eren't going to run
after women all day--they had too much to do to go messing round with
girls!" This objection was met by the Board of Agriculture arranging
training centres in every county. Some of the training was done at the
Women's Agricultural Colleges and among places that arranged training
very early were the Harper Adam's College in Shropshire (Swanley);
Garford (Leeds); Sparsholt (Winchester); The Midland Agricultural
Training College (Kingston), and Aberystwith.

The Women's Agricultural Committee have arranged a great many training
centres at big farms and on the Home farms of some of our estates.

The girls volunteering for training must be eighteen years of age.
They are interviewed as to suitability and references by the Selection
Committee. They must have a medical certificate filled in by their own
doctor or by one of the committee's doctors.

[Illustration: BACK TO THE LAND

WOMEN TACKLE A STRONG MAN'S PROBLEM]

On being passed, they go to the training centre, the travelling
expenses being paid by the Board. Outfit is free and the uniform is
a very sensible one of breeches, tunic, boots and gaiters or puttees,
and soft hat, breeches, etc., cut to measure for each girl. Training
and maintenance are free and there is always an instructor on the farm
in addition to the farmer and his workers. The travelling to the post
found, is again paid by the Government, and if work is not found at
once, on completion of training, maintenance is paid till it is.

The training is generally of four to six weeks' duration and in some
cases longer, and over 7,000 women have been trained in this way and
placed.

Appeals for land recruits were made in February, 1916, and in January
and April, 1917, when the Women's National Service Department asked
for 100,000 women.

The Land Army women after three months' service receive an official
armlet--a green band with lion rampant in red and a certificate of
honour. The Land women are the only women who receive an armlet--the
munition girl wears a triangular brass brooch with "On war service."

To induce the conservative farmer to try the women, exhibitions of
farm work were arranged in different part of the country with great
success, and the girls showed they could plough, and weed and hoe
and milk and care for stock, and do all the farm work, except the
heaviest, extremely well.

The War Office in its official memorandum of 1916 gives a long list of
the farm and ga