200 
year 1805, for encouraging the ‘culture 
of spring wheat: these were widely 
claimed, and, having been followed by 
wnany others since, have proved that the 
article is well established in many dis- 
tricts. te 
I come now to bring to your recol- 
lection, the method and success with 
whic) ‘this institution obeyed a requisi- 
tion from the house of lords, to inquire 
mto, and to report, the means of break- 
ing up certain portions of grass-land, as 
a remedy for scarcity, and laying them 
down again without injury to the pro- 
prietors. The board deliberated | with 
great attention upon this important ob- 
ject, and determined, by offering consi- 
derable premiums, to call to its assistance 
the information of practical men in every 
part of the kingdom. The plan was at- 
tended with all the success that could be 
desired : three hundred and fifty memoirs 
were sent in ciaim of the premiums;, the 
best of them were printed at full length, 
and extracts from many others, forming 
on the whole, a mass of fall and complete 
information, derived from the praetice 
and experience of men known to have 
heen highly successful in their agricul. 
tural exertions. No subject iu the 
whole range of agriculture was.ever so 
fully elucidated. ‘These memoirs further 
eontain much other incidental matter of 
considerable importance ; and they have, 
in various parts of the kingdom, been 
successfully acted upon. I come now to 
ihe more active exertions of the board ; 
in which the principal feature that de- 
mands your attention, is the immense 
undertaking of surveying fourscore pro- 
vinces; that is to say, an empire, in 
which no district was to be omitted from 
the Land’s End. to the Orkneys. The 
reports which have been already printed, 
from among those written ones which 
this measure produced, detail many par- 
ticulars relating to the extent, soil, and 
climate, of eacl county; the rivers, na- 
vigations, roads, aud whatever contri- 
hutes.to internal communication; the 
tenures by which landed property is pos- 
sessed and vccupied, including the effect 
of long and short leases: they describe 
those circumstances which demand at- 
tention in the buildings necessary to the 
occupation of land; they note the pay- 
ments to which it is subjected in rent, 
tithe, and parochial taxes; they give the 
size of farms, awd the consequetces of 
both large and small occupations;. they 
present a detail of enclosures, whether 
hy private exertion or by public autho- 
Proceedings of Learned Societicss 
{April t, 
rity, and the consequences which have 
flowed from them; they describe the im+ 
plements of husbandry, and mark such 
as merit removal from a confined district 
to a more general application; they enter 
into all the minutiz of the cultivation of 
arable Jand, and are equally attentive to 
the pasturage and meadows of the king- 
dom; they give the particulars of woods 
and plantations; they enter largely into 
the detail of the waste-lands of the king- 
dom, their soil, climate, and value, the 
improvements which have been made 
upon them, and others of which they are 
susceptible; they report upon the means 
used fer the improvement of all the va- 
rious soils, whether by draining, irnga- 
tion, paring and burning, manaring, or 
embanking; they describe the live-stock 
of the kingdom, and the great improve- 
ments which have been made in that 
important department; they note the 
price, and various other circumstances, 
respecting rural labour, the state of the 
poor, and the various efforts which have 
been made for ameliorating their condi- 
tion; and they give such particulars re- 
lating to manufactures and commerce, as 
connect them with rural] economy. Frora 
this detail, which does not however in- 
clude the whole of the inquiries directed 
by the board, it must be sufficiently ob- 
vious, that these works must neeessartly 
lay such a foundation for a scienufic 
knowledge in every branch of agricul- 
ture, as cannot fail of diffusing a spirit 
of improvement through every part of 
the realm: this is their direct tendency ; 
and if they should fail of effecting that _ 
object, it is not so much the fault of the 
works themselves, as of the neglect of 
those who do not sufficiently examine 
them. It may be asserted with equal 
safety, that no inquirer into the facts on 
which the science of els engi. 
ought to be founded, can neglect con- 
sulting these works without manifesting 
an ignorance proportioned to such neg= 
lect: in fact, they may be as useful to a 
member of the legislature, as they ought 
to be to a practical farmer; and I do not 
found this assertion on a reference to a 
few of the best of these productions, but 
am justified in the opinion by a perusal. 
of the worst, Et must be in the recol- 
lection of maim members of the house | 
of eemmons, thaY Mr. Pitt founded 
many of his calculations that were 
brought forward in a budget, on the in= 
formation derived from one of these 
reports. 
That I do not estimate this undertak- 
! ang; 
~ 
