ON THE LAND.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 13870, 2 October 1908, Page 8

ON THE LAND.

AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION. Our English agricultural correspondent writes:—"A thorough-going report, after an exlmustivo inquiry, has been issued by tlio Departmental Committee on agricultural education in England and Wales. An interesting historical review of tho institution and progress of agricultural education in tlio country is followed by a brief notico of attention given to tho subject by previous Parliamentary Committees and Commissions, and by roferoncos to tlio systems of agricultural instruction carried out in several foreign countries. But thero is a comprehensive account of tho institutions of tho country, finishing with tho conclusion that tho foundations of a national system of agricultural education have been laid, but that much remains to ho dono before it can bo regarded as satisfactory. Tho committee obtained evideneo of tlio practical value of agricultural education in improving farm practice, particularly in relation to tho selection and use of artificial manures' and feeding, stuffs, and to tho practice of dairying. A great incrcaso of funds for existing institutions is declared to bo needed, as well as for tho establishment of what are known in some foreign countries as winter schools and of farm institutes, for an increased number of itinerant instructors, and for experiments and research. The most astonishing statement uiado by the committee is that there is a dearth of capable agricultural teachers, which raises the question: "What, thou, havo tho great agricultural colleges and agricultural departments of universities been doing during the many years of their existence? They have not trained thoroughly any considerable number of farmers' sons, because their fees for in-students aro far too high. Future landlords and land agents thoy have educated, but surely it, might have been supposed that they would also havo educated a very largo number of thoroughly qualified instructors.

IMPORTANCE OF AGRICULTURE. Tho wealth of a nation depends primarily on tho fortuity of its land. A country rich in minerals may become opulent through possessing the wherewithal to buy largely of another nation's food products, and thus for a time hide its own deficiencies but its position is dependent on an unknown.and unstable quantity. All necessaries of life aro produced from tho soil and tho moro highly developed a country's agricultural resources are, tho greater is its self-contained wealth. Farming is tho ono original and fundamental occupation; all other businesses and professions are either its offshoots or its parasites. Every one whose labours aro directed towards increasing the productiveness of the soil is permanently raising the commercial prosperity of that country in a degree corresponding with.the success of his efforts. A man may engage in trading, and should his venture not bo a financial success, he may go out of tho "business again, leaving tho world at largo neither better nor worse for tho time spent,' for ho. has been but a medium of exchange; but every tree felled or furrow turned marks an advancement in the development of the world's food supply.

BOYS AND FARMING. An influential Australian farmer, dealing ! with the question of keeping boys at home,: said many young men were working for other people for. tho reason that they had cither too long hours to work at home, or else . received no* pocket money from their ] fathers. The boys should bo brought up to take.an interest in their work, and should bo given regular working hours—say, from; seven a.m. to five p.m., and on Saturdays: until ono p.m., except perhaps on special* occasions. With, regard to giving them a start in life, which would prove generallyeffective, assuming that the father had some freehold property, oven though limited in extent, let him plant something profitable on a plot set asido for the purpose soon after the birth of the first boy, and pay all proceeds from this plot into tho Savings Bank, allowing it to accumulate until his son had reached his majority. Personally, ho had planted thirty almond-trees as a broakwind about 17 years ago. They came into bearing after the fifth year; and from tlio returns to date, and those for a further four years, and also the, compound interest added, thero would bo enough to pay several sons £100 on arriving at their majority.

INTENSIVE AGRICULTURE. ' Tho most successful practical ■experiment yet made in England to introduce a system of close cultivation and co-operative organisation was inspected recently by tho Essex Field Society (says tho Daily Mail). Tho final achievement of the colony, which was settled less than , two years ago at Mayland, then a derelict comer of Essex, is a French garden of two acres, largely worked by Frenchmen. There have been published from time to time in this journal accounts of the gross returns of French gardens in Paris, in Evesham, and iii Berkshire. These returns havo varied from £500 to £620 per acre. The Essex garden, though built on as tough a clay soil as ever England can produce, begins to put these figures "in tho shade," huge as they arc; and the method of cultivation is cheaper. Up to this month the garden has produced since January £500 per acre—£looo to tho two acres—and it has still a. long period of cropping beforo it. Mr. Joseph Fels and Mr. Smith, his chief agent, expect an addition of from £200 to £300 to the returns during (lie year. That is to say,;that hind, lately almost derelict and of the most stubborn nature, is capable,of producing, after less than two years' . treatment., up to £800 worth of stuff per acre per year.' This is not the end of the marvel. Alongside tho French garden is a strip of open garden on which no frames and no cloches havo been put* It has not been manured in any exceptional degree or at great cost; but off this open strip crops to tho value of over £200 per acre have been taken merely by following common-sense rules of claw and intensive cultivation. On tlio French garden the melon harvest was at its height, and on .tho beds an admirable example of tlio methods of close cultivation was in evidence. The frames had been lifted and tho hugo melons were lying on tlio open lieds in tlio sun, ready to bo picked. In a few clays those will bo cleared, and as you looked closer you saw vegetables already growing up strong among tho stalks of the melons. The crops are cut successively, but grow concurrently.

Close by a new device of extreme ingenuity was to Iw seen. There is a period in winter when the lights on the frames arc not used, and in most gardens aro slacked in idle heaps. The idea is repugnant to tho new market gardener, and lie lias at last found a means; of continuous use for the glass. A skeleton grcenhouso had been erected, for the moment a mere framework of upright and slanting posts, standing over chrysanthemums and late tomatoes. But the framework is so, designed that the lights covering tho framed in tho Trench garden fit it exactly, and a Wrning's work converts the skeletons into a perfect greenhouse, with shuttered walls and Ji glass roof. The glass is put on just at th<j moment when thoro is risk of frost to the chrysanthemums, and tlio crops are sold off juk before the lights are again wanted in thel garden. In all this Essex garden less manure was used than in other English gardens, and only for the melons is great heat required. The cost of the frames, lift by 4ft sin, was 325.