308 
The late Dr. Voelcker. 
tenance of live-stock, too, will enable the straw of the cereal 
crops to be put to more economic use than that of fuel. 
There is a prevalent idea that, because the farming on the 
prairie is, much of it, primitive in style, it is immaterial whether 
an intending settler knows little or much of the practices of 
modern agriculture. Such a notion is delusive and mis- 
chievous, and there can be no doubt that a knowledge, and a 
good knowledge, of English farming would prove extremely 
valuable on the prairie. Equipped with such knowledge, the 
prairie farmer is possessed of an ideal to which he can always 
be getting nearer and nearer in the management of his holding. 
But if he commences operations with no agricultural knowledge 
at all, or only with that which he may have acquired on the 
prairie itself, he is far less advantageously circumstanced, and 
must be dependent on external influences for any improve- 
ments in his practice ; whereas the farmer who has taken with 
him the effects of a good training, will find his own mind con- 
tinually suggesting to him desirable modifications based on the 
recollections of past experience. The marked contrast of the 
seasons, and the uneven distribution of labour throughout the 
year, may no doubt be cited as points in which the prairie must 
ever differ from the old country ; but, independently of these, 
the farming of the prairie must continue, it may be slowly, but 
none the less surely, to approximate in its character to the best 
types of English practice,— even as the farming of Ontario is 
obviously doing to-day. The general maintenance of stock, for 
example, will go a long way towards affording occupation for 
the winter months, over and above that which is concerned with 
the hauling of wood and corn, threshing, fence-making, black- 
smith's work, repairing houses and buildings, shooting and 
fishing, as at present, and may even create for winter labour a 
demand which does not now exist. 
X. — Tlie late Dr. Voelcker. By Professor J. H. Gilbert, 
LL.D., F.R.S., &c., Harpenden, St. Albans. 
The Members of the Royal Agricultural Society of England, at 
home and abroad, will naturally look for some notice of their 
late Consulting Chemist in the first number of the 'Journal' 
which appears after his lamented death. The Chemical Com- 
mittee requested me to prepare such a notice. I had consider- 
able misgivins lest I should not have sufficient leisure for the 
adequate performance of such a task, but I felt I could not 
