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tural class in every part of the country. In 1841 there were only twenty-three of these bodies in existence, and at the halfyearly meeting in May, 1844, it was stated that the number was not less than one hundred. A very judicious arrangement has been made relative to the prizes distributed at the local meetings, which are now given for operations in husbandry only, the premiums for stock being furnished by the local association. The society is establishing an agricultural museum in Dublin for the reception of

The Yorkshire Agricultural Society holds its annual show in the different towns of that county in rotation, a plan which is very successful in rendering them attractive. Farmers' clubs have also recently become more numerous. They are eminently practical; but the local results which they collect and discuss may become applicable to other parts of the country placed under similar circumstances of aspect, soil, and situation. It would stimulate the exertions of these clubs, if a department of the Journal of the Royal Agricultural Society' were re-implements of husbandry, seeds, grasses, served for some of the best papers read at their meetings. The annual report of every farmers' club should be transmitted to the secretary of the Royal Agricultural Society; and the title at least of all papers read at the meetings during the year should be given in the 'Journal.'

The agriculture of Scotland has been largely indebted to the societies which have been established at different periods for its improvement. A 'Society of Improvers in the Knowledge of Agriculture in Scotland' was established in 1723, and some of its Transactions were published. The society becoming extinct was succeeded by another in 1755; and the society which now stands in the same relation to Scotland as the Royal Agricultural Society to England was established in 1784. It is entitled the Highland and Agricultural Society of Scotland.' The constitution and proceedings of the society are as nearly as possible similar to the English society. The society publishes quarterly a very excellent Journal of its Transactions, which has at present a circulation of 2300. The Agricultural Museum at Edinburgh was assisted in 1844 by a parliamentary grant of 5000l.

In 1840 the Royal Agricultural Improvement Society of Ireland' was established on the plan of the Royal Agricultural Society of England; and in May, 1844, the number of subscribers was 581. The society already possesses funded property to the amount of 48591. Since its establishment great progress has been made in the formation of local societies in communication with the central society, which is the best means of ensuring the support and co-operation of the agricul

&c.; it circulates practical information connected with husbandry by means of cheap publications; and one of its objects is the organization of an agricultural college.

In England there are no institutions of a public nature which combine scientific with practical instruction in agriculture. The advantage of establishing such an institution was suggested by the poet Cowley; and in 1799 Marshall published Proposals for a Royal Institute or College of Agriculture and other branches of Rural Economy.' There is the Sibthorpian Professorship of Rural Economy in the University of Oxford; at the University of Edinburgh, a Professorship of agriculture; and at the University of Aberdeen there are lectures on agriculture. The botanical, geological, and chemical professorships and lectures in the different universities are, to a certain extent, auxiliary to the science of agriculture. In the absence of such establishments as the one at Grignon, in France, young men are sent as pupils to farmers in the counties where the best system of agriculture is practised, especially Norfolk, Lincolnshire, Northumberland, and the Lothians; but although this may be a good plan for obtaining practical knowledge, it is imperfect as regards the knowledge gained of the scientific principles of agriculture. The Earl of Ducie has established a model or example farm on his estate in Gloucestershire, where the scientific principles of agriculture are carried into operation; but this is very different from an institution which imparts a knowledge of these principles. In 1839 the late B. F. Duppa, Esq., published

a short pamphlet entitled Agricultural
Colleges, or Schools for the Sons of
Farmers,' which contains many useful
suggestions for the establishment of such
institutions. He laboured indefatigably
in the promotion of this object, and pro-
bably would have succeeded but for his
premature death.
It is not improbable,
indeed, that before long an agricultural
college will be established in England,
with an example-farm attached to it, as
the Cirencester Farmers' Club, under the
auspices of several noblemen and the
principal landowners of the district, have
issued proposals for such an institution;
and in May, 1844, the club announced by
advertisement their intention to apply for
a charter of incorporation; and also ad-
vertised for tenders of farms of from 300

to 600 acres.

land. (Committee of Council on Education, 1844.)

