212 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JouRNAL. [1 Sepr., 1897. 
. Agricultural Schools and Experiment Stations. 
Noxx but those who follow the expansion of the agricultural industry of 
foreign countries can form any conception of the great importance attached to 
the necessity for fostering, by State aid, the interests of the farming and dairying 
classes of their respective countries by the Governments of the United States, 
Germany, France, Belgium, Russia, &e. We, in Queensland, are being forced 
by competition to recognise that the old methods of farming and dairying are no 
Jonger profitable. We must move with the times or be hopelessly left behind 
in therace. We have, however, made a commencement. The Department of 
Agriculture is very much alive to its responsibilities. Both the Government 
and the people, as a body, recognise that now, as in the days of Rameses and 
Solomon, the support of a nation lies in its agricultural resources : “The king 
himself is served by the field.” The sinews of war are said to be money, but 
the real sinews of war are supplies; and if they are not forthcoming, armies and 
navies are helpless. Therefore, it is the duty of all patriots to exert them- 
selves to the utmost to foster and extend the profession of agriculture. It may 
be difficult to move older men out of a groove they have moved in for many 
years. What suited their fathers still suits them, but it will not suit the 
younger generation. These require to be moulded into intelligent, educated, 
scientific agriculturists. Hence the necessity for colleges, dairies, and 
experiment farms. Where these are under proper supervision and conducted 
on a liberal (not extravagant) scale, no greater boon could be conferred by a 
Government on its people. Thestudents at the various stations will go forth 
to the world with enlarged ideas, instructed in the latest and most economical 
methods of cultivation, harvesting, and marketing their produce. There will 
be no happy-go-lucky wasteful methods in their farming operations. Besides 
this they will, by their example and let us hope, by their success, induce 
many who have not had the same advantages to follow their example; and 
the result cannot fail to be a beneficent one, not only to this colony, but 
to those to which our products are exported. We have been led to these 
remarks by a perusal of the report of the Agricultural Experiment Stations 
in Prussia (Germany), which is one of the most interesting of our exchanges. 
From it we extract the following, which will doubtless be of interest to many 
of our own readers :— 
“ Prussia, with its 134,500 square miles and about 30,000,000 inhabitants, 
has 42 agricultural experiment stations and agricultural schools ; 16 of these are 
general stations, doing all classes of practical and scientific work and research ; 
7 are stations of control, doing chiefly tests of seeds, soils, manures, &c. There 
are 12 special stations for the benefit of the sugar industry, brewing, fruit and 
wine culture, &c.; besides 7 agricultural schools, academies, and universities. 
The staff at these establishments is an enormous one, comprising about 64 
directors (chiefly chemists), with 95 assistants, 5 bacteriologists, 29 botanists 
and entomologists, 14 engineers and surveyors, 18 clerks, and numerous 
laboratory servants. The total income of the experiment stations (excluding 
schools and universities) was in the year 1894, the complete report of which is 
just to hand, £56,600, of which £11,200 was contributed by the Government, 
and £40,000 was taken in payment of analyses and other work done. The 
expenses amounted to £53,800. 
