The story of the Agricultural Club, 1918-1921

Front matter

by the

ONTARIO LEGISLATIVE

LIBRARY

Prefatory Note

Foreword by Lord Bledisloe

chap.

I Historical .

II Personal .....

III The Pursuit of Ideals

IV Practical Farming

V Agricultural Economics VI A Business Proposition VII The Educationalist VIII Agrarian Politics IX Nationalisation of the Land X Ownership and Tenancy XI The Cottage ....

XII The Worker's Share in Agriculture

XIII The Sons of Toil

XIV Rural Psychology

XV The Foreigner ....

XVI The Future of the Village XVII Conclusion .....

Appendix. List of Members of the Club Index .......

v page ix

xiii

X

9 16

99 no

134 146

176 189 196 199 203

ILLUSTRATIONS

Sir Henry Rew, K.C.B., President . to face page i

H. Padwick, C.B.E., Vice-President ..,,,, 80

George Dallas, Vice-President . . „ „ 144 vu

Piper, sit thee down and write In a book that all may read " —

So he vanished from my sight : And I plucked a hollow reed,

And I made a rural pen.

Blake.

Vlll

PREFATORY NOTE

It is with some hesitation that I have compiled this chronicle. When circumstances brought the career of the Agricultural Club to a close, a desire was expressed by some of its members that the papers and addresses submitted to the Club should be put on permanent record. A few of them have been published in different quarters — mainly in the Journal of the Ministry of Agriculture — but the majority were circulated only to members of the Club and were not accessible to the public. One or two indeed never attained even this degree of permanence, but were condensed into a typewritten summary. A complete collection was therefore impossible. Even had it been possible there would still have been difficulty. Some of the addresses were prepared mainly to stimulate discussion, and their authors would not wish them to be regarded as embodying their considered opinions, while others were of passing interest which was not likely to be re-awakened at this time.

Being in doubt I consulted the members of the Club — with the usual result. To compare small things with great, I was in like case with John Bunyan —

" Some said let them live : some let them die."

The former were in a large majority, but minorities, even if they " must suffer," have nevertheless some claim to consideration. Eventually, of course, I compromised. I decided to select from the disjecta membra a sufficient number of fragments

ix x PREFATORY NOTE.

to make a more or less coherent story which should give a fair representation of the general spirit of the discussions and convey, so far as might be done in cold print, a sense of the atmosphere of the Club. Now that I read the story I find that it has not developed exactly as I intended when I began it —

" When at the first I took my pen in hand Thus for to write I did not understand That I at all should make a little book In such a mode."

One obvious and unintended defect is that the opinions of the story-teller have intruded unduly into the Story. This is inexcusable, but it can now only be brazened out. It may testify to the stimulating effect of the discussions.

An apology is due, in advance, to those whose utterances have been quoted. I am conscious that in many cases the extracts given from papers read give an inadequate idea of their merits, while the brief notes of discussions — which in the absence of a shorthand writer were all that were available — do much less than justice to the speeches, which in many cases were reasoned and balanced arguments, frequently reaching a high dialectical level. It is but fair to add that the existence of any record of the discussions is due to the assiduity of the Honorary Secretaries of the Club — Captain Page Roberts and Mr. S. A. Smith — both of whom were very successful in making summaries of the proceedings.

But whatever may be its deficiencies, I make no apology for giving the Story to the world. Lord Bledisloe in his sympathetic " Foreword " speaks of it as an " inspiring record," and I venture to think that this is a true description. No one is better qualified than he to speak of the proceedings at the Club, for very few, if any, of the members were more regular in their attendance at the meetings. The record

PREFATORY NOTE. xi

is an inspiration because within its limits it proves that all concerned in the welfare of Agriculture may not only meet in the spirit of comradeship but may unite in the furtherance of the objects which are so largely common to all.

For me the Club was a liberal education. My most indelible memory of it is the unfailing kindness and consideration which all the members at all times displayed towards their fortunate President.

R. H. R.

February, 1922.

Foreword

Right gladly do I comply with the request of the author that I contribute a Foreword to this inspiring record of an epoch-making and surprisingly successful social experiment.

