One of the difficulties incidental to a movement of this kind, which, for the reasons already set forth, had to be rapidly and widely extended, was the enormous cost to its supporters.  It is needless to say that such a staff as I have described could not be kept continuously travelling by rail and road for so many years without the provision of a large fund.  These officers must obviously be men with exceptional qualifications, if they are not only to impress the thought of their agricultural audiences, but also to move them to action, and to sustain the newly organised societies through the initial difficulties of their unfamiliar enterprise.  Such men are not to be found idle, and if they preach this gospel, they are entitled to live by it.  They are not by any means overpaid, but their salaries in the aggregate amount to a large annual sum.  Before the creation of the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction in 1900 large sums were spent by the I.A.O.S. not only in its proper work of organisation, but also in giving technical instruction, which was found to be essential to commercial success.  When the Society was relieved of this educational work many of its supporters withdrew their subscriptions under the impression that there was now no longer any need for its continued existence.  But so far from the Society’s usefulness having ceased, it has now become more important than ever that the doctrine of organised self-help, which must be the foundation of any sound Irish economic policy, should be insisted upon and put into practical operation as widely as possible.  All those who are devoting their lives to the firm establishment of this self-help movement among the chief wealth-producers of the country are agreed that no better educational work can be done at the moment than that which is bringing about so salutary a change in the economic attitude of the Irish mind.

It is not to be wondered at that the greater part of the necessary funds should have been drawn from a very limited circle of public-spirited men capable of grasping the significance of a movement the practical effect of which would appear to be permanent only to those who had a deep insight into Irish problems.[41] The difficulty of a successful appeal to a wider public has been the impossibility of giving in brief form an adequate explanation, such as that which it is hoped these pages will afford, of the part the movement was to play in Irish life.  We were asked whether our scheme was business or philanthropy.  If philanthropy, it would probably do more harm than good.  If business, why was it not self-supporting?  I remember hearing the movement ridiculed in the House of Commons by a prominent Irish member on the ground that the accounts of the I.A.O.S. showed that L20,000 (L40,000 would be nearer the mark now) had been put into the ‘business,’ and that this large capital had been entirely lost!  When we proved that agricultural co-operation brought