Feb.  1,  1896.]  Supplement  to  the  “ Tt&pical  Agriculturist'' 
b79 
is  to  blame  if  all  farmers  are  not  so  learned?  1 
say  again  not  the  farmers,  but  the  Government. 
My  able  colleague,  Mr.  Hendrick,  has  recently 
pointed  out  that  no  great  comprehensive  scheme 
of  education  has  ever  been  established  in  any 
country,  except  by  a Government  or  some  similarly 
powerful  authority.  American,  French,  German, 
Danish,  and  all  other  systems  of  agricultural 
education  owe  their  existence  and  their  chief 
support  to  Government  aid.  In  our  own  country 
a great  system  of  elementary  education  has  been 
instituted  by  a Government  Department.  Secon- 
dary education  is  organised  by  Government,  and 
our  universities  receive  large  endowments  and 
grants  from  Government.  IIow  is  it  expected 
that  agricultural  and  technical  education  only 
should  be  left  to  voluntary  effort?  No  intelligent 
man  will  question  the  importance  of  elementary 
education,  but  had  it  been  left  to  voluntary  effort 
alone,  it  is  certain  that  no  such  complete  and 
comprehensive  system  could  ever  have  been 
instituted.  This  holds  still  more  true  of  technical 
education ; and  if  it  be  the  case  that  there  are 
branches  of  agricultural  science  with  which 
farmers  have  little  acquaintance,  1 allinu  that  the 
fault  does  not  lie  with  them.” 
But  it  ought  to  be  added,  after  all,  the  educa- 
tion in  Agricultural  Science  can  have  only  a 
limited  influence  on  farming.  There  are  many 
((ualilies,  combined  with  great  and  minute 
practical  knowledge,  that  go  to  make  a successful 
farmer.  Science  is  only  of  secondary  importance 
as  compared  with  these;  it  can  only  contribute  a 
little  more  to  help  a man  to  success,  but  so  far  as 
it  does  so,  it  deserves  tbe  greatest  attention  from 
all  friends  of  agriculture,  and  much  greater 
support  from  them  and  from  Government  tlian 
it  has  hitherto  received  in  this  Kingdom. 
The  following  is  from  an  address  by  I’rincipal 
Smith  : — 
“ Those  of  you  who  have  been  but  a short  time 
at  the  College,  and  have  learned  something  of  the 
nature,  composition,  and  uses  of  artificial  manures, 
w’ill  be  "able  to  gauge  the  value  of  the  instruction 
you  receive  when  you  are  told  that  farmers  may  be 
met  with  who  use  superphosphate  of  lime  instead 
of  nitrate  of  soda  for  no  other  reason  than  that  the 
former  is  cheaper  than  the  latter.  This  is  simply 
a matter  of  ignorance,  which  will  not  lie  possible 
when  instruction  in  ‘ science ' has  become  more 
general. 
“Some  practical  people  are  prejudiced  against 
‘science'  and  ‘agricultural  .science.'  But  I do 
not  think  they  will  quarrel  with  the  definition 
as  given  by  Mr.  Warington  at  Ipswich.  ‘Agri- 
cultural science  should  mean,’  he  says,  ‘ the  best 
knowledge  of  the  day  on  tlie  subject  of  agri- 
culture, and  a farmer  will  do  wisely  to  obtain 
the  aid  of  this  knowledge  in  all  his  operation.’ 
AVe  do  not  ask  for  science  to  supplant  experience, 
but  to  supplement  and  to  aid  it. 
“ In  the  discussion  which  followed  the  reading 
of  Professor  AA’aringtou's  paper.  Professor  Marshall 
AVard  pointed  out  that  a system  of  practical 
agricultural  investigation  was  one  thing,  and  a 
system  of  agricultural  education  was  another. 
That,  I think,  was  a most  approjtriate  remark. 
Research  and  education  cannot  go  aloug  together, 
and' do  not  to  any  great  extent  in  otlier  depart- 
ments of  science:  a teaclier  should  seek  to 
disseminate  the  information  that  has  been  gained 
by  research.  It  may  be  a humbler  function  than 
the  office  of  adding  to  the  stock  of  the  world’s 
knowledge  by  means  of  original  investigation, 
but  it  is  a no  less  necessary  one.” 
