INTRODUCTION.

IT cannot fail to excite a considerable degree of astonishment, that the noble and useful science of Agriculture, to which we owe not only many of the comforts and conveniences of life, but

even the means of existence, should so lone have

oO remained neglected, and almost despised; while every other art and science, from the liberal en- couragement and support they have received, seem to have gone on in a steady and rapid step towards perfection*. But the period of indiffer- ence and neglect 1s| at length to have arrived, in which we shall no

xassed, and the time seems

longer have occasion to lament the slow progress that has hitherto been made in this invaluable branch of science. Happily for the country in general, and for the agricultural part of the com- unity in particular, such a spirit for the im- provement and advancement of husbandry has

*« The land constitutes by far the greatest, the most ‘* important, and the most durable, part of the wealth of

** every extensive country.‘The poor cannot be so much

a

* distressed by any rise in the price of poultry, fish, wild ‘** fowl, or venison, as they must be relieved by the fall of S* potatoes.”’—Smith’s Wealth of Nations.

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