VOLUNTEER LABOUR FOR THE LAND.
SUGGESTIONS are numerous-for a solution of the problem how to find labour for the land without taking strong men away from the Army. Our readers are already familiar with the proposal that agricultural labourers who are assigned to home defence should be grouped in special battalions so that when they have completed their military training they can put in their time working on the land till there is a call for their services as soldiers. But this scheme would not cover the whole ground, though it would provide much comparatively skilled labour. There will be plenty of room for the voluntary labour of civilians, both men and women. Many women may be able to give their whole time and work for wages. There is an excellent proof of what can be done by women in the war harvests in France, which have been gathered in mainly by old men, women, and boys. But we want to write now only of voluntary part-time labour. As the production of food is the question of the moment, preparations cannot be made too soon to tap every possible source of help. No doubt Mr. Neville Chamberlain's plans for laying voluntary civilian labour under contribution all over the country will make a point of providing far the land. We necessarily write in ignorance of what those plans may be, but it seems to us that there may be an opportunity of using the Volunteers—our part-tithe soldiers—for preparing or cleaning the laud, and for getting in the hay and corn harvests.
The authorities may of course have schemes for utilizing the Volunteers that would prevent them from doing any agricultural work. If it should be decided that the Volunteers have become a force of such military value that their greatest service to the country consists in improving their drill and military knowledge, it would be impossible to say a word against'that decision. Nothing, indeed, could be a cause of greater pride and gratification to the Volunteers than for the War Office to say in effect to them : " You have done so well that we are now ready to entrust you with fresh military obligations. You have tried seriously to make yourself soldiers, and we want you to be more serious than ever. In addition to your musketry and drill, we want you to practise bayonet exercises, to make 3-ourselves competent bombers, to pick out men to master the technique of machine guns, and, in short, to become complete infantry units instantly ready for any service at home that you may be called upon to perform." After all, the Volunteers set out to be part-time soldiers in the faith that if the war went on long enough their services were bound to be required. The more far. seeing of them were never in the least dejected when it was freely being said that the War Office hula° use for them, and.never would have.. They foresaw that. if the' man-power of the nation shoultt become exhausted, the. War Office could not possibly decline the proffered, services of two or three hundred thousand pion over the inilitaear a,ga who, without any expense to the country, had somehow
tartuselthemeelvea into tolerably well-trained soldiers. The prophets of the movement always knew that the decision auto whether it was
worth while to go on rested with the Volunteers themselves and. not at all with the War Office. Now that the Volunteers are being graciously recognized, it would be absurd for them to say that they went to he agricultural labourers in their, spare time if the War Office wants them to give up every minute they can to soldiering,
But with that reservation made, we fancy that for some time yet there may he opportunities for the Volunteers to work on the land —proper opportunities in the sense that their work will be of more importance there than anywhere else. Even if this he not true of the Volunteers in every part of the country, it may be true of them in some parts. Or again; if it be not true of the Volunteers anywhere as a general rule, it may be true of them all for a short period of time—during the harvests, for instance. Perhaps those Volunteers who could be most easily mobilized for service at vital points in the event of a German raid might have to spend their spare time ex- elusively in military exercises, but this might not be so with corps in many other parts of the country. On the assumption, at all events, that Volunteers can be used to some extent for the land, there can be no doubt about the extreme convenience of employing them in sections, platoons, or companies. Trained men are moved *bout and set to work without delay, for the-simple lemon that they are accustomed to respond to words of command. Regimented labour is the most easily instrocted form of labour when it is neces- sary to explain the nature of now work, and of course to the majority of Volunteers work on the land would be new. We do not think that our farmers have any just conception as yet of the amount of work a Volunteer corps would get through during a Saturday afternoon and the whole of Sunday. They have not seen the Volunteers' trench-work. For most Volunteers physical labour is a recreation after sedentary work. The agricultural labourers would be resting on Sunday; but it would probably be an amuse- ment to them to watch the amateurs at work, and to tell them if they were doing anything wrong.
Suppose a, Volunteer corps which has boon engaged for months in digging trenches on Sundays, and let us imagine that the authorities decide that, though trenches are needed, they are less important on.the balance than the necessity of cleaning the land in a particular district when the spring begins to bring up the weeds fast. No great skill is required for pulling up weeds, yet the value of a growing crop may be increased by twenty per cent if these parasites which consume the nutriment of the soil are removed. A Volunteer battalion would clean several acres in the course of Saturday after- noon and. Sunday. If such work went on all over the country, the benefit would be great.
A correspondent has sent us an account which appeared in the Birkenhead Advertiser of a scheme of volunteer labour for farmers which has been started at Prenton. The volunteers in this case are civilians ; they are not part-time soldiers ; but the lesson they can teach others is important. The report says :— " As was stated fully in Saturday's Advertiser, the immediate object of the gentlemen who have formed themselves into a body to be known es the Prenton and District Civilians' Aid Association for Local. Farmers is to aid only those farmers in the district in which they reside, but in an appeal they have just issued they throw out the hint that when the scheme has been in operatiop for a sufficient period for them to judp the extent of their resources they will endeavour to go further afield. The idea at present is that the supplemeotary labour received will be directed to work on five or six farms, representing 850 acres, immediately adjacent to Prenton and Tranmere. It is intended to enrol the names of mon and women residing in Prenton or the adjacent neighbourhood. A rota will be organized, and all those who are willing to come forward are asked to sacrifice half a day (morning, afternoon, or evening), a whole day, or such time as they can spare each week from now onwards until the crops are gathered, in. By intimating, the amount of spare time at their disposal they will enable the Committee to make the best arrangements possible as the farmers make known their requirements for extra assistance. Two farms at Prenton were selected for Saturday's commencement of the experiment, and the volunteers were divided into squads of eleven and twelve. The weather was quite favourable for the work, and it was a lesson in willing labour and self-sacrifice to watch gentlemen who in pre-war days were to be seen spending their leisure time on the golf links wielding the pitchfork and the spade and, under the instructions of experts, wielding them to good effect. At the conclusion of the afternoon's operation a farmer was asked by the Advertiser representative for his views on the work, and he was candidly favourably impressed by what had been done and the promise of what could be done. ' Considering that the majority, if not the whole of the volunteers were new to the work, it was quite well done,' he said, ' and this sort of labour will be of great assistance, especially in what might be termed the preparatory work of farming.' "
Such an experiment absolutely invites imitation. Whatever Mr. Neville Chamberlain's plans may be, he is not likely to interfere with "going CO1101115," for where the heart is there is good laboue also.
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