Small farms

Author's Note

No attempt has been made to bring the scientific work done by Sir Albert Howard into relation with modern plant-breeding or modern soil science. Such great advances have been made in both directions since he left India that this would imply a survey of scientific achievement on these two topics such as would be out of place in the present book. My task has been limited to presenting his work as a human achievement complete on its own terms. I have throughout referred to him by the title under which he became so well known to the English-speaking world; the knighthood was actually conferred after the completion of his career in India.

L. E. H.
34 Earl's Road
Tunbridge Wells
Kent, England
1953

---

Acknowledgements

Acknowledgement is hereby made for permission to reprint many passages from Sir Albert Howard's writings: to the Government of India (from the Agricultural Journal of India, Wheat in India, and other official publications); to the International Labour Office, Geneva (from the International Labour Review); to the Oxford University Press (from The Waste Products of Agriculture, Crop Production in India, Indian Agriculture, The Application of Science to Crop Production); to Messrs. Faber and Faber (from Farming and Gardening for Health or Disease); to the Royal Society of Arts (from the Journal of the Royal Society of Arts). Other sources are acknowledged in the various notes.

Further, I wish to record my most grateful thanks to Mr. H. Martin-Leake, Sc.D. , formerly Director of Agriculture, United Provinces and sometime Principal, Imperial College of Tropical Agriculture, Trinidad, for his great care in reading the proofs of this book and for many suggestions; and to Mrs. V. M. Hamilton, for help in preparing the manuscript and for drawing up the index.

Quotations in the text are throughout drawn from books and papers by Sir Albert and Gabrielle Howard; the bibliographies at the end of each chapter are built up from the same sources.

L. E. H.

---

Glossary

zamindar = an Indian landholder
ryot = an Indian peasant
rabi crops = cold weather crops
maund = 82. 28 lb.
seer = 2 lb.

---

'The agriculturist is the servant of the plant.'
-- Gabrielle Howard

---

Contents

Author's Note
Acknowledgements
Glossary
Introduction
1. Career and Work in India
2. The Work on Wheat
3. Soil Aeration and Irrigation
4. Various Crops and Various Problems
5. The Problem of Disease
6. The Work on the Indore Process
7. Relations with Cultivators and the Treatment of Labour
8. The Position of the Scientist
Final Remarks

Next: Introduction

Back to Small Farms Library index

---