Initiated by the author's own fertile brain, and guided by his tactful and sympathetic pilotage, the Agricultural Club during the four years of its all-too-short existence rendered a signal service, not merely to those who enjoyed the privilege of its membership, but indirectly to the whole rural community, which it would be difficult to over-estimate.

Arising out of the existence of the Agricultural Wages Board and the necessity for its members to assemble in London the night before its deliberations, it resulted in a frank interchange of opinion — often bluntly, but always kindly expressed — and a mutual respect and intimate friendliness between leading representatives of the three classes generally believed to be irreconcilably hostile in outlook and purpose, which would have surprised most armchair politicians who know little of the mentality of the true countryman, had they looked in upon our pleasant gatherings in the erstwhile studio of the great British artist Gainsborough — possibly the greatest, and certainly the most truthful of England's eminent portrait painters. On many a chilly winter's evening, illuminated and warmed by two great fire-places and the often unvarnished rhetoric and scathing sallies of bucolic orators of very varying political views and social experience, the owner of many broad acres, the tenant farmer of wide agricultural experience and renown, and the industrious and independent farm worker, living in and loving (as only an English agricultural worker can) his humble, creeper-clad cottage home, could have been seen filling their pipes from the same tobacco-pouch and enjoying each other's company in an unaffectedly congenial atmosphere. To me, as to many others, these gatherings were a monthly tonic and a

xiii xiv FOREWORD.

valuable education. All alike were ascripti glebce and felt that inspiration which present or past contact with our common alma mater, the English country-side, so potently evokes in the breasts of her own children. If the great defects of modern rural England are (as indeed they are) the prevalence of suspicion between classes and creeds, and a general lack of vocal expression of thought and aspiration, no one could suggest that such defects vitiated the atmosphere of the Agricultural Club. All listened with respect and generally with sympathy, if not with agreement, to conversational speeches, free from all conventional veneer and artificiality, which they felt to be candid and sincere, and prompted by the conviction that their translation into everyday experience would redound to the happiness, contentment and prosperity of the whole village community. Never have I heard the voice of the son of the soil ring truer than at these historic gatherings. The Press was unrepresented. The farmer, the land-owner and the worker alike spoke their true minds to one another fearlessly and honestly. Notably so the worker. What we always listened to was the authentic voice of rural labour, tinged oftentimes with a touch of true poetic sentiment which carried its earnest appeals straight to the heart of its audience.

The fact that this section (and may I without offence add, the most interesting, informing and attractive section of our Club) appeared to desire and unhesitatingly advocated the entire elimination, by the process of Nationalisation, of that branch of the agricultural Trinity to which I and several others belonged, in no degree affected our profound admiration of many of its representatives and of the talented genius which inspired the able and clear presentment of their case.

Many of those whose social environment differs profoundly from theirs, but who, as the outcome of these happy evenings, can now claim — and be proud to claim — comradeship with these men, must surely realise in face of the many and grave economic difficulties which menace (and threaten sometimes to overwhelm) our oldest and most essential industry, that greater mutual knowledge and the sympathy and confidence which flow from it will prove more effective in solving the pressing and vital problems of our country-side than the well-meant but often harmful activities of political enthusiasts. If there is bondage in the country-side, it is

FOREWORD. xv

(or arises out of) the bondage of ignorance — ignorance of the economic position, the ideals, the true wants, and the sentiments of those among whom we live and move and have our being. In this sense not merely the agricultural worker, but also the squire and the farmer have some need of emancipation. As Cowper says : —

" He is the free man whom the Truth makes free, And all are slaves besides."

As in the days of Gainsborough, 140 years ago, so in these latter days, the room in which the Club met was indeed a " Palace of Truth." The discussions pointed the way to a condition of greater freedom in which all alike could participate.

The good seed which was sown by the far-sighted and statesman-like hand of the much-respected author of this memoir in establishing the Agricultural Club has taken root to the permanent advantage of rural England. The young plant must assuredly not now be allowed to wither by reason of the fact that the Club, like its somewhat unpopular parent, has been consigned to the limbo of post-war memories. In some other and more permanent form it should be, and indeed it must be, revived and fertilised by the sympathetic efforts of those who enjoyed its membership and who realise its far-reaching and healthful potentialities. In this event, if there be no other fruitful aftermath of the Great War, there may yet be a Renaissance of Rural England, and thereby the establishment on a more stable basis than ever before, of the great nation to which we are all proud to belong.

