214 Tobacco as a Farm Crop for England. 
the scientific and commercial details, and to epitomize my own 
experiences, so as to lay a safe foundation for others to work upon. 
I found it impossible to give the public an adequate im- 
pression of the importance of the subject, without entering 
closely into the question of revenue. I also further found that 
even the earliest principles that must guide us to the successful 
cultivation of this delicate plant required a certain knowledge 
of the abstruse questions of chemistry and botany. I have, 
therefore, endeavoured to collect all the information I could in 
the limited time at my disposal, leaving to others, more capable 
than myself, to carry on the subject, each in his own particular 
province. 
Together with my own remarks, I have incorporated Mr. 
A. Wingham's analyses of tobacco grown by Lord Harris, 
Mr. W. L. Wigan, and myself; and Mr. Wigan's description 
of his own experiment in tobacco-growing at East Mailing, 
which they have kindly given me permission to publish. 
It will be obvious to those who read this article that many 
great and important interests in this country are connected with 
the cultivation and sale of tobacco ; and although it is of para- 
mount importance at the present moment to increase the profit- 
able emploj'ment of labour in this country, these vested interests 
deserve mature consideration before being interfered with. 
A list of books and pamphlets treating of tobacco will be 
found appended to this paper, to which any readers of this 
article who desire further information on this head may refer ; 
and the comments I have made on some of these books may 
possibly guide their research. 
As soon as it was generally known that tobacco was about 
to be cultivated in England, and during the growing, harvest- 
ing and drying of my crop, numerous questions were put 
to me, some displaying curious ignorance, and others so per- 
tinent that they led me to the idea of reproducing them in the 
form in which they were asked, and in which the answers were 
given to them. The form of dialogue, though backed by very 
high and ancient authority, is not usually favoured in scientific 
or agricultural literature ; but I have adopted it on this occa- 
sion, seeing that ihe subject of tobacco culture in England is 
not confined to the agricultural community alone, but possesses 
an interest for many to whom a long string of agricultural and 
scientific details would be tedious, and which the system of 
question and answer may tend to simplify. This mode of 
treating the subject is not entirely unprecedented in the 
'Journal,' for the questions in the last number* which drew 
* Vol. xxii., 188G, p. 377 et seq. (H. F. Moore.— " The Winter of 1885-C 
