120 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
order to get a higher price for their seed the growers are onlyJ:oo 
ready to have their fields inspected and to obtain certificates. Dr. 
Quanjer explains this pretty fully, and I imagine the day is coming 
in Britain when certificates of freedom from these diseases will be 
called for as well as certificates of purity and freedom from wart 
disease. 
In concluding, let me quote Murphy, who sums up the position in 
a sentence : "It is the appearance of the plant which produced the 
tuber which counts most." Healthy plants will give healthy offspring, 
and we can never have healthy plants without a good appearance. 
Every farmer and gardener knows this to be true. 
One serious difficulty we practical men are up against is the 
difficulty of diagnosing the diseases — leaf-roll, mosaic, crinkle, which 
I have not referred to, but which Quanjer warns us against- — a 
disease resembling mosaic but more rugged with leaves curled down- 
wards — the difficulty of recognizing the troubles when we see them 
with certainty when the experts admit at times that it is quite im- 
possible for them to be certain. The Ministry of Agriculture publishes 
two very helpful 4-page leaflets on Potato Leaf-curl and Mosaic 
Disease — Nos. 164 and 373 respectively. I advise every grower to 
obtain these, which he can do by sending a letter of request to the 
Publication Branch, Ministry of Agriculture, 10 Whitehall Place, 
London. 
Sir Daniel Hall, Chief Scientific Adviser to the Ministry of 
Agriculture, was to have delivered the Inaugural Address to the Con- 
ference, but he was detained at Geneva, where he had gone to repre- 
sent the Government at an International Agricultural Conference. 
Lord Lambourne, the President of the Royal Horticultural Society, 
presided at the opening and gave an address of welcome to the 
delegates. It was most unfortunate that Sir Daniel Hall was not 
able to attend, because in his address, which is printed in the Report 
of the Proceedings, he raises many issues of supreme importance. For 
example, he advocates the increase of yield by improved cultivation, 
by the introduction of better cropping varieties, by the dissemination 
of good seed, and by the prevention of disease : but he is wise enough 
to say " that we cannot all at once increase our potato acreage, the 
market will not stand it, and it is one of the duties of the industry 
to conduct a propaganda and enlighten the people on the value as 
food, and on the many ways in which it can be utilized." I can 
imagine that would have formed a fine subject for discussion. Sir 
Daniel also says that diseases of all kinds are " the chief factors 
limiting production and increasing the price to the consumer." In a 
discussion the question would have arisen — how much lower can the 
grower go in his price to meet the consumer ? Not a penny if he is 
to remain solvent under present rents, taxes, rates, costs of manures and 
labour. Sir Daniel is alive to the present heavy freight charges on 
potatos for seed that come from any distance to the southern potato- 
grower. What about the freight charges for ware from the northern 
