SOME BOOKS OF THE WEEK. _
[Under this heading we notice such Books of tho week as have not been reserved for review in other forms.]
The Case for the Goat. By "Home Counties." (G. Routledge and Sons. 3s. 6d.)—This volume is based on an article with the same title which appeared not long ago in the Quarterly Review, an on contributions to various journals, the Spectator among them. Its contents largely consist, as might be expected, of technical details, particulars of the breeds which may most profitably be kept, of the best food, quarters, &c. These are matters for the expert, and we must leave them alone. But the volume may be warmly recommended as containing much that is very likely to be useful. The author specially commends to the attention of his readers the appendix, in which the answers sent in by keepers of goats to a set of questions are given. One to which many will turn at once is 23: "Do you believe in the commercial possibilities of Govr-Fsamma ? " The answers are, it must be allowed, commonly in the negative. There are cases, it is true, in which high prices for goat's milk have been obtained ; but, as a rule, the prospects are not favourable. But then there is something else to be considered. The goat has been well called "the poor man's cow" (meta pauperis). But this means that it is kept for the supply of the family, not for the market. If the "three acres and a cow" prescription could be applied, it would be in the same way. No one could set up a milk-walk with this provision, but he could vastly improve the family diet. Of course the difficulty here is that the man of three acres must have two cows at the least, unless he is pre- pared to sell the animal when she begins to "dry off." But this does not exist in the case of the goat. A sufficient number of these animals can be kept to make a continuous supply. If small holdings are to become numerous, the "case for the goat" is greatly strengthened.—We take this opportunity of mentioning The Small Holdings and Allotments Handbook, by Corrie Grant, M.P., with an Introduction by Lord Carrington (J. W. Arrow- smith, Bristol, is. net). The Act of 1907 and the statutes incor- porated and allied are given ; and there is a specially instructive set of questions and answers by which much light is thrown on the subject. One of these we may quote,, because much turns upon it :— " Question. Can small holdings ever become your own property ? Answer. Yes. When a County Council can buy land by agreement they can sell it again to small holders. When, how- ever, they buy it compulsorily, they cannot sell it again; they can only let it."
The Act was severely criticised in this respect. But the neces- sity of the provision is obvious. Land might be compulsorily bought, divided among applicants, and sold again by them for some purpose quite foreign to that of the Small Holdings Act.
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