The  Gloucester  Show,  1909. 
163 
than  because  of  any  probable  increase  in  imports.  The  great 
multiplication  of  allotments  and  small  holdings  has  had  a 
marked  effect  upon  the  trade  in  vegetables  particulaily,  as 
many  thousands  of  families  who  were  at  one  time  buyers, 
now  supply  themselves  and  sell  a surplus  to  their  neighbours, 
or  send  it  to  market.  With  respect  to  potatoes,  the  growth 
of  productive  varieties,  the  custom  of  sprouting  the  seed 
tubers,  and  the  improvement  in  cultivation  and  manuring 
have  permanently  increased  the  yield  from  a given  area  of 
land  ; and  if,  in  any  season,  there  is  a comparative  scarcity, 
so  that  prices  are  fairly  good,  Germany  is  always  ready  to 
send  large  quantities  to  our  markets. 
In  the  case  of  fruit,  although  growers  in  countries  which 
have  seasons  earlier  than  ours  continue  to  “ take  the  cream 
off  the  market,”  it  is  chiefly  the  growing  home  production 
which  in  good  crop  years  brings  prices  to  an  unremunerative 
level.  But  with  fruit  and  vegetables  alike,  great  benefit  to 
producers  might  be  attained  by  the  re-organisation  of  our 
wasteful  and  unsatisfactory  system  of  distribution,  under 
which  middle  men  obtain  more  profit  in  a few  hours’  trading 
than  growers  derive  from  the  labour  and  expenditure  of 
a year. 
William  E.  Bear. 
Magham  Down,  Hailshain. 
THE  GLOUCESTER  SHOW,  1909. 
Although  seventy . “ Royal  ” Shows  have  now  been  held 
in  different  parts  of  the  country,  yet  on  only  one  previous 
occasion  has  the  city  of  Gloucester  been  the  place  of  meeting, 
and  that  so  long  ago  as  1853.  The  Show  of  that  year,  in 
common  with  all  the  other  Shows  of  the  Society  before  1858, 
resulted  in  a loss — of  2,084L  We  are  told  that  “ the  weather 
at  the  opening  was  so  unfavourable — rain  falling  heavily 
and  incessantly  for  four  and  twenty  hours,  with  but  little 
intermission  for  twelve  more — that  the  Showground  was 
converted  into  a quagmire.  During  the  night  preceding  the 
second  day  of  the  Show  the  yard  was  coated  with  sawdust 
brought  from  neighbouring  saw  mills,  the  footways  were 
planked  out,  and  thus,  with  improving  weather,  visitors  were 
able  to  move  about  with  some  degree  of  comfort.” 
The  Show  of  1909  at  Gloucester  can  hardly  be  said  to  have 
fared  any  better,  as  far  as  the  weather  was  concerned,  than  the 
meeting  of  fifty-six  years  ago. 
M 2 
