ADDEESS. 73 



Our people are wisely extending the range and variety of 

 their products, and bestowing more attention than formerly, to 

 the equally, or more important matter of securing the best vari- 

 eties of whatever they aim to produce. The time has paslbd, I 

 trust, when farmers will be content to sow and plant irrespective 

 of quality, and the new era come, when the question of what 

 hind will be considered the all important one. 



Stock raising is beginning to receive some attention, too, and 

 not a few of our most intelligent farmers are giving heed 

 to the best methods of importing from other countries, when 

 necessary, and seeking to acquire the best, regardless of trouble 

 or expense. Doubtless some of these praiseworthy efforts will 

 fail ; but in the end the result will prove a thousand-fold better 

 for the State, than if the experiment had never been made. 

 Let these generous efforts continue, and may intelligent men, — 

 above all may it be ihe policy of the State Agricultural Society, 

 to help forward the good work by all the aid in its power, 

 whether by encouragement, by money, art, or science. 



But not alone do we find the evidences of improvement in 

 the products of the field and the stall ; many other departments 

 of agriculture are equally worthy of commendation. 



The mechanic arts have not gone backward, as the variety, 

 number, and perfection of its beautiful and ingenious products 

 abundantly testify. 



Agricultural Mechanics, constitutes an important branch of 

 agriculture itself; and to hope for success without fostering it, 

 were the grossest absurdity. But of this there is little danger ; 

 the two departments of industry, agriculture and mechanics, are 

 inseparable in their failures and their successes. The one can- 

 not go up, while the other goes down. Always when agricul- 

 ture flourishes, the skill of the mechanic is stimulated, and 

 proportionally better rewarded. 



But we have not yet come to perfection. Our Society is still 

 young, and of tender growth. Let us see that it does not meet 

 with disaster or blight, but patiently foster it, expecting, even 

 in our day, to see it grown heavenward — a mighty tree ! 



H 



