48 
LAND & WATER 
May 25. 1916 
SESAUNDERSl 
EAST COWES 
Contractors to the Admiralty 
and War Office. 
The 
British & Colonial Aeroplane 
Co. Ltd. 
FILTON. BRISTOL. 
CONSTRVCTOKS OP 
Cie/w^ila/ive^. 
COSTS ACTOKS TO 
H.M. War Office & Admiralty. 
Telegrams: Ttlfpht^nti : ) Private Branch 
" AVIATION, BKJSTOL." 3906 BRISTOL, i Exchange. 
(.Continued from pngc 46.) 
worker to produce greater results for tlie amount of effort he 
jmts fortli. To expect each man henceforth to do three men's 
work would not solve the problem, because that would only 
wear out men's lives untimely. 
This being a scientific age, the obvious course is to employ 
machinery to an ever-increasing extent. It does not tire as 
rapidly as a man or an animal, and it can embody strength far 
beyond the capacity of liuman or animal physique. No form 
of machinery illustrates this more convincingly than the 
motor. Hence its growing importance as an Imperial factor. 
Before the war the world's motor industry was primarily 
devoted to the evolution and production of passenger vehicles. 
To-day tlie greatest amount of developmental and maniifactur- 
ing enterprise in Europe is being concentrated on the utility 
motor vehicle. Moreover, in tlie New World there are al- 
ready over ninety utility motor vehicle producers. These 
facts alone illustrate the extraordinary degree of progress 
that has been made in a short time. Rut tliey do not give 
the complete idea. Merc haulage of goods cither in bulk or 
in retail quantities represents but one among several classes 
of demand for motors in the Empire overseas. 
During the last two years yet another notable branch of 
the industry, the ultimate proportions of which we cannot yet 
estimate with any degree of accuracy, has aiisen in coimection 
with agriculture. 
Agriculture's Demands 
In this connection it is argued by some that the British 
agricultural motor industry can never attain great proportions 
because in most cases the machines it produces are too ex- 
pensive for the small farmer at home to buy and too large 
for the small fields that provide one of the most notable 
characteristics of our scenery. In the latter connection, 
however, the Britisher overseas will discover a notable reason 
why the agri-motor manufacturers at home are producing 
the sorts of machines which will be of the utmost use to him 
on the larger scale on which he farms. Nor are those who 
contend that the need is for much lighter agri-motor machinery 
than we produce wholly in the right, for we make some quite 
small varieties. 
Of course the most widely agitated point at present touches 
the question of price. Despite all the heralding of ])ublicity 
agents, the fact remains that no firm in America has yet pro- 
duced the much-talked-of half-a-million agri-motors in a 
year. The time may come ; but it is not yet. In any case, 
however ^v•e recognise the fact that some agri-motor manu- 
facturers in the United States are already producing on a 
scale much larger than anything our own motor industry 
has yet attained, therefore there is no blinking the fact that 
they can cut prices accordingly. But there is no pretence 
that the cheaper American agri-motors arc intended to last 
more than a few seasons. As the advantages of regularly 
acquiring fresh types of machinery were never less in any 
field of motor enterprise than in that of agriculture by motor, 
and as the more expensive types of British-made machines 
are very obviously built to last, I see no reason why users 
in the Empire overseas should not find it at least as economical 
to buy a higher, priced, longer wearing article in preference 
to a lower priced one of much less durability. 
Ear more important in connection with this matter is the 
problem of design. It will take at least a decade before 
the average of the workers on the world's farms will have 
become engineers of sorts. Therefore agri-motor manu- 
facturers must give more and more thought to producing 
machinery that can be put into the hands of the ordinary 
farm labourer of to-day, as distinct from instruments that 
demand the services of a mechanic to maintain them. This 
remark applies alike to the agri-motor productions of the 
Old and of the New World. 
Admittedly, inunensc strides have been made already to- 
wards solving this problem ; also in regard to the no less 
urgent matter of organising adequate systems for promptly 
supplying users with any parts that may be needed froiir 
time to time either as renewals or replacements. America 
leads the way in this direction. In fine, we are only Ibeginning 
to apprehend and utilise the motor as an Imperial factor. 
By its aid, in the course of the next few years we shall both 
open up and bring jnder cultivation vast tracts of virgin 
country all over the world. Farming has already entered on 
a new phase in Canada. 
Apart from the transport of goods by road and track, and of 
ploughing, sowing and reaping by motor, we have to recognise 
that we have onlj' begun to employ it on colonial railway 
systems, Most of our overseas dominions will soon be produc- 
ing all, and more than all the liquid fuel necessary to work 
their motors of every kind, including those to be placed 
wholesale on their waterways for the cheapest of all forms 
of transport. 
