1922.] School 01 Asuh i i tore, Cambridge University. 



223 



with the men who are actually making the new science. The 

 Lieutenant is often admirable, but the farmers wish to meet the 

 General. It is in such meetings that some enthusiasm is created, 

 which may lend, for instance, to symposia in which the farmers 

 can thrash out things for themselves, perhaps with a Professor 

 of Agriculture as a referee. 



It is impossible to think of a winter-afternoon exercise more 

 profitable intellectually and pecuniarily than going through a 

 book like " Agricultural Research and the Farmer." And it 

 adds to its own merits by giving a guide to detailed literature. 



It often looks as if there were some serious flaw in the con- 

 nections which should bind the scientific expert and the farmer 

 in co-operation. Perhaps this is in part due to the superiority 

 of the pioneer scientists who queered the pitch by finding no 

 place for the empirics, who retaliated by having no use for 

 them ! The day for this is past. In many cases the empirics 

 were and are quite marvellous, sometimes reminding one of 

 physicians born with a flair for diagnosis. All the surviving lore 

 of the old farmers is valuable, as long as it is not superstitious. 

 Yet it requires to be rationalised and illumined, and the long 

 and short of it is that scientists and farmers cannot afford not to 

 join hands. In active co-operation in the quest for new 

 knowledge mistrust will disappear and mutual appreciation will 

 grow. 



****** 



THE SCHOOL OF AGRICULTURE OF 

 THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE. 



Professor T. B. Wood, C.B.E., M.A., F.I.C., F.R.S... 

 Drapers' Professor of Agr%cultivre i and Fellow of Gonrillc and 

 Caius College, Cambridge. 



Agriciltlre has been a subject of academic study in the 

 University of Cambridge for less than 30 years. Nevertheless i! 

 is by no means an easy task to describe precisely the earlier 

 stages of its development. Like most of the newer departments 

 of the University, the School of Agriculture in its present form 

 has grown up gradually from small beginnings. 



Informal Beginning. — A windfall to the Exchequer, the fore- 

 sight of a Minister of Agriculture, and the persistence of a small 

 committee of enthusiastic members of the University and of the 

 neighbouring County Councils assisted at its birth. A hard- 

 working staff, backed by the prestige of the University, and 



