20 



Present State of the Science of 



reach of every inquirer. The chemist requires but a room in 

 which to set up his furnace, and evolve his gases ; not so the 

 agricultural inquirer ; he requires a large farm (for a small one 

 would be insufficient), and a large capital, too, practically engaged 

 in its cultivation. Neither would one farm be sufficient, since 

 the results of its treatment would apply to one soil only, and sub- 

 soil, one climate and elevation ; whereas there are, even in this 

 country, many soils and subsoils, climates and elevations ; and 

 it can scarcely be expected that, either by individual or by public 

 means, such farms should ever be provided in such number. 

 Still, if we wish, as agriculturists, instead of uncertain local rules 

 of practice, unknown beyond the districts in which they are seve- 

 rally handed down, to attain the knowledge of general certain 

 laws, not less certain because liable to many equally certain local 

 exceptions, — that is to say, if we wish to raise our important art 

 to the rank of a science, this difficulty must be overcome. After 

 all, however, it is not a difficulty with which we alone have to 

 cope. On the contrary, botany, geology, and other sciences which 

 might be named, depend equally upon the collection of numerous 

 minute facts, by individual observers, over a large surface, even 

 that of the whole globe. But it has been found, in these and 

 in many departments of knowledge, that by the formation of 

 permanent societies, having the promotion of the particular sci- 

 ence for their special object, great progress has been attained. 

 Such a society, by bringing together men who are already de- 

 sirous of a common end, encourages their zeab and attracts other 

 labourers into the field. It also regulates their endeavours, as 

 their mutual intercourse shows them more clearly the points of 

 doubt which particularly require to be cleared up. Further, 

 such a society, as it spreads forth its branches, provides a scattered 

 but disciplined host of observers and pioneers. Lastly, the facts 

 thus obtained are recorded, and gradually accumulate, until, by 

 careful comparison of the points in which they agree, some ge- 

 neral rule is discovered ; and, of those in which they differ, the 

 exceptions are also found, and the causes of those exceptions. It 

 is thus that geology has grown into a science within the present 

 century. It may be said, indeed, that the labour of observation 

 on so minute and extended a scale is great, and the prospect of 

 practical improvement, at best, problematical. It might be asked, 

 in reply to such spiritless objections, why agriculture should be 

 the only science in which patient pursuit of knowledge found no 

 reward ? — or whether, while the philosopher, from mere love of 

 science, seeking, for instance, to learn the fixed causes which 

 govern the most changeful and seemingly accidental of all na- 

 tural things, notes down daily, from year to year, the shiftings of 

 the wind and the rise or fall of the weather-glass, hoping that 



