579 



inhabitants, or prevent those desiring a better supply from making im- 

 portations from other States. 



I have dwelt with some emphasis, and at some length, on the cultiva- 

 tion and economy of the leading articles of produce in your county. 

 Their importance deserves it, and if, by showing you in some degree 

 the results of what must be considered a defective system of farming, I 

 can induce you to progress and improve, and thus increase your produc- 

 tions and your own usefulness and wealth at the same time, I shall con- 

 sider myself well repaid for my visit. Were I addressing you as you 

 were situated some eight or ten years ago, probably some of my re- 

 marks would be out of place ; but the whole position of the farmers of 

 this State has changed within that period ; and now, instead of being 

 on the outskirts of civilization, you are directly in the midst of it, and 

 occupying a prominent place, too. With these fertile fields in your pos- 

 session, it is expected that you will use thera to the best advantage. 

 With the most approved implements brought to your very doors, it is 

 expected that you will not only learn to use them, but that you will 

 patronize the manufacturer by using them up and ordering more, from 

 the fact that they will be found indispensable to your more extended op- 

 erations. 



Instead of the scythe or the cradle swinging through your fields, it is 

 now the mowing and reaping machines that with rapid clip lay the 

 crops at your feet. Instead of the grain or the live stock being taken 

 to market with many days of arduous travel, the steam car sweeps the 

 whole from your sight, and returns to you the proceeds, it may be the 

 next day, at the highest market rates. Instead of waiting for days to 

 obtain a glimpse of what the prices of produce might have been days 

 before the news of change reached this out-of-the-way part of the world, 

 you are now in instant communication with all the great marts of com- 

 merce, and not a throb or a start thrills thera that it is not felt even 

 here through the nerve-like wires that have been stretched far and wide 

 over the land, by the matchless powers of American invention. 



On every hand, and from almost every department of science, you 

 receive aid and encouragement in the path of progress. The chemist, 

 in his laboratory, is at work among the long-hidden cells in which na- 

 ture has hoarded her stores; with his apparatus he measures, weighs 

 and tests the qualities of each new substance he brings to light ; and 



