 

 in 1916. Thirty-eight reprints in all are included in the Memoirs, and the 

 subjects dealt with cover micro-organisms of the soil, biological conditions in 

 the soil, weeds, rain water, and the carbohydrates in plants. The Volume is 

 handsomely bound, and should be very useful to students of agricultural 

 science for the purposes of study and general reference. 



The Report of the Progress of the Ordnance Survey for the 

 Year 1919-20.— (London : H.M. Stationery Office, 1920, price Is. net). 

 This report gives an account of the activities of the National Survey during 

 the first year since the date of the Armistice. The importance of the work 

 done, and its value to British farmers, is perhaps not generally realised, but 

 the Department, by the issue of Ordnance Survey maps covering the entire 

 surface of the United Kingdom, has done much to assist the interests of 

 British agriculture. 



Maps on the scale of 6 inches to one mile and on the still larger scale of 

 25 inches to one mile are available for the whole surface of the United 

 Kingdom, except waste and mountainous areas. Copies may be obtained at 

 all the principal booksellers, or direct from Southampton. 



It is these large scale maps, particularly those on the scale of 25 inches to 

 one mile, that are so useful to owners of property, estate agents, farmers and 

 all who have to deal with agriculture and the land. For the price of a few 

 shillings every owner or tenant can obtain an accurate plan of his property, 

 on which every field and enclosure is represented, and on which the acreage of 

 every enclosure is given. 



The large scale maps are periodically revised. As would be expected, the 

 greater number of changes occur near growing towns and villages; the features 

 of agricultural England change but slowly ; but even .the maps of agricultural 

 regions are revised every 20 years. The revision of the large scale maps is at 

 present proceeding in Derby, Durham, Essex. Gloucester, Northumberland, 

 Oxford and Yorkshire. It should be noted that the maps of the agricultural 

 districts of those counties which have not been recently revised are substan- 

 tially perfect, and no one need hesitate to buy a large scale map on the ground 

 that the revision is a few years old. 



The information given by a 25-inch Ordnance map is, briefly, the follow- 

 ing: — The position of every fence, hedge, wall, ditch, river, stream, canal, 

 road, path and railway ; the position and shape of every House, out-building, 

 wood, copse or orchard; the acreage of every parcel of land or enclosure* the 

 heights above sea level of important objects and surfaces ; the boundaries of 

 civil parishes, boroughs, wards and unions, urban and rural districts. The 

 map. indeed, gives a vast amount of information which could only be obtained 

 from other sources with difficulty and at considerable cost. 



Perhaps enough has been said to indicate the value to the agricultural 

 community of the large scale Ordnance Survey, especially of the 25-inch maps. 



