State Agricultural Society. 23 



ment of the University, there can be but one opinion as to the intention 

 of the National and State Legislatures. Tbat intention is definite and 

 unmistakable that the donation by Congress was for the sole and spe- 

 cific purpose of founding a college in each State for the benefit of those 

 engaged in practical agriculture and mechanic arts. It was donated 

 with a view of elevating the industrial classes, of creating among them 

 a taste for scientific research and practical and technical knowledge, 

 and thus indirectly of developing and utilizing the vast resources of the 

 country. 



In the Atlantic States this endowment has been and is being adminis- 

 tered in a way to secure these benefits to the classes and objects intended. 

 In Massachusetts, for instance, the Agricultural College is organized so 

 as to secure upon its Board of Management one Trustee from each 

 county in the State, and each county has as a Trustee of the college its 

 best representative of its leading industries. There is three hundred 

 and eighty-three acres of the real estate belonging to the college already 

 divided up into farming ground, orchards, vinej^ards, woodland for arti- 

 ficial forest culture, vegetable and nursery gardens, bo.anical garden, 

 ornamental grounds, and arboretum. A labor corps of students is estab- 

 lished, and all the students are required to labor two hours on each 

 alternate day in some department of the labor on the farm, under the 

 direction and instruction of a skillful and intelligent Superintendent. 

 For all extra labor the students are allowed twelve and a half cents an 

 hour, and it is found in practice that the best students are most fre- 

 quently the most industrious laborers and receive the greatest pecuniary 

 aid therefor, as well as the formation of habits of industry and economy 

 and good robust constitutions. The farm is well stocked with the best 

 breeds of cattle, sheep, swine, and horses, and no department of agri- 

 cultural industry is neglected. 



The Cornell University of New York, also established to secure the 

 benefits of the national donation to its citizens, is likewise a model insti- 

 tution, and is founded upon the same principles as that of Massachu- 

 setts — the primary benefit of the industrial classes and the higher devel- 

 opment of the material industries. The students are also required to 

 perform moderate labor here, and are allowed ten cents an hour for the 

 same. The President of the institution reports here also the best labor- 

 ers among the best students of the University. A large amount of 

 labor, such as under-draining, special and experimental fertilizing, has 

 been done on the farm of the college, and nearly all by the students, 

 who are thus receiving practical lessons in agriculture and farming, in 

 habits of thrift and economy. 



California, above all other States, needs and could be most benefited 

 by a practical School of Agriculture, of Mines and Mechanic Arts. Her 

 undeveloped resources, and the new and peculiar conditions of these 

 resources, demand practical, skillful, and intelligent management for 

 their development. The peculiar location and climate of our country 

 require extensive irrigation and reclamation systems, to inaugurate and 

 accomplish which demands the highest science and engineering ability. 

 Indeed, the field for experiment in agriculture, for genius in the direc- 

 tion and development of the mechanic arts and mining and civil en- 

 gineering, is unlimited, and the future prosperity of the State is, to a 

 great extent, involved in the good or bad management of these great 

 physical questions. 



How important, then, that all the means in our hands or at our com- 

 mand for the education of our youth in the practical arts and sciences, 



