Miscellaneous. 



434 



[November, 1910. 



again means that the population cannot 

 be very dense, and that the exports 

 of agricultural produce to other places 

 in the country, or to places abroad, must 

 be small in amount and consequently 

 that the purchases of tools or ot other 

 things not made by the cultivators them- 

 selves must be limited. Money, too, can 

 only be available in very small amount, 

 and, therefore, improvement must be 

 very slow, aud so on in an endless circle. 

 All parts of agriculture, all parts of the 

 problem, fit together, and any change 

 in one item involves a change in others. 

 If cattle, for example, are to be im- 

 proved, their food supply must be im- 

 proved to match, or the new breeds 

 cannot be maintained in a good and 

 efficient condition. Improvement of the 

 food involves many other changes in 

 other departments. Again, improved 

 cattle must have improved tools to work 

 with, or their improvement is of no 

 value, and this again involves many 

 changes. A clear grasp of this priuciple 

 of the interdependence of all parts of 

 the problem is absolutely necessary for 

 any one who is to work at the improve- 

 ment of agriculture. 



We may express this, perhaps, by 

 saying that in anyone country at any 

 one time, there is an agricultural equili- 

 brium. The problem before us is to 

 raise that equilibrium. If a pile of 

 spillikins be thrown down, they will fall 

 into an equilibrium. No one can be 

 easily moved without moving others, 

 just as is the case with the different 

 parts of the agricultural problem, but 

 it is none the less possible to so re- 

 arrange them that they shall be on the 

 whole at a higher plane and less densely 

 grouped than they were before, and this 

 is what we have to try to do with agri- 

 culture. At the same time we have to 

 try to raise the level of the entire mass. 

 The basal level of North American 

 agriculture is far ahead of that in the 

 tropics, and we want to bring up the 

 latter to the level of the former. The 

 agricultural equilibrium of most tropical 

 countries is very low, and it is a question 

 as to how it got into that position, 

 or whether it was ever above that. 

 There is- no doubt that it was once as 

 low in the northern countries, and has 

 slowly risen. Perhaps the simplest way 

 in which to represent it is by the aid of 

 such a diagram as that given in the first 

 lecture. 



We have made four levels in this 

 diagram. The lowest represents the 

 present state of peasant agriculture 

 in the tropics, the next that below 

 which, in our opinion, real scientific 

 agricultural progress is to all intents 



impossible, and above again the level of 

 the best peasant and capitalist agricul- 

 ture. [The levels are placed at equal 

 distances apart for convenience, but of 

 course (1) may be close to, or the same a3 

 (2), or (3; may be above (4).] 



Now the problem before us is to raise 

 the agricultural equilibrium from its 

 present level, and somewhere near to 

 that of the capitalist agriculture. This 

 can, we are firmly convinced, only be 

 done by means of what we have called 

 the preliminary factors of land, capital, 

 transport, and education. 



We may take an analogy from vege- 

 table physiology. Growth, it used to be 

 said, could not go on without a supply 

 of food with sufficient heat and suffic- 

 ient moisture, and each of these factors, 

 though it was admitted that all were 

 necessary, was assumed to act inde- 

 pendently of the rest. It was found 

 that it increased up to another temper- 

 ature, which was called the optimum, 

 and then decreased up to a maximum, 

 when it ceased. We now know that 

 the factors do not act precisely as 

 we had thought. All must be acting 

 together, and the rate of growth 

 is regulated by the one which is present 

 in barely sufficient amount. If there is 

 plenty of heat and food, the growth 

 will be regulated by the moisture, and 

 when that also is present in full measure 

 will go on at the maximum speed, while 

 when that falls off it will also fall off. 

 In the same way, heat, or food, may be 

 the regulating or limiting factor, or first 

 the one and then the other. In a similar 

 manner, agricultural progress from the 

 low level (1) has several factors, which 

 we have indicated on the diagram, and 

 will be regulated by the one of these 

 which falls into insufficiency, so that at 

 one time progress in a given country 

 may be checked for want of education, 

 at another for want cf transport faci- 

 lities, at a third for want of capital, and 

 so on. 



To complete the analogy, just as 

 growth will not go on beyond a certain 

 limit, so it is with agricultural progress. 

 But by providing the necessary factors, 

 and by removing the hindrances to their 

 action, we make it go on at the fastest 

 possible rate, and up to the highest 

 possible limit. 



To raise level (1) to level (2), that be- 

 low which real progress in agriculture, 

 strictly so called, is impossible, requires 

 the aid of all the various factors which 

 we have been considering. If they are 

 all put into action, the level will rise, 

 but not infrequently the rise will be 

 found to slacken or cease, and then it 