♦ 
DAIRY  FARMING  AND  MURRAIN. 
We  make  the  following  extracts  from  the  annual 
report  of  Mr.  Mollison,  Superintendent  of  Farms, 
Bombay,  with  reference  to  the  Poona  Dairy  aiid 
dairy  herd.  [In  1894  the  Ceylon  Government 
Dairy  was  unfortunate  enough  to  experience  an 
outbreak  of  murrain  (rinderpest)  among  the  dairy 
herd  ; all  the  details  with  reference  to  this  out- 
break were  made  public  at  the  time,  and  formed 
the  subject  of  a special  report  by  the  late  Colonial 
Veterinary  Surgeon,  Mr.  Lye.  With  the  recollec- 
tion of  that  sad  experience  still  fresh  in  our 
memory,  we  can  deeply  sympathize  with  the 
Superintendent  of  the  Poona  Farm  on  the  outbreak 
wiiich  the  Dairy  experienced  during  the  year 
ending  March  31st  1893]  : — 
The  financial  results  are  shown  in  the  appended 
balance-sheet.  The  profit  for  the  j ear  is  R266-ll-ti 
as  against  112,254-13-2  last  year. 
The  reason  wiiy  the  margin  of  profit  is  so  small 
is  due  to  n very  serious  outbreak  of  rinderpest  dur- 
ing the  year.  If  reference  is  made  to  Appendix  V 
it  will  be  seen  that  54  cattle  died  during  the  year; 
of  these  one  cow  (our  best  Adei?)  was  poisoned 
(intentionally  I believe),  one  cow  died  from 
inrtammation  of  the  lungs,  and  a few'  calves  w'ere 
lost,  as  they  ordinarily  will  be.  There  w'ere  34 
deaths  due  directly  to  rinderpest,  and  some  calves 
which  recovered  from  disease  died  from  after- 
effects. They  never  recovered  their  strength 
though  w'ell  cared  for.  The  indirect  loss  due  to 
diminished  milk  yield  in  the  healthy  cattle  was 
l)robably  more  than  that  from  death.  The  disease 
first  broke  out  amongst  unweaned  calves,  and 
these  had  necessarily  to  be  separated  from  their 
dams.  The  maternal  instincts  of  Indian  cattle 
are  very  strong  and  the  effect  of  separation  from 
the  calves  upon  the  milk  yield,  especially  of  the 
buffaloes,  w'as  remarkable.  The  cattle  were  in 
full  milk  at  the  time,  the  whole  herd  giving  about 
700  lbs.  daily.  A week  after  the  rinderpest  ap- 
peared the  daily  yield  w'as  about  4<19  lbs.,  repre- 
•senting  a daily  loss  of  18  rupees.  It  seems  to  be 
practically  impossiltle  to  wean  calves  at  birth 
from  Indian  milk  cattle  unless  done  wdien  the 
heifer  has  her  first  calf,  but  tbe  above  results 
point  to  the  necessity  of  doing  so  if  possible.  The 
carca.ses  of  the  cattle  that  died  were  all  burnt. 
This,  with  medicine.s,  cost  R206. 
The  number  of  deaths  was  about  70  per  cent,  of 
affected  cases.  It  is  significant  that  indigenous 
breeds  escaped  contagion  to  a far  greater  extent 
than  exotic  breeds.  An  English  cow' and  calf  be- 
longing to  his  Excellency  the  late  Governor  were 
about  the  first  to  succumb,  Tw'o  Bahrein  cow's  of 
a noted  milk-breed  which  I had  bought  at  con- 
siderable expense  from  the  head  of  the  Persian 
Gulf,  died  within  thirty  hours  of  the  first  symp- 
toms. Every  Aden  which  came  in  contact  with 
contagion  became  infected  and  died.  We  lost  one 
Sind  cow,  but  no  Gir  cattle,  and  only  two  buffalo- 
cows,  though  a number  became  infected  but  only 
in  a mild  manner.  Young  buffalo  and  cow-calves 
died  very  quickly.  Cows  advanced  in  pregnancy 