BLEDISLOE.

Lydney Park, February, 1922

SIR HENRY REW, K.C.B.

I H KM. CLUB.

THE STORY OF THE

AGRICULTURAL CLUB.

Chapter I. Historical

Man has been described as a " clubbable " animal, though it is not certain that he has an exclusive right to the adjective. It would be easy to contend that rooks, at any rate, are clubbable and that the kind of institution most in vogue with them is a discussion club. Bees also, though they are mostly regarded as factory-workers—

" Creatures that by a rule in nature teach The act of order to a peopled kingdom " —

might also claim to be clubbable, while, if the Jungle Book may be taken as an authority, it would be difficult to deny the clubbable instinct in monkeys and wolves.

Whether it was in response to the sub-conscious prompting of inherited instinct, or no, the fact to be recorded here is that no sooner had a body of men and women been officially brought together to form the Agricultural Wages Board than they immediately proceeded to form an unofficial Club. It is safe to add that all of them obtained more personal satisfaction from the unofficial body than from the official one, which is perhaps another way of saying that occupations which are optional are more attractive than those which are obligatory.

The Agricultural Wages Board set up under the Corn Production Act consisted of thirty-nine persons, of whom sixteen were representatives of farmers, sixteen representa-

1 B tives of farm-workers, and the remainder appointed by the Minister of Agriculture as independent and impartial persons.

The first meeting of the Wages Board was held on December 6, 1917, and Mr. R. E. Prothero (afterwards Lord Ernie), who was then Minister of Agriculture, attended to give it his official blessing. In the course of his address he remarked that the members collectively possessed " a very varied and a very intimate knowledge of agricultural conditions throughout the whole country," and added that never before had a body assembled which represented the agricultural industry so fully and fairly as the Agricultural Wages Board. It was an inspiring address, and the following passage expressed an idea which pervaded the future deliberations of the Board and the proceedings of the Agricultural Club : —

" The farmer and the worker are both of them capitalists ; the farmer has money — not so much as he wants very often — and the worker has labour. If a remunerative return is denied to either of these classes — is denied, that is, either to the farmer or to the labourer — the result is practically the same. The farmer or the labourer leaves the land. Thus no doubt there may at first sight seem to be a direct conflict between the interests of those who pay wages and the interests of those who receive wages. But my own view is, that the differences are comparatively superficial, and for this reason : Neither the farmer nor the labourer can get on without the assistance of the other ; and that fact means this — that behind and above the personal superficial differences which may arise, there are common interests which are really deep and permanent."

The Agricultural Wages Board was in its time subjected to much criticism and accused of many faults, but from one charge at least it escaped — that of idleness. Seldom, if ever, has a public body devoted itself more assiduously to the duties entrusted to it. It met early and rose late (on one occasion the day's meeting ended about II p.m.) and frequently, in the earlier stages, the meetings lasted over two days and on at least one occasion over three. As

HISTORICAL. 3

members of the Board came from all parts of the country — as distant as Northumberland and Cornwall— they necessarily reached London on the day preceding the meeting. Thus the suggestion arose that the Board rooms should be open on the evening previous, so that members could, if they wished, foregather there. This suggestion developed into a proposal that they should discuss subjects of common interest, and thus the idea of a Club fructified.

A meeting of the members of the Wages Board was held on March 13, 191 8, when it was decided to form a club for the discussion of agricultural subj ects, every member of the Board and its staff to have the right of membership and power being taken to elect by ballot a limited number of outsiders. A little later it was decided to extend the right of membership to members of District Wages Committees, but this right was not in fact largely exercised.

The following were the rules of the Club : —

1. The object of the Club is the discussion of subjects relating to agricultural and rural development.

2. Members of the Agricultural Wages Board, District Wages Committees, and officers on the Board's staff, are eligible for membership of the Club without election.

