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The farming industry—Technical education for
farmers— An agricultural department a necessity—State of
farming in Australia—Slovenly methods—New products—
Necessity for experiment—Village settlement—Water
conservation—Futility of a protective policy.
There is in the Australian colonies, alas ! another
branch of national industry, more ancient and honourable even than that
of mining, and which is even more in need of the wise help of
well-wishers, and the sympathy of friendly counsellors. We read and hear
of much being done for the mining interest, and no one grudges all that
is being done to elevate this most important industry to a position
commensurate with its deserts. But what about the patient farmer and
toiling husbandman ? What is being done by our universities, our
governments, our politicians, to help forward the grand old primal
industry, and to accentuate the homely old aspiration of "Speed the
plough"? Trades unions and guilds exist in plenty, by the laudable
efforts of which the position of the artisan has been much ameliorated.
Organizations exist, by which the class interests of special sections of
the community are jealously guarded, and their rights and privileges
conserved. But why is it we hear so much in New South Wales, at least,
of the poverty of the farmer; of the disabilities and drawbacks under
which tillage labours; of the disinclination which undoubtedly exists
among young Australians to take to the plough and become cultivators of
the soil?
Is it that
farmers are more divided, less intelligent, more indifferent and less
energetic than the artisan and the miner? Surely, for
the very honour's sake of the sower and reaper, we
cannot say that.
Is it that
the climate is too rigorous, our soil too poor, and
our returns too scanty, our expenses too excessive,
our fiscal policy too unaccommodating, our markets too
limited, or our rulers too antagonistic and
unsympathetic, that agricultural pursuits seem to
languish? Some of all of these causes' are assigned by
various authorities ; but whatever be the reason, it
seems to be the common opinion that farming in
Australia, as it is understood in the old country, does not pay. It is
an undoubted fact that among the masses in general,
much apathy and ignorance does exist on this most
vital subject, the progress of our agricultural
industry.
Now surely
it will not be denied that farming is of equal
importance to mining. It is certainly capable of more
widespread application. It gives employment to more
inhabitants in the State. It is, in fact, the industry
par excellcnce which forms the basis and foundation of
all others. All other implements, where usefulness is
concerned, must yield the place of honour to the
ploughshare. And yet is it not a notorious fact that
the practice and science of tillage is sadly neglected
in Australia generally ? Instances of wasteful and
ignorant farming are not confined to New South Wales.
They are common enough even in New Zealand.
Surely if a school of mines is a necessity, a school
of agriculture is not less so. (I merely select mining
for the purpose of a comparison, and not with the
intention of undervaluing its great importance). Yet certainly if
lectures on metallurgy and mineralogy are valuable,
instruction by practical experts in the chemistry of
soils, the laws and phenomena of growth, the relations
of climatic influences to varieties of products, and
the experimental introduction of new plants, new processes,
and new adaptations of natural and mechanical
forces to the art and practice of cultivation, whether
in field or garden, are of equal importance and
desirability.
The plain
fact is, I take it, that from a broad national point
of view, the vast importance of farming, whether
pastoral or agricultural, has been much
under-estimated, if not altogether overlooked. Mining
speculations, commercial undertakings, engineering works, explorations,
politics and polemics have all loomed largely in the
public eye ; but the work of the silent ploughshare,
of the meditative, unobtrusive husbandman, has
attracted little notice, either from the honest
patriot or the scheming self-seeker. Farmers have been
too widely scattered (one of the direct results, in
New South Wales, at least, of indiscriminate selection
before survey), and have been too disunited, to make
them attractive-enough material for the blandishments
of the professional demagogue ; but the inevitable
Nemesis which follows a disregard of Nature's laws is
now forcing the question of agriculture to the front.
Farmers' unions, too, have been established of late
years; and the farmer is now becoming an object of
more interest to certain classes, who see in him a
convenient peg on which to hang a pet nostrum, or a
handy hack on which to ride some cherished hobby.