In Ireland the government affords direct encouragement to agricultural education through the instrumentality of the Board of National Education. The persons who are trained for the office of teachers in the national schools are required to attend the lectures of a professor of agricultural chemistry; and during a portion of the time occupied in preparing for their future duties they are placed at the model farm at Glassneven, where they are lodged, and where, during five mornings of the week, they attend lectures on the principles of agriculture; and an examination subsequently takes place. On the sixth morning they are taken over the farm, and the operations going forward are explained to them. The Board admits a certain number of in-door pupils for the term of at least two years, who pay 10l. a year for board, lodging, and education. They work on the farm, attend the lectures, and receive such instruction as qualifies them to fill the office of bailiffs. There is likewise a class of schoolmasters trained to conduct agricultural schools. It is intended to establish twenty-five agricultural model schools in different parts of the country. The Agricultural Seminary at Templemoyle, six miles from Londonderry, is one of the most successful experiments which has yet been made in the United Kingdom to establish an institution for agricultural education. It was founded by the North West of Ireland Society. The plan is in some degree taken from the institution established by M. Fellenberg, at Hofwyl, in Switzerland. In 1841 the house contained 70 young men, as many as it can accommodate and the farm afford instruction to; and there were 40 applications for admission. The size of the farm is 172 acres. An account of the institution and of the course of instruction will be found in the Minutes of the Committee of Council on Education,' p. 565, 8vo. ed.

Schools of industry, similar to the one established by the late Rev. W. L. Rham at Winkfield, and by the Earl of Lovelace at Ockley, may be made the medium of imparting an acquaintance with the principles of agriculture, which at present the labouring classes do not usually obtain. To Winkfield school there are attached about four acres of good land; and under the guidance of so accomplished an agriculturist as Mr. Rham the scholars enjoyed the advantage of pursuing all the details of the most skilful husbandry, and undergoing a course of training in garden and farm management of no ordinary excellence. On Mrs. Davies Gilbert's estate there is a school of manual labour, and the principle on which it is established might perhaps be made conducive on a large scale to the two objects of enabling the scholars to acquire the elements of learning and of fitting them by proper industrial training to become expert and industrious in field and garden work. At the school here spoken of the master is paid one penny per week for each boy; but the chief emolument of the master arises from the labour of the boys on the school land. Their time is divided into two portions, one part of which Such societies as the Scottish Agriculthe master devotes to their instruction tural Chemistry Association, established in reading, writing, &c., and in return at the close of 1843, are very well calcufor which they employ another por-lated to advance the progress of sciention of their time in cultivating his tific agriculture; and they can be es

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[86]

tablished in any district where a sufficient
number of subscribers can be obtained to
command the services of a competent
chemist. Associations of this nature
show how much can be done in this
country without any assistance from the
state. The object of the Scottish associa-
tion is the diffusion of existing informa-
tion, theoretical and practical, by means
of occasional expositions, addresses, and
correspondence; and secondly, the en-
largement of the present store of know-
ledge by experimental investigations of
practical agriculturists in the field and of
the chemist in the laboratory. Landed
proprietors who subscribe twenty shillings
yearly, and tenants who subscribe ten
shillings yearly, are entitled to have per-
formed analyses of soils, manures, &c.,
according to a scale fixed upon; and if
more than a certain number are required,
a charge of one-half above the scale is
made. Letters of advice, without an
analysis being required, are charged
2s. 6d., and at present the number which
each subscriber may write is not limited.
Every agricultural society subscribing
51. yearly to the funds of the Association
is entitled to one lecture from the chemist;
if 10l. to two lectures, &c. Counties
which subscribe 201. annually are entitled
to appoint a member of the Committee
of Management. The Society in question
has raised a fund sufficient to defray all
expenses for the ensuing four years. The
chemist of the association has his labora-
tory at Edinburgh, but he is to visit va-
rious parts of Scotland according to cer-
tain regulations.

In France there are schools assisted by the state, where young persons can obtain instruction in agriculture both practical and theoretical. The principal institution of this kind is that at Grignon, where one of the old royal palaces and the domain attached to it, consisting of 1185 acres of arable, pasture, wood, and marsh land, has been given up on certain conditions. The professors are paid by the government, and the pupils are of two grades, one paying 481. a year, and the other 361. For the purpose of imparting theoretical knowledge, courses of lectures are given on the following subjects:-1. The rational prin

