The Stratford Evening Post WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER THURSDAY, DECEMBER 2, 1915. THE NATIONAL INTEREST.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXVIII, Issue 99, 2 December 1915, Page 4

The Stratford Evening Post WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER THURSDAY, DECEMBER 2, 1915. THE NATIONAL INTEREST.

iu his presidential address before the British Association this year. Mr R. H. Row, statistician to the British Board of Agriculture and President of the Agricultural Section of the Association, spoke on fanning and food . supplies in war time. The position of Britain during past great wars was ;reviewed, and referring to agriculture .in the stormy period from 1793 to 18,15, Mr Rew recalled the fact that the half of the eighteenth century had witnessed a revolution of British agriculture. The work of Jethro Tull, “Turnip” Townshend, Robert Bakewell, and their disciples, had established the principles of modern farming. Coke, of Rolkham, had begun his missionary work, Arthur Young was preaching the gospel of progress, and in 1803 Humphry Davy delivered his epoch-making lectures on agricultural chemistry. Common field cultivation, with all its hindrances to progress, was rapidly being extinguished, accelerated by the General Inclosure Act of 1801. In the far-away days. England certainly grew fur more wheat, proportionately to her population than she does to-day, but even thou her requirements had to be made up by importation. Mr Rew remarks that it appears paradoxink but in a souse it is true, to .say that the scarcity of wheat in certain years arose from the fact that the country was too largely dependent on its own crop. The risk of a bad harvest iu a climate such as that of the British Isles, he points out. must always be serious, and by the fortune of war this risk between 1793 ami ISI I turned out to be very high. M hen supplies are drawn from the four quarters of the globe, it is evident that the rhk of a shortage in time of peace is grcatlv reduced. He also observes that “whether in a g''eat war it is preferable to be more dependent on the sen than on the season is debatable.” Mr Row simnglv urges that the national int, iv 1 Gy iu maintaining. and as far as possible increasing, the produce of I lie laud, and the recent returns issued showed the measure the English farmer’s achievement. They have added ”o per cent, to the j acreage of wheat, ami > per cent, to the acreage of oats, ami then bare

kept the area of potatoes up to the high ami sufficient level of the previous year. It is also shown that tlie liritish fanners, in response’ to the (jiovernments appeal, have largely increased their stock of cattle and sheep, in spite of the, many difficulties and drawhacks of an unfavourable season.