State Agricultural Society. 11 



sense of duty to provide employments and occupations, lest prisons and 

 asylums be overcrowded. 



Of course our children are, for the most part, fitted by nature and 

 inheritance for the learned pi'ofessions and for lecture fields — possibly 

 for editors, even — but, there being a danger of crowded ranks, it is 

 earnestly to be hoped that within a few years we may be able to offer 

 good living wages for physical work to young men and women, poets 

 and literati, who constitute a large class that sheep-herding alone does 

 not afford a sufficient refuge when bread has become scarce. Within 

 the last twelve months, our population has been increased by immigra- 

 tion about forty-seven thousand, and it must gratify those who sympa- 

 thize with the poor, and are compassionate toward laborers and children, 

 to know that on\y eight thousand of the new arrivals came from China. 

 Natural increase of population is unavoidable; immigration will cer- 

 tainly continue; both are desirable. But we must cease to pay unneces- 

 sary tribute to strange countries, if we would wisety avoid the creating 

 of strictly ornamental classes, paupers, and criminals. Our social sys- 

 tem has added the word "hoodlum" to the English language, and has 

 established a class that needs regenerating. We owe it to ourselves and 

 to the human race, to show that, as a community, we are capable of a 

 nobler inspiration than that which comes from Washington Irving's 

 sarcastic " almighty dollar." Sound policy and sympathy for the nearly 

 helpless, alike demand concerted action. 



Our woolen mills, sugar factories, watch-making establishment, linen 

 factory, and creditable number of other industries, are good as far as 

 they go; but they stop short of our needs, far short of the increase 

 demanded by our situation, and fully warranted by every circumstance 

 of country and population. 



We can make no better use of wealth than to keep the greater por- 

 tion of it at home, but in active use; nor can we attract desirable immi- 

 gration by any surer method. 



Those alone who are oppressed and misgoverned, or who inhabit 

 sterile countries and poverty-stricken lands, may be justified in forcing 

 their children to go abroad in the world to seek for life or meet with 

 death. We have a government under our own control; a fertile and 

 generous home; a range of natural blessings almost peerless in the 

 universe. Let us temper the spirit of our boasting by a spirit of faith 

 resulting in works that show a confidence in our future. 



ARBORICULTURE. 



Farmers should plant forest trees, and look well to making them 

 thrive and grow. 



Through the improvident waste which characterized our earlier his- 

 tory, and in the legitimate use for mining purposes of large quantities of 

 timber, our agricultural interests have suffered great injury, and are 

 now constantly jeopardized from the same causes. 



It is notoriously true that throughout the entire mining area valuable 

 timber is constantly, recklessly, and indefensibly wasted. If our miners, 

 and many farmers, as well, were compelled to follow that Japanese law 

 which requires every man who fells a tree to plant a sapling, most of 

 them would not find time for any other work. The spirit of the United 

 States statutes seems incapable of materialization in defense of splendid 

 forests. To procure a few cords of stove-wood, or the furnishing of a 



