t 



424 Transactions of the 



applications of science to horticulture, arboriculture, bee, vine, and silk 

 culture, where they give board, lodging, clothing, and books to a limited, 

 number of pupils, with forty dollars for the first .year, sixty-four dollars 

 for the second, seventy-two dollars for the third, and eighty dollars for 

 the fourth and last year; and all this does not adequately illustrate the 

 spirit and energy with which the Government is pushing forward the 

 noble work of educating the agricultural classes. Nov is she doing less 

 for her schools of arts and trades. The Emperor Alexander has given 

 the most careful attention to the tx*aining of mechanicians and techno- 

 logists, and to the furnishing of workshops and laboratories where these 

 are taught; one hundred thousand dollars is expended annually for a 

 school of this kind at Moscow, where fourteen professors impart 

 theoretical instruction, with a still greater number of practical mechauics 

 to oversee the foundries, forges, lathes for wood and metals, cutting 

 machines, and trip-hammers, which earn an additional sum of forty 

 thousand dollars for the support of the institution. 



I might fill pages with the details of^vhat the Continental States of 

 Europe are doing in this direction, drawn, not from government reports, 

 but from that of our own Commissioner to the Paris Exposition in 

 eighteen hundred and sixty-eight, the accomplished* Secretary of the 

 Wisconsin Agricultural Societ}*, who has no superior in zeal or in knowl- 

 edge of either agriculture or education. * 



WESTWARD PROGRESS. 



]STot only eastward, but westward, do we see the same large policy 

 toward the uplifting and enlightenment of industry. The ancient empire 

 of Japan has called from our Bureau of Agriculture its efficient head, at a 

 salary of twenty thousand dollars and his expenses (equal to the salary of 

 the President of the United States). It has secured the services of four 

 other principal officers of the Bureau, and made the most muniticent 

 provisions for the success of their work. This, in a country which 

 already knows how to make its limited territory feed a larger population 

 than 4s done on any equal area on the habitable globe. Nothing w T as 

 done worthy of us as a nation until Congress, by the Act of Jul}- second, 

 eighteen hundred and sixty-two, gave to each of the States the means of 

 founding (not of sustaining) an institution of this class. The amount of 

 k benefit each will receive depends entirely upon the intelligent adminis- 

 tration of the fund thence derived, the good faith in which the spirit of 

 the Act is carried out, and the hearty cooperation of the people. The 

 object of the grant was, without a doubt, to make more farmers and 

 mechanics, and not, as has been assumed in some places, to educate the 

 sons of farmers and mechanics. Were the latter all that was contem- 

 plated it would be right to hitch an agricultural professor or two to 

 some existing college feeder of the professions, and take the income of 

 the grant as liquid pro quo; but 1 know of no reason why Congress 

 should educate your son more than your doctor's son; though I see a 

 very good reason for her establishing great manufactories of intelligent 

 industry. And this she has aimed to do, and to her credit, be it said, 

 she accomplished her part of the work in the darkest hour of her strug- 

 gle to preserve the national existence. 



The proceeds from the sale of the lands thus donated by Congress 

 have not yet been sufficient to put any of the institutions, founded upon 

 or assisted by the grant, in full working order. The Empire State, 

 having the largest representation, got the lion's share, and had a citizen 



