His system of husbandry found very few followers at first, and those who adopted it were in many cases obliged to return to the old methods, for want of the necessary mechanical instruments for following his directions; but it has been more recently revived, mechanical skill making it practicable and comparatively easy of application, while thorough drainage, trenching, and subsoil ploughing have gained the assent of most intelligent farmers. Even his drilling system for wheat and other grain crops has been extensively adopted in Great Britain, and is fast gaining favor. After Tull, we find little progress in agricultural literature till toward the close of the last century. The chief gain in the art in the intermediate time was occasioned by an active competition in cattle breeding by Bake well and others in England, which led to the most important practical results. Arthur Young, to whom perhaps the world is more indebted for the spread of agricultural knowledge than to any other man, was born in 1741, and died in 1820. His journeys to obtain information on agricultural subjects, and his writings, had a powerful influence in creating a love for agricultural pursuits among the learned.

His searching inquiries and experiments on different soils, to ascertain the real causes of fertility (1783 - '6), laid the foundation at least for more exact researches into the principles of fertility afterward. He first established the fact that common salt is a valuable manure, though it had been recommended before his day. Previous to his time ammonia was thought to be injurious to vegetation, and natural philosophers had asserted that the food of plants was contained in acids. Young tried it in very many cases, and always with great success. He made experiments to learn the effect of the sun's rays on the soil, and came to the conclusion "that covering the soil is beneficial to it."

Hence we may infer the error of the ancient practice of summer fallowing, which left the ground wholly unoccupied with crops every second or third year; a practice which continued in England down to a comparatively recent period, and even now prevails in many parts of Europe. He found that nitrogenous manures increased the power of plants to avail themselves of mineral manures, thus showing the advantage of a proper use of both classes, a conclusion whose truth has been still more recently established by Lawes and others. He also tried the effect of different gases on vegetation. In 1786 he says: "To imagine that we are ever to see agriculture rest on a scientific basis, regulated by just and accurately drawn principles, without the chemical qualities of soils and manures being well understood, is a childish and ignorant supposition." Such were some of the efforts of Arthur Young; they may be found embodied in the "Annals of Agriculture," and other useful treatises. But one of the first systematic works on the subject, which can be said to have really advanced the art of agriculture, was the " Practical Agriculture, or Complete System of Modern Husbandry," by R. W. Dickson (1805), which Thaer, who had it translated and published in Berlin in 1807, calls the first truly scientific work of the English, not even excepting Young's writings.

Dickson's chief merit, however, is his excellent collection of the many valuable experiments and statements of distinguished members of the board of agriculture, and other farmers. In the period embracing the close of the last century and the beginning of the present, we find many important additions to the literature of agriculture. Such are the works of Marshall; the admirable works of Young already alluded to; Elkington's "Mode of Draining Land," described by Johnstone; " Davison's Phytolo-gy," " Modern Agriculture," and " Synopsis of Husbandry," by Donaldson; the "Gentleman Farmer," by Lord Kames; "Anderson's Essays"; the " Communications to the Board of Agriculture," and numerous agricultural reports. " The Experienced Farmer " and many others might be mentioned, all of which contributed more or less to awaken the spirit of inquiry and improvement which has eminently characterized English agriculture for the last 50 years, and made it a model for the rest of the world. Nor has the agriculture of Scotland felt the influence of the spirit of progress in a less degree. In 1768 Lord Kames, in the " Gentleman Farmer," very forcibly described its imperfect condition at that time.

He says: " Our draught horses are miserable creatures, without strength or mettle; our oxen scarcely able to support their own weight, and two going in a plough, led on by two horses; the ridges in the fields high and broad, in fact, enormous masses of accumulated earth, that could not admit of cross ploughing or cultivation; shallow ploughing universal; ribbing, I by which half the land was left unfilled, a general practice over the greater part of Scotland; a continual struggle between corn and weeds for superiority; the roller almost unknown; no harrowing before sowing, and the seed sown into rough, uneven ground, where the half of it was buried; no branch of husbandry less understood than manure; potatoes generally planted in lazy beds; swine but little attended to; and very few farms in Scotland proportioned to the skill and ability of the tenant!" "What a contrast," exclaims Sir John Sinclair, 40 years after, " to the present state of Scotch husbandry; and it is singular that, with hardly an exception, these imperfections have been removed.

Had it not come from so high an authority, it is hardly possible to credit, that within the memory of so many persons now living our agriculture could have been so miserably deficient as it seems to have been at that time." But in the course of these 40 years the Scotch farmers had acquired a habit of reading, and agricultural books were extensively distributed among them. Besides this, many of them visited other countries for the purpose of obtaining information, and observed the improved practices prevailing there, to return and introduce them at home. Sir John Sinclair was born in 1754, and died at Edinburgh in 1835. His writings were numerous and important. Hartlib, a century and a half before, and more recently Lord Kames in the " Gentleman Farmer," had pointed out the utility of a board of agriculture, but it was left to the zeal and untiring effort of Sir John Sinclair to call into life that valuable auxiliary to agricultural progress, and the board was created in 1793. To its establishment, more than to any other movement of that day, England is indebted for the present high and prosperous state of her agriculture.