292 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. [1 Ocr., 1897. 
Friend or Foe. 
A PRELIMINARY INQUIRY. 
By HENRY A. TARDENT, 
2 Manager of the Westbrook Experiment Farm. 
No doubt the early history of Australia lacks the warlike episodes to be found 
in older countries; still, when writing about the origin of our Australian 
Commonwealth, the Carlyles of the future will have to record an abundant 
harvest of heroic deeds furnished daily by the pacific conquest of the 
continent. Could there be anything more heroic, indeed, than the travels 
of our explorers through an unknown and inhospitable continent; the 
perseverance and endurance of the squatters who followed in their steps; of 
‘the farmers who came next, and crowned the conquest by compelling the earth 
to become fertile and bring forth her fruit ? 
It has been the privilege of the writer to watch rather closely some of the 
great wars of this century in Europe. He has also spent many years of his life 
amongst the Australian farmers; and he has no hesitation in saying that, in his 
eyes, the redeeming of the wild bush, and the establishment on it of a station 
or of a farm in working order, entail as much self-denial, courage, perseverance, 
and real heroism as are to be found associated with the most famous victories. 
In former times the farmer used to be left pretty well to himself in his 
fight against Nature. The Governments of those days thought they had done 
enough when they had maintained order, collected the taxes, and insured the 
safety of the frontiers. It is a redeeming feature of our generation that now 
the Governments of the more advanced countries of the world have a much 
higher notion of their duties. The powerful means at their disposal are now 
directed towards helping the farmer to subdue the refractory forces of nature. 
Here, for instance, in Queensland, in a young community of less than half 
a million of inhabitants, we have a scientific body watching over the health of 
the community ; a chief inspector of stock constantly on the lookout for any- 
thing capable of enhancing the prosperity and well-being of the millions of 
domestic animals entrusted to his care; a geologist, who advises the miner; a 
hydraulic engineer, who, like Moses of old, strikes the earth with his rod and 
causes artesian springs to flow where there was previously only desert and 
water famine; a meteorologist, who investigates for us the laws of our 
atmosphere, bringing by his daily forecasts incalculable benefits to the agri- 
culturist—benefits which will still be greater when, in the course of time, 
he will be enabled to forecast seasons perhaps years in advance; an ento- 
mologist, who has most patiently studied our friends and foes of the insect 
world, and has discovered, amongst other useful things, the very parasite which 
preys on the fruit fly, and is likely to rid us of this terrible pest; a fruit 
expert to advise and direct the operations of orchardists; a bacteriologist, who 
moves with perfect ease amidst our friends and foes of the bacterial world, 
taming them, concluding alliances with them for our benefit, compelling them 
to save our cattle from tick fever and our pastures from the depredations of 
the rabbit, &c.; and last, but not least, we have a botanist, who has spent a 
long and most useful life in conquering and classifying new plants for our use, 
and in warning us against the introduction of such plants as might become 
noxious to us. More recently, other forces have been joined to these; centres 
of agricultural science have been created, where the accumulated knowledge of 
humanity will be, so to say, focussed and put within the reach of the growing 
generations. 
