38 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 



within our State, and thus produce a complete revolution in our copper 

 iiHnin<>; interest. The experience of nations proves that no classes of 

 industries aid more in enriching and rendering a State independent than 

 mechanics and manufactures. California has greater natural facilities 

 for hccoming an extensive manufacturing State than any other in the 

 Union, and her isolated position furnishes a strong reason for fostering 

 and encouraging them. 



For the advancement and improvement of all these objects — and, 

 indeed, all the industries of the State — was this society instituted. 

 While the holding of annual fairs, at which the products aud improve- 

 ments of every department of industry are exhibited for comparison and 

 instruction, aud to stimulat(^ emulation and enterprise, is calculated to 

 do great good, and should therefore be continued, yet, for the financial 

 success of the society, the fairs should be made to assume such a char- 

 acter as will prove at once the most attractive and least expensive. It 

 should be no ground of complaint should the Board adopt this policy. 



There are other and less superficial mediums through which, in addi- 

 tion to the one just named, the society may render itself equal!}' bene- 

 ficial to our present population and their material interests, and enlarge 

 and extend its sphere of usefulness, so as to enhance more perceptibly 

 and certainly the State's future prosperity. 



Among these may be mentioned a means already adverted to, the 

 appointment of competent committees to investigate and report upon 

 the present condition and best means of improvement in each branch of 

 industry. These reports should assume the character of short, practical, 

 and, to some extent, scientific treatises, wholly Californian in their 

 chai-acter and application. The society should also own an experimental 

 farm, with all the facilities and appliances for practically teaching and 

 illustrating au-riculture, in all its branches, as adapted to the peculiarities 

 of our soifand climate. It should possess an extensive mineral, mechani- 

 cal, and agricultural museum, for illustrating our natural history, our 

 mineral riches, and our advancement in the useful arts and sciences. It 

 should enjoy the advantages of a philosophical and chemical laboratory, 

 and an extensive library of useful and practical knowledge, for exempli- 

 fying and explaining the truths of science as applicable to the various 

 industrial pursuits of life. 



Add to these, by authoritj^ of law, the facilities of collecting agriciil- 

 tural and other important statistics, in an authoritative and authentic 

 manner, and the society would then occupy that position of usefulness 

 for which it was originality organized, but to which few such societies 

 attain for want of some definite aim and some constant and steady hand 

 to guide them. 



The official management of the agricultural societies of Xew York and 

 Massachusetts have respectively been under the control of B. P. Johnson 

 and C. L. Flint almost since their first organization. These societies, 

 either of them, are an honor to any country or nation, to say nothing of 

 the States in which they arc located. 



The importance of reliable agricultural and other statistics to the 

 successful and intelligent conduct of a government, and to the advan- 

 tageous direction and development of the resources of a State, are too 

 obvious to require an argument, and particularly so in a new State, 

 with resources so diveisified as ours; and yet we regret to record the 

 fact that we have not now, as a State, and never had, any system by 

 which such statistics have been or can be collected. In older and more 

 thickly settled communities, with their superior fiacilities for communica- 