3. Persons, other than members of the Agricultural Wages Board, District Wages Committees, or officers on the Board's staff, may be elected as members of the Club, but the total number of such persons shall not at any time exceed 20. Any such persons must be proposed by the Committee at a meeting of the Club, and the name, address and qualifications of candidates must be stated in the notice of the meeting at which they are proposed to be elected. The election shall be by ballot.

4. The annual subscription shall be 5s.

5. Any member ceasing to be a member of the Agricultural Wages Board, District Wages Committee, or officer on the Board's staff, shall also cease to be a member of the Club, but shall be eligible for election under Rule 3.

6. The Officers of the Club shall be a President, three Vice- Presidents, and an Honorary Secretary. Of the Vice-Presidents, one shall be an appointed member, one a representative of employers, and one a representative of workers, on the Agricultural Wages Board.

7. The Committee shall consist of the President, Vice-Presidents, Honorary Secretary, one appointed member, three representatives of employers and three representatives of workers on the Agricultural Wages Board. The Officers and Committee shall be elected annually, in January.

8. The Committee shall arrange the subjects for discussion at meetings of the Club, and for the persons to introduce them. Non-members of the Club may be invited by the Committee to open discussion. Speakers introducing a subject shall be limited to half an hour, and subsequent speakers to ten minutes.

9. Any member of the Club may introduce one visitor at any meeting. Visitors may only take part in discussions by consent of the meeting. No person may be introduced as a visitor at more than six meetings in the course of a year.

10. Any alterations of these rules must be proposed by at least three members (being members of the Wages Board) and no alteration shall be made unless due notice of the proposed alteration has been given to every member of the Club, and the alteration is carried by a majority of two-thirds of the members present at a meeting of the Club.

The distinctive character of the Club was that farmers and agricultural labourers were placed on an absolute equality, and that the maintenance of this equality was the basis of the constitution. This was in effect embodying in the rules of the Club the fundamental principle of the Agricultural Wages Board.

It is curious that the historical significance of the composition of the Wages Board has been so little regarded. The relationship of man and master in Agriculture evolved out of the manorial system, under which the hired labourer was a serf, and developed through a long period in which the farmer's status and power, political and economic, steadily increased, while the agricultural wage-earner (largely owing to the superfluity and immobility of labour in the rural districts) sank lower and lower into a position of dependence and subservience. The gulf widened between employer and employed, and although it was undoubtedly often bridged by personal relations of mutual respect and regard, it yawned inexorably in public affairs. When the labourer won his way to the polling booth, political equality was established, but this had little or no effect on the social or economic relations of the two classes. If labourers were invited to join an Agricultural

HISTORICAL. 5

Committee, cr other body, it was regarded as a liberal recognition of democratic theories, but it occurred to no one that they should be represented on equal terms.

A year or two ago I had occasion to attend a meeting in the market town of a typical agricultural district. It purported to be a conference between the representatives of farmers and of farm -workers with regard to a dispute then in progress. I was shown into the conference room, where I found the farmers assembled in force round a large table, and I was honoured with a seat at the head of the table by the side of the Chairman. After some discussion among themselves the Chairman announced that they were ready to receive the representatives of the workers. About half a dozen of them entered, and were ranged on a form against the wall at the lower end of the room. The Chairman addressed them civilly enough, but with much the same air of condescension as a magistrate assumes in speaking from the Bench. I am sure that no offence was intended or taken. The position seemed perfectly natural to both parties. It was the normal and habitual relation of master and man in discussion.

The Agricultural Wages Board was the expression of a new relationship. It was a body formed to discuss and decide certain vital economic questions affecting Agriculture, and its members met not as " master and man " but as " man and man." It was an agricultural body really and fully representing the interests of working Agriculturists, and recognising the equality of capital and labour, to which Lord Ernie referred in his address.

The title of the Agricultural Club was deliberately chosen to embody the idea that the familiar term " agriculturist " is not synonymous, as is frequently assumed, with " farmer." The largest number of agriculturists are those who actually till the soil, and they are strictly entitled to be so described. It is in fact a stretch of language, etymologically at any rate, to describe as an agriculturist one who employs others to cultivate the land for him.

