X 
Report  to  the  General  Meeting. 
worthy  of  the  prize  offered  by  the  Society  in  that  class,  the 
Council  appointed  a Committee  to  report  on  the  best  mode,  in 
their  opinion,  in  which  a practical  farmer  may  be  enabled,  in  the 
simplest  manner,  to  keep  the  requisite  accounts  connected  with 
his  farming  establishment.'’  The  Committee  having  taken  that 
important  practical  question  into  their  mature  consideration,  and 
having  examined  the  various  forms  transmitted  at  different  times 
to  the  Library  of  the  Society,  have  laid  before  the  Council  the 
forms  of  accounts  proposed  by  them  for  adoption.  These  forms 
having  been  sent  round  to  each  Member  of  the  Council,  inviting 
their  comments  and  suggestions,  the  Council  took  such  com- 
munications into  their  consideration,  and  finally  agreed  to  adopt 
the  forms  proposed,  subject  to  certain  alterations  of  headings  and 
rulings,  and  conditionally  that  a statement  should  be  inserted  in 
the  principal  book  (to  be  sold  with  the  others  at  a reduced  price 
to  the  Members  of  the  Society),  that  they  were  submitted  to  their 
notice  only  for  present  adoption,  in  the  hope  that  such  suggestions 
would  be  offered  to  the  Council  by  practical  men  who  might  use 
them  as  might  tend  to  their  further  improvement.  The  Council 
are  fully  aware  that  forms  of  accounts  of  any  kind  must  be 
adapted  to  the  different  capacities  or  habits  of  business  of  those 
who  are  to  use  them,  and  bear  a reference  to  the  farmer’s  extent 
of  occupation.  They  accordingly  put  forth  these  forms  of 
accounts  more  as  further  means  for  improvement  to  be  derived 
from  experience  of  their  practical  use,  than  as  offering  them  to 
the  agricultural  world  as  an  exact  or  universal  model  by  which  all 
farm  accounts  are  to  be  kept.  They  conceive  the  experience  thus 
gained,  and  the  simple  fact  of  impressing  upon  farmers  the 
necessity  of  keeping  accurate  records  of  outlay  and  income,  and 
of  profit  and  loss,  in  the  several  departments  of  their  farming,  will 
in  itself  be  a great  step  towards  that  desired  end.  The  habit  of 
exact  registration  thus  acquired  in  their  money  transactions  will 
also  extend  to  other  objects,  especially  to  that  journalising  of 
daily  occurrences  and  operations  on  their  farms  which  will 
become  to  them  a valuable  historical  record  for  detecting  the 
cause  of  failure  or  success  in  any  particular  mode  of  cultivation 
