The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1884-01-29 00:00:00

Berset (Nutt! Express.

DORC FLUTE R. JANUARY 296. 1564.

THE FARMERS' POSITION.

It dose not augur very bop,fully for the asTrire.teral
interest that a lan.llrd ohoul I have r •c •r.t'y remitted
a half-year's ret t to his gallants. This, It maser,
Lord llought on hos done ; and there is no reason
for thinking that the farmers on his estate are more
unfavourably situated than those in ther parts of
the country. Tee fact is that the prosperity of last
&vegan has been rather exagg .ratod. The skies were
fair ; the crops for the molt part were good ; but, as
It takes more than one ewal ow to make a summer,
so doe. it need more than one propitious season to
restore vitality ti a loug-depreesed interest like
farming. Six ysars of uninterrupted prooperity would
not be too long a patio I to bring thing. t the old
standard. Los of capital is a thing not qnlckly or
easily repaired. If the ft cud herds now existing
were compare 1 to thoes of seven year. ago,
an enormous folding-off would be seen. St..*
has been reduced to enable the former to
pay rent and the nurnerouo other demands
which are ma Is upon lals parse. fits substanos has
been weakened, while he has been battling vri.h the
storm, the c.onsequenot being that, oltia nigh he seems
now to have turned the corner, I. is as littl, able to
pay rent as whoa the gra attst pressure wee upin him.
Tome luallords wb cro 401:140)10 U nli:otend this ;
wise on s, like Lord IL not .n, .till see that the
present is a time ot need. roe coutin lance of foot-
end-month oisease I. now the obstacle to be battled
with ; ant we with we cull think that the
authorities had lotted meths for over-c nein.; the
difficulty. Whether animals should he imported
alive or dead, or, if alive, how long they
should he kept in queraatine ; whether restric-
tions should be placed upon Importation Iron
countries in which diseases has prevailed, or only at
11..,, when it actually exists; whether a check should
be imposed on the importations of all animals—these
and many other questions NOM to puzzle politicians of
both parties. Meanwhile farmers gaffer and con.
earners oleo, and the most extensive interest in the
country is kept in a continued stets of unrest and
doubt. It is well, of course, to direst the farmers'
attention to other Kinross of profit ; but agriculture
without cattle is deprived of one of its chief elements
of existent*, and it 110111,01 to uo that the prevention of
disease should be considered before the increase]
growth of fruit or the enlarged supply of jams. On a
healthy oondition of cows depends not only beef, but
that iodide which is daily growing In popular ei,teern,
milk. lii. now admitted that In milk we have wine-
thing which even the foreigner otanot interfere with.
Rican send us butter and obsess, and thus affect the
price of the English market. lie cannot, however, im-
port the raw material, and as the supreme ioapartanos
of the latter as an article of diet is now widely under-
stood, the former may feel ours of having something
to fall back upon If only disease can be kept away
from his herds. Mr. Chaplin is accused of taking a
one-eldsd view of the matter of importations; he Li,
moverthelese, doing good in keeping the subject well
before the public, and there is hope that, in spite of
certain Prothationist tendenois., be will in the end
succeed in Inducing the authorities to acknowledge
that mama moat be found for excluding cattle-disease
from the country. We have often said that the ordeal
farmers hays undergone, and are still undergoing,
would be by Its very nature protracted. A few
obstacle* may have been surmounted, but there are
more to subdue, and it I. the obvious duty of
Governmest to afford whatever relief is possible,
and not to leave a large and deserving class of the
community entirely to the action of fate.