THE MAGAZINE 
OF 
THE SCHOOL OF AGRICULTURE, 
COLOMBO. 
Added as a Supplement monthly to the "TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST." 
The following pages include the contents of the Magazine of the School o f 
Agriculture for December: — 
THE REPORT OP THE SCHOOL OF 
AGRICULTURE 
{Bead before H. E. the Governor.) 
It is nearly 6 years since the Colombo School of Agri- 
culture was opened in January 1884, and at this its 
second public prize distribution, I have to repeat the 
pleasant duty of a past principal and heartily welcome 
Your Excellency and thank you for the honour you have 
done us in coming here today to distribute certificates 
a nd prizes to the successful students. On the former 
occasion, Your Excellency expressed the hope that at 
some future date your successor would hear of the 
success of the stu lents who have p assed out of this 
school. It has so fortunately occurred that this success 
can be reported during Your Excellency's own regime, 
and it is a source of gratification that the work which 
was initiated by the present Director of Public In- 
struction, aided by the great influence of Your Excel- 
lency's own approval, is able to show proof of its useful- 
ness to the people for whose good it was intended, with- 
in the period of Your Excellency's rule, in spite of many 
influential prophecies to the contrary. Since my arrival 
in the island in February of this year, my experience 
has led m i to believe that there cou Id not have been a 
happier ide v than that of the D. P. I. in initiating the 
work of agricultural reform with which his name wi 1 
always be associated and that whatever the opinions to 
the ooatrary, that reform is gradually working its way 
among our agriculutural classes to their material bene" 
fit. Bjth from tin reports of our agricultural instruct- 
ors, as well as from piivato communications and per- 
sonal observation, I am led to believe that the apathy 
and eveu active opposition which originally meet the pro- 
f ress of improved methods of cultivation are steadily and 
surely giving way to a more liberal spirit, — a fact which 
it must be admitted is a source of great enconnigenient 
to allthosse oonneoted with this work. The records 
Experiments at this sohool, as well as the reports from 
experimental stations at Toppur. Panapitiya, Minuwan- 
goda, Mullaittivu, Galle, Akmimana, Nikaweratiya, and 
other places, not only from our instructors, but from 
headmen (and more especially from the President of 
Tibagoda in the Matara district), have all been publish- 
ed, and I need not detain Your Excellency with them. 
Now as to figures, beyond reminding you, sir, that they 
all bear witness to the great success of the improved 
method over the old system of paddy cultivation. The 
sending forth of men who have for two years had the 
scientific principles of agi iculture explained and illus- 
trated to them, is bound in time to influence the minds 
of those among whom the students will move and work ; 
and turn them to see the need of improvement in certain 
of their agricultural operations ; while the practical proof 
shown on the spot of a double crop always, and some- 
times a still more largely increased yield, emphasises 
any mere teaching. During the past session, four 
additional classes have been added to the curriculum, 
viz., veterinary, entomology, geology and field-surveying. 
These are of an elementary nature, and deal with the 
subjects only so far as they can benefit the classes from 
which the students spriug. For I consider that the 
more one knows of the different aspects of his work, 
the greater is the interest and enthusiasm he will evince 
in the thorough performance of it. A practical know- 
ledge of veterinary is, I think, of the first importance to 
agriculturists in a country where cattle are so fully 
utilized and where so much loss results, almost annually 
from the so-called " cattle murrain,'' which is mainly 
caused by the want of the knowledge of a few simple 
facts relative to the proper feeding, housing, and treat- 
ment of stock. A knowledge of entomology will be no 
less useful in a tropical country such as ours, where every 
circumstance seems to favour the development and 
spread of insect-life which is year by year, whether in 
the case of paddy, coconuts, or what not a serious 
Mndrance iu the way of successful cultivation, I should 
