512 
Recommendations of the 
the low price of agricultural produce must be accepted as the 
effect of foreign importation. 
While the difficulties of the farmers have been thus increased, 
higher wages and more general employment have proportion- 
ately improved the condition of the labourer. It is most satis- 
factory to be assured that the labouring class has been scarcely, 
if at all, affected by the distress which has fallen so heavily 
^ipon owners as well as occupiers. Provisions have been cheap 
and employment abundant, while wages in a few districts only 
have been slightly reduced. 
In connection, however, with the unsatisfactory supply of 
labour, our attention has been directed to the insufficiency of 
house accommodation, and to the present system of education 
as it affects that class. 
Although it is generally admitted that within the last twenty 
years very great progress has been made, especially upon large 
estates, in providing better cottages for agricultural labourers, 
yet, in many districts, the accommodation is still very defective. 
To a considerable extent the interest of owners in attracting 
labour, and retaining it upon the land, would no doubt operate 
as a sufficient inducement to provide cottages with gardens or 
allotments, at reasonable rents, for farm-labourers. It is due to 
the owners of land to state that, irrespective of considerations 
of interest, many of them have expended, and continue to expend, 
large sums of money to supply good and sufficient cottage 
accommodation. 
A large proportion of cottages are, however, in the hands of 
small owners, who have neither the means nor the will to ex- 
pend money on their improvement. The sanitary authorities 
throughout the country have certain powers to deal with cases of 
•defective accommodation ; and if these powers are exercised 
with judgment and impartiality, we may reasonably look forward 
to such improvement in the condition of labourers as would 
render them less inclined to abandon the field for the town. 
Education. 
There is a very general complaint amongst farmers that the 
present system of education operates prejudicially to the interests 
of agriculture. Boys, it is said, are kept at school at an age at 
which they might be usefully employed upon the farm, and be 
thus acquiring habits and tastes which would fit them for farm 
service. As it is, the standard of education is so fixed that not 
only are the first years of industrial training lost before a boy 
can attain it, but when he does attain it, he acquires with it a 
desire for what he regards as more suitable occupation ; so that 
