by Ernest Clarke

“ The experiments which he was conducting at Rothamsted early brought Lawes into prominence. He joined the Royal Agricultural Society in 1846, and became one of its governing body on 22 May 1848, retaining his seat on the council for the unprecedented period of over fifty-two years. He became a vice-president in 1878, and a trustee in 1891, and was offered the presidency in 1893 (the year of the jubilee of the Rothamsted experiments) , though he then felt unequal, through advancing years and increasing deafness, to accept the post. ”

“ Robert was described as 'a model all-round farmer good cattle, good sheep, good crops, neat hedges, neat farm-buildings,' but, not being so much of a specialist, was less known than his more businesslike and versatile brother Charles. ”

“ In September 1783 he graduated M.D. (List of Graduates in Medicine in University of Edinburgh, 1867) for a thesis, 'De Scarlatina Cynanchica.' It is not clear whether he ever practised as a physician; but he appears to have specialised in the sciences bearing upon agriculture.
On 7 July 1790 Sir William Pulteney took the first steps towards endowing a chair of agriculture in the Edinburgh University,nominating at the same time Coventry to be the first professor. ”

“ Owing to his dissatisfaction with the awards at the Tyneside Society's show in 1812, he gave up showing cattle at agricultural meetings for twenty-six years, and did not again exhibit until the first show of the Yorkshire Agricultural Society, held at York in 1838, when he won five prizes with seven animals. ”

“ A 'shyness' sprang up between the brothers, which became accentuated in March 1793; and the Barmpton and Ketton herds for some time lived apart, though later more amicable relations were restored. When, in October 1810, Charles Colling sold off his Ketton herd of shorthorns, Robert's herd at Barmpton 'became the centre of interest' to the breeders of shorthorns, which had then become fashionable. ”

“ Bates was educated at the grammar school at Haydon Bridge, and afterwards at Witton-le-Wear school, where 'he never joined in his schoolfellows' games, but would sit for hours in the churchyard with a book' (T. Bell, History of Shorthorns (1871) , p. 110) . At the age of fifteen he was called home to assist in the management of his father's farms. Before he was eighteen he became tenant of his father's patrimony at Aydon White House. ”

“ But 'all the time he was accumulating a fortune by business in London, he was at home spending a fortune in laborious scientific agricultural investigations' (R. Warington, F.R.S., in Agric. Gazette, 17 Sept. 1900, p. 180) . ”

“ Experiments on an actual course of rotation without manure and with different manures were also made : 'wheat, barley, oats, beans, clover and other leguminous plants, turnips, sugar beet, mangels, potatoes, and grass crops having been thus experimented on. The main object of the experiments on animals (commenced in 1847) was to ascertain how they could be most economically fed for human consumption ”

“ BLITH, WALTER (fl. 1649) , agricultural writer, issued in 1649 a work entitled 'The English Improver, or a new Survey of Husbandry. . . . Held forth under Six Peeces of Improvement. By Walter Blith, a Lover of Ingenuity,' London, 1649. This edition has two dedications: one ' To thole of the High and Honourable Houses of Parliament ”

“ Hitherto occasional lectures on this subject had been delivered by other professors, e.g. by the professor of chemistry, Dr. William Cullen [q. v.] , at the instigation of Lord Kames. A much fuller course had also been given by John Walker (1731–1803) [q. v.] , then professor of natural history, in 1788. ”

“ On 11 Oct. 1810 Colling sold off his entire herd at a public auction, which was very largely attended. The prices fetched by each animal are quoted in many works on the subject (e.g. Youatt, Cattle (1834) , p. ”