Welsh Journals

over the preceding decades, grabbed his opportunity with both hands and, as a reward for his service to Pitt, requested financial support for a 'Board of Agriculture and Internal Improvement.' Although Pitt was not prepared to grant Sinclair his request in full, he allowed Sinclair to establish the Board and agreed to award it a grant of £ 3,000 a year to cover its expenses. Sir John Sinclair became its President and Arthur Young was appointed its first Secretary. For Sinclair at least, the Board had very clear aims. In the parlia- mentary speech at which he proposed the creation of the Board, Sinclair explained that it was intended to: collect information on the subject of agriculture: to point and circu- late that information, when collected: to encourage a spirit of exper- iment: and to favour with public countenance, and perhaps with public aid, such as shewed a good example of rural industry to their neighbours .9 In his Plan for Establishing a Board of Agriculture and Internal Improvement (1793) he went further and wrote that the Board was designed to specifically assist 'the farmer.'10 Its provision of details regarding the best and most efficient agricultural practices were thereby calculated to 'excite a spirit of industry and experiment'11 amongst the agricultural community. Sinclair believed that this new spirit of agricultural enterprise could best be fostered by the publication of reports on the agricultural condition of England and Wales. Initially, he had thought that a 'Statistical Account' of each of the counties, mirroring that which had already been completed on Scotland, could achieve this end. However, the sheer magnitude of this task led Sinclair to reassess his aims. Instead, he proposed that a series of 'County Reports,' written by a range of different surveyors, be commis- sioned which could eventually be amalgamated into a single 'General Report' of the agricultural condition of the whole of England and Wales. In Sinclair's opinion these reports could be drawn up quickly, in about four to six weeks, inexpensively and even as the surveyors were engaged in other business. The 'County Reports' were intended as a foundation and were designed to provide the details which the 'General Report' would use in its evaluation of the agricultural condition of the whole nation. To Sinclair, the production of the 'General Report' was the ultimate objective of the whole project and was intended to be the means of 'establishing agriculture on a more solid basis than has hitherto been the case.'12