The Distribution of Wart Disease. 



previously stated, was cheaper than by rail for long distances 

 only. The northern merchants were therefore compelled to adopt 

 this method of transport to secure trade, and, for financial 

 reasons, to choose districts in England fairly remote from Scot- 

 land, where shipping ports existed. 



Thus the southern merchants of Scotland captured the trade 

 in the North and Midlands of England, with the result that the 

 bulk of the seed sent to, and grown m, Lancashire and the 

 Midland parts of England was derived from the Lowlands of 

 Scotland (Fife, East, West, and Mid Lothian, Glasgow, and 

 Dumfries) . 



The merchants of the North founded good shipping routes 

 l)etween the East Coast ports of Scotland — Dundee, Montrose and 

 and Arbroath — and the Wash ports, London, and in lesser degree 

 G-rimsby, and in this w^ay soon captured the trade in South 

 Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, the Eastern Counties, and Kent. 

 Another shipping line was established between Ballintore (in 

 Eoss) and Portsmouth and Southampton, so that the bulk of 

 the seed sent to Hampshire and Sussex was obtained from the 

 furthermost potato county of Scotland (Eoss) . 



Lincolnshire and Lancashire have also from early days pro- 

 duced large quantities of seed potatoes. Those despatched 

 from Lincolnshire were sent to the Southern and South 

 Western Counties, while Lancashire sent much into South 

 Wales and the industrial parts of the Midlands. 



From the preceding facts the inference must be drawn that 

 the disease has been distributed with the seed potatoes sent out 

 by rail from the infected parts of South Scotland to the Nortli 

 of England generally, subsidiary infection of the Midlands, 

 North and South Wales having taken place at a more recent 

 date from seed supplied from Lancashire and Cheshire. The 

 concentration of the disease in the North W^est, the Midlands, 

 and South Wales has been due more to considerations of 

 transport than to influences of soil, or to the fault of the miner 

 with his allotment garden, as has hitherto been believed by 

 many. As very little transference of seed potatoes takes place 

 in a northerly direction, the disease in the South of Scotland 

 has not reached the northern potato areas of Perth, Forfar, 

 Kincardine, or Eoss, and all these districts remain clean, or 

 comparativeh' so, to-day. Thus it is not surprising to learn 

 that in 1916 Lincolnshire, the Eastern and Home Counties, 

 Kent and the South of England were generally free from Wart 

 Disease. Had the distribution of seed potatoes, now outlined, 

 remained fixed, it is probable that the disease would never have 