The location of the Club — and of the Wages Board — was interesting, architecturally and historically. The meeting-place was a spacious room built over the back yard or garden of 80 Pall Mall, lighted mainly from the top, and, in spite of two capacious fireplaces and a supplementary gas stove, apt to be chilly and draughty on a winter's night. The atmosphere, owing to the pervading influence of My Lady Nicotine, tended to be smoky, but it was never heated, and always genial even when the thermometer was unusually depressed. The heat of argument sometimes engendered sparks, but they lost all fire at once in the cooling air of good-humour and good-fellowship.

Pall Mall is one of the many distinctive street names of London. Its origin is said to be in the game of " paille maille," described as " something between golf and croquet," which became fashionable early in the seventeenth century. There was plenty of room then to play games, for in 1656 only eight householders were recorded as living in the Pall Mall. I take the following from An Historical Guide to London, by G. R. Stirling Taylor : —

" Nos. 80-83, on the south side, are the centre and west wing of all that remains of the beautiful Schomberg House, which was built during the reign of William III, and takes its name from the Duke of Schomberg, William Ill's famous general, who was killed at the battle of the Boyne ; the house was built by his son. Afterwards it was tenanted by the Duke of Cumberland, who fought at Culloden. But perhaps its greatest tenant was Gainsborough, the painter, who lived in the west wing (after the house was divided up into tenements) from 1777-1783, where the beauty and fashion of London flocked to sit for their portraits ; Cosway, the miniature painter, occupied the centre in 1787-99. Near Schomberg House once stood the house where Nell Gwynne lived from 1671-1687, when she died there : she talked to Charles over the garden wall at the Mall side, which Charles frequented. Two doors eastward of this house lived Sir William Temple, 1681. Behind the west end of Pall Mall lies Marlborough House, overlooking St. James's Park. In the earlier next house to Schomberg House, on its west side, lived Mrs. Fitzherbert, the morganatic wife of George IV.'

HISTORICAL. 7

The studio in which Gainsborough immortalised on canvas the fashionable folk of his day was the meeting-place of the Agricultural Club. The walls which had echoed to the flippant scandal and gay gossip of the town a century and a half ago were equally responsive to the country-side conversation and agricultural arguments of the present

day. And in another hundred and fifty years . In

that spot —

"Where I made one — turn down an empty glass."

The Club held thirty-seven meetings for discussion. On two occasions the proceedings did not begin with a prepared address on paper ; in one case the gentleman who was to introduce the subject failed to attend owing to unexpected detention at the House of Commons, and in the other case the subject was, so to speak, thrown down from the Chair to be scrambled for without formal introduction.

The subjects discussed took a wide range and were as follows : —

" The Training of the Rural Worker in the operations of the Farm," Sir A. D. Hall, K.C.B.

" Pig Keeping in War Time," Lord Bledisloe, K.B.E.

" Village Life After the War," Sir Henry Rew, K.C.B.

" Industrial Farming," Mr. C. S. Orwin, M.A.

" The Place of the Small Holder in the Problem of Rural Reconstruction," Mr. George Nicholls, O.B.E.

" The Place of Women in Agricultural Development," Mrs. R. Wilkins, O.B.E.

" British Agriculture as a Business Proposition," Mr. J. H. Guy.

" The Decline of Village Life : Cause and Remedy," Mr. Haman Porter.

" Village Reconstruction," Sir H. T. Eve, K.B.E.

" Rural Housing : Policy and Administration," Sir Lawrence Weaver, K.B.E.

" Agricultural Development and National Welfare," Mr. R. V. Lennard.

" Agricultural Organisation with particular reference to guaranteed prices," The Rt. Hon. F. D. Acland, M.P.

" Food Production in War and Peace," Sir T. H. Middleton, K.B.E.

" Intensive Culture : Is there Scope for Further Development ? " Mr. R. R. Robbins, C.B.E.

" A Few Thoughts on Agricultural Reconstruction and Free Trade," Mr. W. S. Miller.

" Land Nationalisation," Mr. Christopher Turnor.

" Apprenticeship in Agriculture," Sir A. Hazlerigg, Bart.

