Transactions at the Annual Meeting. 121 



Since the dav when want drove me from the face of Wisconsin, 

 a geological survey of that state has taken place. Men versed in 

 the mysteries of rocks and minerals, geological commotions and 

 periods, fossils and crystals, seams and ore veins in rocks, in argilla- 

 ceous and aluminous earths, have traversed that state, and have 

 made volumes finely illustrated, fall of fat things for other men 

 equally learned, and with choice pictures for children, young and 

 old. Large sums of money have been expended, and as one of 

 the tax payers of Wisconsin, I have asked myself, has it been 

 well spent? Or must some other man of less learning and more 

 practical common sense, strain out of this flood of learning grains 

 of practical knowledge for the use of common men? My friend, 

 J. C. Plumb, has done considerable such straining, but many more 

 golden grains are left behind. The United States has also placed 

 a very few of her enlisted men to observe the variations of the 

 thermometer and barometer, the variations and velocity of the 

 winds and the rainfalls. From these, "Old Probabilities" has 

 been forecasting the character of the climate for to-morrow, but 

 how few of the people even know the meaning of the vague 

 language in which it is couched, if, indeed, they even see the 

 papers which each morning print the predictions. These do great 

 good, and have developed an idea I had long before advanced ; 

 but how much more could have been done for the people. Fruit- 

 growers and farmers most desire knowledge of the character of the 

 outer six feet of the earth's surface, the rainfall on that surface 

 and the seasons of its fall ; of the heat and sunshine necessarv to 

 produce their crops and the cold that will destroy those crops. 

 Here is where the student of nature gets in his work, and the 

 philanthropist gives his advice to man. Prudent is he who gives 

 heed to that advice. 



Well do I remember the first time, perhaps, you met, as you do 

 to-day, in the capitol of Wisconsin. You were weak then, and 

 } r ou had no speaker, with a learned address for the public ear. 

 Your secretary, then as now my friend, found me at work in the 

 basement of the old capitol, and, with malice in his heart, drew 

 out of me some thought?, and finally seduced me into writing 

 some foolish things, which I was unable to defend under cross- 