For myself
personally, I can claim to have been a persistent and
consistent advocate of the importance of our agricultural interests
ever since X cast in my lot for good in this the land
of my adoption. By writings, by lectures, by
experiments, by distributing seeds and plants, by every influence I
could command, I have never lost an opportunity
of trying to rouse public attention to the vital
importance of this much-neglected branch of our
national industries. I have been a humble coworker with some of the
brightest and noblest spirits in the colonies ; but
the most brilliant individual efforts are, after all,
apt to get lost in the immensity of conflicting
interests which agitate young and expanding
communities such as these. The time has come when a
Department of Agriculture should form part of our administrative
machinery. A Minister of Agriculture is a
necessity for New South Wales no less than for New
Zealand. If Victoria, South Australia, India, Canada,
to say nothing of such countries as France, Germany, and other
continental states, including even little Denmark, have found it a wise
provision, surely the necessity is even greater for an imperfectly
developed country like New South Wales ? Experimental farms and schools
of farming are badly wanted, and must be founded, if we are to keep pace
with the achievements of other communities, utilize to the full our
splendid possibilities, and hold our own in the march of material and
mental progress.
I have already
spoken of the wasteful methods in vogue with the New
Zealand farmer; as, for instance, in the disposition of
straw, neglect of manure, disregard of draining, and so on
; but a much more serious matter is the exhaustion of
the land in many of the earlier settled districts.
Continuous cropping without rotation or rest has worked
its usual result in Otago, Canterbury, and Southland, as
in County Cumberland in New South Wales, and in other
parts of Australia. The rotation of crops is part of the
alphabet of agriculture; but it would seem as if
Australian farmers were really, in some respects, ignorant
of their first letters. Or is it that they are too lazy,
or too greedy? "Soft words butter no parsnips!"
Anyway, I believe soft soap is a poor salve. "Faithful are
the wounds of a friend, but the kisses of an enemy are
deceitful." It is the veriest folly to imagine that any
soil, even the richest, can be cropped year after year
with the same crop, and not become impoverished. Wheat,
for instance, takes a certain set of constituents
from the soil. These must be given back in the form of
manure, or the land inevitably becomes less able to grow
wheat. Disease is at once a consequence and an evidence of
insufficient nourishment. Hence many common crop diseases are
Nature's protest against a direct infringement of
hg'r laws. It is probable that if lands round Camden, we
will say, had been well-manured, or if farming by rotation
had been practised, rust might never have put in an
appearance in County Cumberland. Now, in the earlier
times, wheat seemed to be the ultimate limit beyond
which the mind of the farmer never rose. Even now
the bucolic mind is desperately conservative, and it seems
hard to make the ordinary farmer understand that if wheat
will not pay, something else might. Instead of resolutely
tackling the problem of experimenting, of availing himself
of all the modern discoveries and improvements in the
art and practice of agriculture, he too often gets
led away by some irresponsible will-o'-the-wisp, in the
shape of some glib-tongued theorist, who seeks a remedy
for short crops and poor prices in such cabala as
reciprocity, free-trade, protection, reduction of railway rates, and so on.
There is a
certain text in an old-fashioned book which will persist
in forcing itself on my memory when I hear the plausible
specifics of such Sangra- dos. It is one of those proverbs
which the scribes of Hezekiah copied out, and it is well
worthy the attention of every farmer. It is a promise and
a warning, which is peculiarly applicable to Australian
farmers in the present juncture. It is this: "He that
tilleth his land shall have plenty of bread; but he that
followeth after vain persons shall have poverty enough."
