547 
THE FARM PRIZE COMPETITION OF 1891. 
The very interesting and instructive custom of having a Farm 
Prize Competition in connection with the Royal Agricultural 
Society's Annual Meeting was continued for the year 1891 by 
the offer of the Doncaster Local Committee of the liberal sum 
of 300L, to be competed for by tenants holding occupations of 
various sizes, divided thus : — 
Class 1.— For the best-managed Arable and Grass Fasm of 200 acres 
and upwards, of which not less than one-half shall be arable. First prize, 
501. ; second, 301. ; third, 20/. 
Class 2.— For the best-managed Arable and Grass Farm above 100 
acres and not exceeding 200 acres, of which not less than one-half shall be 
arable. First prize, 50/. ; second, 30/. ; third, 20/. 
Class 3.— For the best-managed Arable and Grass Farm above 40 
acres and not exceeding 100 acres. First prize, 50/. ; second, 30/. ; third, 
20/. 
The Council appointed as Judges to inspect the farms : 
Garrett Taylor, Trowse House, Norwich ; and William Coulman 
Brown, Appleby, Lincolnshire. It was intended that the first 
visit should be made early in Januaiy, but the severe weather 
caused a delay of quite a month. 
The competition was limited to farms within the boundaries 
of Yorkshire, and, as will be seen, that county, the largest by far 
in England, contains farms as diversified and some of them as 
well managed as any in the kingdom. 
Even on the competing farms the greatest contrast possible 
was observed by the Judges. The deep loamy soils at Catterick, 
where the plough could and did reach ten inches, are almost 
historic, situated in that noted Vale of Mowbray in which some 
of the inhabitants believe, and perhaps rightly, the finest farms 
of the kingdom are to be found. 
Then, at the opposite corner of the county, at North Dalton, 
a high wold country presented itself, where on many an acre 
4 inches of soil at the most is all that can be turned over. 
Indeed, the surface of some of t he fields is nearly white, being com- 
posed almost entirely of fragments of the prevailing chalk ; and 
yet, since the introduction of bone manures, &c., excellent 
turnips and barleys are grown, with the assistance of large 
flocks of sheep, which on such land were in good times x-eported 
to " tread with a golden hoof." 
Regret was expressed in all quarters that the number of 
entries should be so small. No representative put in an appear- 
ance from the great Warp district, where thousands of acres of 
