which have grown up to £4 an acre for the sites near the station, where manure is received in large quantities from London.125
Happily enough, the Bedfordshire County Council has been eager to acquire land for small holdings, and, after having spent £40,000 in the acquisition of land, they have, up to 30th June, 1911, provided one-third of the applicants with 2,759 acres — the total demand, by a thousand applicants, having already attained 12,350 acres.
And yet all this progress still appears insignificant by the side of the demand for vegetables which grows every year (and necessarily must grow, as is seen by comparing the low consumption of vegetables in this country with the consumption of home-grown vegetables in Belgium, indicated by Mr. Rowntree in his Lessons from Belgium). The result is a steadily increasing importation of vegetables to this country, which has attained now more than £8,000,000. 126
A branch of horticulture which has increased enormously since the first edition of this book was published, is the growing of fruit and vegetables in greenhouses, in