When coffee in
Ceylon was blasted by the blight which ruined more than
half the planters, and nearly wrecked the prosperity of
the island, what has been the result ? It was seen how
dangerous it was to rely on any one staple; how
important not to have all the eggs of national prosperity
in one basket. Now Ceylon is entering on a new and
extended lease of renewed vigour and prosperity. Tea,
cinchona, india-rubber, cocoa, and other products are
yielding splendid returns, and much of this resuscitated
life and reawakened enterprise is due to the experimental
gardens, and the work which has been done by planters and
others in acclimatizing new plants and trying new
products.
So, too, with
Mauritius. The over-production of sugar, with the
consequent collapse of the sugar market, brought the
staple industry of Mauritius to the verge of extinction ;
but now it is found that coffee, the aloe, china-grass,
fibres, and other products can be successfully grown ; and
it is certain that good, and not evil, will be the
ultimate issue of present perplexities.
Surely such
lessons are plain enough for us to learn them here.
All the schools
and lectures and experiments in the world will not furnish
the farmer with moral attributes. They will not provide
him with thrift, energy, intelligence, industry ; but if
in the possession of these, they will help him to use them to the
best advantage, and I think it is in this way we
can secure the most practical protection to the pristine
profession, and give the most living impetus to the great
agricultural industry.
Doubtless there
are many drawbacks attendant on farming in Australia and
New Zealand, such as want of capital, dearness and
scarcity of labour, which act as a handicap on the
struggling husbandman at the antipodes, but there are none the less
grave grounds for reproach, and plenty of opportunities for candid
self-examination and reform- Both in New Zealand and
Australia, I have frequently observed with pain and regret the
slovenliness and wastefulness of the methods employed by
farmers in the ordinary work of the farm. There is
frequently, too, the smug self-satisfaction of the
incurably self-conceited egotist. Many ignorant
dunderheads are too self-complacent to take a wrinkletoo
hopelessly obtuse to act on a hint; too slavishly wedded
to antiquated custom to profit by the experience of
others.
To give an
instance: I once remonstrated with one man for burning the
stalks of his maize crop. I informed him they were
nutritive, contained much saccharine matter, could be
chopped up and mixed with chaff and straw, and when
moistened, and a little salt added, made an excellent
fodder, and were so used by the Germans and by the
cultivators of India. The old farmer only insulted
me for my well-meaning bit of information ; but a young
neighbour of his took the hint, and it has resulted in a
very considerable addition to his income.
Wherever any
farmer has resolutely set himself to discard old,
antiquated notions, and gone in for modern farming,
availing himself of the use of modern labour-saving
machinery, and growing such crops as were most readily
saleable, growing them, too, on a scale large enough to
enable him to concentrate work and expenditure, the result
has, in every case I have observed, been a triumphant vindication of
science over rule of thumb, and such men, though they may
grumble at lots of things, do not blame either the soil,
the climate, or the country.
If we in New
South Wales can buy potatoes, wheat—nay, even cabbages,
cheaper from Victorian, New Zealand, and South Australian farmers,
the natural course is to buy them, and let our own
farmers turn their attention to something that will pay
better. And so it is I advocate the establishment of experimental farms,
and a department of agriculture as an imperative
necessity, to say nothing of the beneficence of such a
policy. There are drugs, dyes, fibres, fruits, oil-seeds,
vegetables, timbers, barks, piths, nuts, roots, even
mosses, weeds and fungi, with multitudes of valuable
fodder plants, which are eminently suitable to our soil,
adapted to our climate, and congenial in every way
to all our conditions. It is in introducing these, in
making these known that our experimental farms would be so
beneficial. In no other way that I can see would so much
national good be done at so little cost, Methinks that in
this direction even the most bigoted protectionist, and the
mOst utilitarian free-trader might work hand in
hand.