" Organisation of the Village," Sir D. Newton, K.B.E.

" The Origin of Land Tenure," Mr. A. G. L. Rogers, M.A.

" Land Settlement," Sir F. L. C. Floud, K.C.B.

" The Worker's Share in Agriculture," Sir Henry Rew, K.C.B.

" Suspicion," Mr. Castell Wrey.

" Rural Housing and Cottage Rents." No formal introduction.

" A Brief Resume of the Condition of Agriculture," Mr. A. Wadman.

" Agricultural Housing and Rents," Lord Astor.

" Farming Accounts and Costings," Mr. H. G. Howell.

" Milk Production," Colonel Sir Archibald Weigall, K.C.M.G.

" Land Tenure," Mr. E. W. Langford.

" How the State can Best Help Agriculture." No formal introduction.

" Realities of the Wheat Position at Home and Abroad," Capt. R. T. Hinckes.

" The Farm Worker as Manager," Mr. F. E. Green.

"Unemployment in Agriculture and its Causes," Mr. Haman Porter.

" Unemployment in Agriculture," Mr. George Dallas.

" The Agricultural Labourer at Home and Abroad," Mr. A. G. L. Rogers.

" Village Clubs," Mr. H. Lacey.

" Land and Labour," Mr. W. R. Smith, M.P.

" Rural Life in Denmark," Mr. J. Nugent Harris.

Chapter II. Personal

At the end of 1918 the Committee reported that the membership of the Club was —

Members of the Agricultural Wages Board . 38

Members of District Wages Committees . . 47

Members of staff . . . . . . 31

Members elected under Rule 3 . . . . 14

Total 130

From that time the number of members altered but slightly.

The Original Officers and Committee were —

President — Sir Henry Rew, K.C.B.

Vice-Presidents — The Right Honble. Sir Ailwyn Fellowes, K.C.V.O., K.B.E., Messrs. George Dallas, H. Padwick, C.B.E.

Committee — The Right Hon. F. D. Acland, M.P., Messrs. Colin Campbell, George Edwards, H. Overman, C.B.E. , R. Richards, R. R. Robbins, Denton Woodhead.

Hon. Secretary — Captain F. W. Page Roberts.

The only changes subsequently made were caused by the resignation of Sir Ailwyn Fellowes (now Lord Ailwyn), who on his retirement from the Chairmanship of the Agricultural Wages Board became ineligible under the rules as an ordinary member of the Club, but was at once elected as a member under Rule 3. Mr. Collingwood Hope, who had succeeded him as Chairman of the Wages Board, was elected as a Vice-President of the Club in his place. Captain Page Roberts, on leaving the staff of the Wages Board, resigned the honorary secretaryship in July, 1919. He was also io THE AGRICULTURAL CLUB.

elected a member under Rule 3. He was succeeded as honorary secretary by Mr. S. A. Smith.

The Agricultural Club was an exclusive body. The right to membership was acquired only by service and could not be denied or alienated. Any person ceasing to serve the Agricultural Wages Board on a District Wages Committee forfeited at once his or her right of membership and was ipso facto removed from the roll of members. As Lord Melbourne said of the Garter, membership was esteemed because there was "no damned nonsense about merit" attaching to it, though in this case the qualification was one which denoted the possession of courage and public spirit. As a concession to human weakness the pure doctrine was adulterated by a rule permitting the election of a strictly limited number of members who were frankly chosen for special agricultural merit. This distinction was somewhat grudgingly accorded and for a long time the number was not made up to the maximum of twenty permitted by the rules.

The names of all those elected by the Club honoris causa are given below, but in several cases after election they acquired the right of membership by becoming members of District Wages Committees and were consequently transferred to the ordinary list.

A complete list of all who were at any time members of the Club appears in the Appendix.

A. W. Ashby.

Lord Justice Bankes.

Sir Charles Bathurst, K.B.E. (afterwards Lord Bledisloe).

Lt.-General Sir E. Bethune, K.C.B.

Lady Margaret Boscawen.

Prof. J. B. Farmer, F.R.S., D.Sc.

A. Goddard, C.B.E.

F. E. Green.

Sir A. D. Hall, K.C.B.