cheaper rate than they could be produced at home. Were there no corn imported, it is certain that the price of bread would be greater than it is now, even if the grain harvests had been better than they have been for some years past. A bad cereal harvest in England raises the price of flour, but only to a small and strictly limited extent, because, practically, there is no limit to the amount of bread-stuffs procurable from abroad. When, on the contrary, the turnip crop fails, or that excessive drought greatly curtails the yield of grass, the price of meat and butter increases greatly, and is but slightly modified by the importation of foreign stock.

Hitherto the difficulty of transit has been so great that we have only derived supplies of live stock from countries situated at a short distance, such as Holstein and Holland. Vast herds of cattle are fed with but little expense in America, and myriads of sheep are maintained cheaply in Australia; but the immense distances which intervene between our country and those remote and sparsely populated regions have, hitherto, prevented the superabundant supply of animal food produced therein from being available to the teeming population of the British Isles. Should, however, any cheap mode of conveying live stock, or even their flesh, from those and similarly circumstanced countries be devised, it might render the production of meat in Britain a far less profitable occupation than it is now. That we are increasing the area from whence we draw our supplies of live stock is evident from the fact, that within the last two years enormous numbers of horned stock have been imported from Spain. In that extensive country there are noble breeds of the ox; and it would appear that very large numbers of animals could be annually exported, without depriving the inhabitants of a due supply of bovine meat. As Spain is not very distant, it is likely that this traffic will be increased, and that in a short time we shall be as well supplied with Spanish beef as we are now provided with French flour. Meat is at present dear, and is likely to continue so for some time; but still it is evident that, sooner or later, the British feeders will come into keen competition with the foreign producer of meat, and that the price of their commodity will consequently fall. The mere probability of such a state of things, were there no other reason, should induce the feeder to devote increased attention to the improvement of his stock, and to discover more economical methods of feeding them. There is still much to be learned relative to the precise nutritive values of the various feeding stuffs. The proper modes of cooking, or otherwise preparing, food, are still to be satisfactorily determined; and there are many very important questions in relation to the breeding of stock yet unanswered.

It is but fair to admit that the farmer is earnestly endeavouring to improve his art, and that he is willing, nay anxious, to obtain the co-operation of scientific men, in order to increase his knowledge of the theory as well as the practice of his ancient calling. Indeed, he not only admits the utility of science in agriculture, but often places an undue degree of value upon the theories of the chemist, of the botanist, and of the geologist. This is encouraging to the men of science; but, on the other hand, they must admit that by far the greater portion of the sum of human knowledge has been derived from the experience and observation of men utterly unacquainted with science, in the ordinary signification of that term. This portion of our knowledge is also, in its practical application, the most valuable. In the most important branch of industry—agriculture—the labors of the purely scientific man have as yet borne but scant fruit; whilst the unaided efforts of the husbandman have reclaimed from sterility extensive tracts, and caused them to "blossom as the rose." That practical men should have done so much, and scientific men so little, for agriculture, may easily be explained. Countless millions of men, during many thousands of years, have incessantly been occupied in improving the processes of mechanical agriculture, which, as an art, has consequently been brought to a high degree of perfection: but scientific agriculture is a creation of almost our own time, and the number of its cultivators is, and always has been, very small; all its theories cannot, therefore, justly claim that degree of confidence which, as a rule, is only reposed in the opinions founded on the experience of practical workers in the field and in the feeding-house. Still, the farmer has derived a great amount of useful information from the chemist and physiologist; and they alone can explain to him the causes of the various phenomena which the different branches of his art present. There was a time when it was the fashion of the man of science to look down with contempt, from the lofty pedestal on which he placed himself, upon the lessons of practical experience read to him by the cultivator of the soil; whilst at the same time the farmer treated as foolish visionaries those who applied the teachings of science to the improvement of their art. But this time has happily passed away. The scientific man no longer despises the knowledge of the mere farmers, but turns to good account the information derivable from their experience; whilst the farmer, on the other side, has ceased to speak in contemptuous terms of mere "book learning." It is to this happy combination of the theorist with the practical man that the recent remarkable advance in agriculture is chiefly due; and to it we may confidently look for improvement in the economic production of meat and butter, and for the enlargement of our knowledge of the relative value of food substances.