156 AGRICULTURE OF MAINE. 



mar school. A mature mind ought to learn what of value there 

 is in it in a year's time. 



I would eliminate the first three years of the beginning of the 

 boy's life, and not accept him before eight years, unless in a 

 little kindergarten work, and let him play and grow, and then I 

 would eliminate all memory studies as such, holding that the 

 student who is acquiring useful information in nature studies 

 and other studies has the best disciplinary matter for memory. 

 I would eliminate much of mathematics, holding with Elliott 

 that the form of logic which we get in mathematics is the form 

 of logic least used in the life of most citizens, and only used 

 where the most absolute accuracy is required. And I would 

 make other eliminations. But into the rural schools must come^ 

 not nature studies as we now understand them, but nature stu- 

 dies with an agricultural bias. All our elementary schools, in 

 the new system, must teach the elements of agriculture, and it 

 will be no favoritism, for the increased productive power of the 

 farm means cheaper food for every citizen, a new impulse to 

 every industry, taking out of your ranks men who can go inta 

 other occupations and increase the products which add to the 

 comfort of all. The state's highest interest would be served by 

 such a course of studies. If we have the graded system, these 

 farm studies may go on until they take a higher form in the grad- 

 uating class of the high school, the cap stone of the agricultural 

 system being the State University, where teachers of agriculture, 

 agricultural professional men, and those who want to go to the 

 root of the sciences that have their application to agriculture 

 should be educated. I do not expect your people will deal with 

 the situation until agitation and reflection have crystalized into 

 purpose. But when we deal with the problem, without hesita- 

 tion I would say, put elementary studies in agriculture into the 

 common schools. Are they not pressing into the schools of 

 Missouri? Does not ^lissouri, through her University, educate 

 teachers in agriculture for rural schools? Do not the several 

 normal schools of ^Missouri have a chair of agriculture in each 

 school to teach her to-be teachers how to teach the elements of 

 agriculture? Has she not erected a magnificent system of agri- 

 cultural education that will make harder and harder your efforts 

 to compete with her until you match each energy directed 

 towards higher education with hers? Is it not true of Illinois 

 and other states that elementary education in agriculture is 



