Fertilisers and Feeding Stuffs Act, 1906. 211 
Agriculture to the instituting of a prosecution has damped the 
ardour of many County Councils who before had shown a 
praiseworthy activity. Farmers are quite willing to have 
“ informal ” samples taken of their purchases, so long as this 
involves no responsibility nor trouble to themselves, and 
especially if, by so doing, they can get analyses made for 
nothing, or for a merely nominal sum, but it is only when 
they suspect themselves to have been “ done ” that they will 
trouble further, and then in 99 cases out of 100 they find that 
the statutory limit of ten days has already been exceeded. I have 
been blamed, I may say, for prognosticating that the new Act 
would be made little more use of, if as much, as its predecessor, 
but I already find full confirmation of my views as originally 
expressed. As regards the traders, it must be said to their 
credit, that they have, as a class, loyally complied with the 
requirements of the Act, and the farmer has had the full benefit 
of the provisions introduced by it. In some cases, to which 
reference will be made, it has been sought, by the insertion of 
qualifying clauses, to evade the spirit of the Act, and in others 
guarantees have been given in terms not contemplated by the 
Act, and with “ margins,” as regards composition, much in 
excess of the limits imposed under it. 
Meanwhile, the work conducted for members of the Society 
goes on, if to a somewhat smaller extent, yet without loss of 
activity nor without providing useful guidance to those who 
avail themselves of the privileges afforded them. 
The past season has not brought to light any new points of 
particular importance ; there has not been the introduction of 
any new materials either for food or manure, nor has any 
novel form of adulteration been brought to light. The satis- 
factory features are the general excellence of linseed cakes and 
their freedom from impurity, while the increasing demand — 
a mistaken one in many cases, I consider — for compound cakes 
and meals has led to a corresponding laxity in regard to the 
materials of which they are composed. The inability of the 
Fertilisers and Feeding Stuffs Act to deal adequately with these 
has been specially marked, and it has been made more and 
more apparent that a mere guarantee of oil and nitrogen, 
independently of a consideration of the sources from which these 
are derived, is useless as a guide to the real feeding value of such 
compound materials. Encouragement has thereby been given to 
the setting out of guaranteed analyses showing high percentages 
of oil and nitrogen, and to judging these as if they had been 
obtained from a high-class feeding material such as linseed cake. 
The detailed list of samples analysed is given at the end of 
this report, and it may be mentioned that, in addition to these, 
21 samples of cider and perry and 133 samples of milk were 