ciples of husbandry, and on the manage-
ment of a farm. 2. The principles of
rural economy applied to the employment
of the capital and stock of the farm. 3.
4. The construction
The most approved methods of keeping
farming accounts.
of farm-buildings, roads, and implements
used in husbandry. 5. Vegetable phy-
siology and botany. 6. Horticulture. 7.
9. The laws re-
Forest science. 8. The general principles
of the veterinary art.
10. Geometry ap-
lating to property.
plied to the measurement and surveying
11. Geometrical drawing of
of land.
farming implements. 12. Physics as ap-
plied to agriculture. 13. Chemistry, as
applied to the analysis of soils, manures,
14. Certain general notions of mi-
15. Domestic
&c.
neralogy and geology.
medicine, applied to the uses of husband-
The practical part of the education
men.
is conducted on the following system:-
The pupils are instructed in succession in
all the different labours of the farm.
Some, for instance, under the direction of
the professor of the veterinary art, per-
form the operations required by the
casualties which are continually occurring
in a numerous stock of cattle. Others
are appointed to attend to the gardens,
and to the following departments: woods
and plantations; inspection of repairs
taking place on the premises; making of
starch, cheese, and other articles; the
A daily register
pharmaceutical department; book-keep-
ing and the accounts.
is kept of the amount of the manure ob-
tained from the cattle of every kind. A
pupil newly entered is appointed to act
with one of two years' standing; and at
the end of each week all are expected to
make a report, in the presence of their
comrades, of whatever has been done
during the week in their respective de-
partments. The professor, who presides
over the practical part of their education,
explains on the spot the proper manner of
executing the various field operations;
and he also gives his lectures on these
different processes at the time when they
are in actual progress. The professors
in each department render their courses
as practical as possible;-the professor of
botany by herborizations; the professor
of chemistry by geological excursions;

AGRICULTURE.

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the professor of mathematics, by exeeuting, on the plan he has pointed out, the survey and measurement of certain portions of land. After two years' training the theory and practice of rural economy, the pupils undergo an examination from the professors collectively, and, if satisfactory, a diploma is granted, which certifies to the capacity of the pupil for fulfilling the duties of what Agricultural Enmay be styled an gineer."

1200 acres.

66

Institutions designed for the improve-
ment of agriculture, and supported by the
state, have been established in most parts
of Germany. In Prussia there is a public
model farm and agricultural academy in
nearly every province. The most im-
portant of these institutions is the one at
Mögelin, in Brandenburg, about forty
miles from Berlin, which was founded by
the late king. Von Thaer was at one
period the director. The establishment
consists of a college and a model farm of
When visited by Mr. Jacob,
in 1820 (Agriculture, &c. of Germany'),
there were three professors, who resided
upon the premises: one for mathematics,
chemistry, and geology; one for the ve-
terinary art; and the third for botany
and the use of the various vegetable pro-
ductions in the Materia Medica, as well
as for entomology. Attached to the in-
stitution there was a botanic garden,
arranged on the Linnæan system; an
herbarium; a museum containing skele-
tons of domestic animals, models of agri-
cultural implements, specimens of soils,
&c. The various implements were made
in workshops upon the farm, and the
pupils were expected to acquire a general
notion of the modes of constructing them.
The sum paid by each pupil was very
high, not less than 80l. a year.

At Hohenheim, in the kingdom of
Wirtemberg, two leagues from Stuttgard,
an old palace has been appropriated as
an agricultural college. The quantity of
land attached to the institution is about
The pupils are of two
1000 acres.
grades, and those belonging to the su-
perior class pay for their board 150
florins, and for their instruction 300
florins a year, or altogether 371., and
extra expenses make the annual cost

about 50%. Natives of Wirtemberg are
admitted at a lower rate than the sub-
jects of other states. The higher class
of students do not, as at Grignon, take
part in the actual labours of husbandry,
but the means of theoretical instruction
are very complete. Lectures are deli-
vered by twelve professors on the follow-
ing subjects:-Mathematics and physics,
chemistry and botany, technology, tillage
and other departments of rural economy,
forestry, and the veterinary art. The
lectures are so arranged that they can be
either attended in two half-years or three
or four. In the former case much pre-
liminary information must have been
acquired. There is attached to the insti-
seum of zoological, botanical, and mine-
tution a small botanical garden; a mu-
ralogical objects; skeletons of domestic
animals; collections of seeds and woods;
and a library of works on rural economy.
The establishment also comprises a ma-
nufactory of beet-root sugar, a brewery,
a distillery of potato-spirit, and there is
an apartment devoted to the rearing of
silkworms. A part of the farm is re-
served for experiments. The second
class of students do the manual labour,
but they are nearly maintained at the
expense of the institution, and, when they
can be spared from field-labour, they
have the opportunity of attending the
lectures at the college.

In Bavaria the king has given up the
domain attached to the royal palace of
Schleissheim for the purposes of a model
farm; but a great mistake has been made
in selecting land much below the average
standard of fertility, which, as well as
land of extraordinary productiveness,
should be avoided. It is on a much in-
henheim. In 1840 there were twenty-
ferior scale to the establishment at Ho-
one scholars who paid about 154. a year,
latter are merely field-labourers; and
and eleven who paid about 61.
those who belong to the upper class are
of about. the same grade as the second
class at Hohenheim.

The

There are agricultural institutions supported by the state at Vienna, Prague, Pesth, and various other places in the south-east of Europe. (On public Institutions for the Advancement of Agricul