Another feature
of New Zealand rural life which struck me was the
frequency of villages—the nearness of neighbours—in a
word, settlement in communities, as contrasted with the
isolated, detached way in which habitations are found set
down at wide, weary intervals, in most of the
country districts of New South Wales. Indeed, village
life, such as we know it in the old country, or as it is
found in many parts of New Zealand, is scarcely known in
our older colony. The evils of indiscriminate,
unrestricted selection—the Ishmaelitish, nomadic
proclivities of the roving land-grabber of the old regime
are, alas! "twice-told tales" in New South Wales;
but in New Zealand, especially in Otago, a more human and
humane system had evidently been followed from the first. As a consequence,
farms and fields were neatly fenced and divided. Village churches were
numerous ; common centres round which clustered the neat homes of village
tradesmen and traders. Farm-houses were trim and neat, and adorned with
gardens and orchards much more than is common in Australia. Waste places
were fewer, roads were more numerous and better kept, and, in fact, rural
settlement was more forward ; and notwithstanding a widespread depression
commercially, consequent on continued bad seasons and low prices for
produce, the people looked healthy, happy, and contented, and I saw nothing
to indicate any absence of the material comforts, and even the common
luxuries of life.
For many years I
have advocated that a trial should be given in Australia
to oil crops. Some time ago I contributed articles to
various journals on the subject, and made special
reference to it in my last published volume,3 and it was
gratifying to find instances during my tour that proved my
ideas were not chimerical. I found, for example, a
few progressive farmers turning their attention to linseed
as a crop. I have on record the results of several of
these trials. I find that even with a yield of half the
number of bushels of linseed to the acre as compared with
wheat, the oil seed crop pays better than the cereal. An
average price of 5s. 6d. per bushel is procurable in Dunedin all the year
round for linseed, and I am convinced that rape seed, mustard seed, sesamum,
gingelly, castor and other such crops would be more suitable to our climate
and pay our farmers better.
Much might be
written on this subject, but the space at my disposal is
limited. New Zealand is so bountifully endowed with that
merciful gift of heaven—water—that she has an undeniable
superiority over us in this drought-infested colony
of New South Wales; but this is 'only another argument to
strengthen my contention that we do not utilize our gifts
to the full as we might.
Water
conservation might well go hand in hand with the
experimental work of an agricultural department. As an
instance of what private enterprise can accomplish, I may
mention that in the far west now, I am privileged to be a
coworker with a public-spirited and wealthy land owner,
and on rich soil, such as we have for countless leagues on our great
western plains, he is now irrigating and preparing land
for sowing with tropical crops, and the result may be the
introduction of several new and remunerative industries.
With irrigation,
a plentiful supply of agricultural labour, intelligent experiment and
collation of facts and dissemination of information under
a well-organized and active agricultural department,
a liberal land system, which will seek to minimize
harassing restrictions and exactions, and give fixity of tenure with
compensation for all improvements by which the value of the land would be
permanently enhanced, such as dams, tanks, wells,
&c.—the lot of the farmer in New South Wales might be
enormously advantaged, and it is in this direction that
the friends of the farmer must work, and the hare-brained
twaddle we hear about a protective policy for the farmer, which would tax
him heavily on every implement of husbandry for the
benefit of an insignificant section of weak-kneed
manufacturers, which would seek to force him into a
continuance of his present unequal fight with Nature, in
which he vainly tries to grow products for which his soil
and climate are not so well adapted as those of his
competitors in more favoured neighbourhoods, and which, in
a word, seeks to sap his energies, rouse his worst
passions, inflame his discontent, and make him less
self-reliant and enterprising, instead of encouraging him
to patient investigation and intelligent experiment.
All this irresponsible chatter, I repeat, by impracticable theorists
and hobbyists, all the protection conventions,
vain-glorious challenges to public debate, and organized
stumping of the country by fluent farmers' friends, who
perhaps don't know the difference between a plough and a
pickaxe, would not do one tithe the good that one
experimental farm would do. In fact, by distracting men's
attention from practical measures, and raising clouds of dust on
theoretical issues for purely personal political ends,
these self-dubbed saviours of the farming interest do
irremediable harm..They are only meditating. How long they will meditate
before they will act it is impossible to say.
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