Recommendations of the Royal Commission on Agriculture. 507 
Before sending the foregoing description to the Society for 
publication in its ' Journal,' I wrote to the farmer whose poultry 
farm I have described to ask him for a copy of his balance- 
sheet for the year 1881, in order that the description might be 
brought down to as late a date as possible. In reply to my 
letter the farmer wrote as follows : — 
" I have been trying to get out a balance-sheet of my poultry 
farm for the year 1881, but find I cannot get at all the details, 
•owing to their being mixed with the other business transactions, 
but I am satisfied, were I able to do so, they would not be found 
more satisfactory than those I gave you, in a financial point of 
view ; in fact, my impression is such that I intend much reducing 
my stock and breeding for fancy sale only, feeling assured that 
breeding for the market cannot be made to pay on a large scale. 
I much regret being unable to comply with your request." 
This letter would appear to show that the longer experiment 
had convinced the farmer of the correctness of the opinion he 
expressed to me, namely, that poultry farming on a very large 
scale would not pay. 
XXVIII. — Recommendations of the Royal Commission 
ON AORICULTrRE. 
Prefatory Note. 
The Royal Commission on Agricilture has concluded the 
most laborious and comprehensive Agricultural inquiry ever 
instituted. The abstract conclusions arrived at by the Com- 
mission are appended. Twenty Commissioners and ten As- 
sistant-Commissioners, as may be well expected, have elicited 
a mass of valuable information — matters of fact and matters of 
opinion — recorded in several huge volumes, which to the general 
reader are costly and inaccessible. There is a growing feeling 
that, in a cheap and popular form, the more important and 
interesting portions of the Report of the Commission should be 
reprinted by authority ; and perhaps the Council of the Royal 
Agricultural Society might advantageously be moved to promote 
this demand. But it is a question for future consideration 
whether or not we should really benefit the agricultural student, 
or agriculture in general, by an attempt to crush the mass of 
valuable matter into a form that would harmonise with the 
character and objects of this Journal. There can be no doubt, 
however, that we are right in doing all that time and space now 
