476 [Assembly 



great institutions are spent in dissipation. . West Point fills them 

 up with military duties. I propose to fill them up in the labors 

 of the farm, and in the management of the detail of tlie fields, 

 the bars, the stables and the shops. 



The highest order of talents in teachers can only be procured 

 by large institutions, and such only can afford extensive libraries 

 and philosophical apparatus, so it appears to me necessary, tg 

 have colleges on a large scale, when we have any. We now 

 have in the country, at least one hundred small ones. But the 

 objection made to large numbers of students being brought to- 

 gether is, that it is apt to lead to dissipation. This is only true 

 where the time of the student out of study hours, is left at his 

 own disposal. I propose by the farm to keep him busy summer 

 and v.inter. In the summer, in the field, in the, winter, in test- 

 ing by actual measurement of food and results, the proper mode 

 of wintering domestic animals, and the value of the various 

 breeds. Keep them busy in solving the many questions that now 

 perplex us farmers, and which we cannot solve for ourselves. 

 Not one of us can tell which is the best breed of cattle with cer- 

 tainty, for the reason that not one of us is able to test and prove 

 by a sufficient number of experiments the disputed points. We 

 can *guess and that is all we do. « 



All the cost of such an institution would be paid back to the 

 State abundantly, by the solution of these questions, and I am 

 confidejit, that without an agricultural school and experimental 

 farm, that shall be conducted, not for profit, but for the spread 

 of information, we shall continue to go on in the dark upon 

 many points, from our inability to solve the doubts that hang 

 around them. 



I have before asked tlie question whether the profession of ag- 

 riculture was not an honorable one, and I have tried to show 

 that whether we consider its objects, the number of people enga- 

 ged in it, or the knowledge necessary to its successful pursuit, 

 that in each of these views it is deserving of all honor. Conscious 

 of this, public men on certain occasions do pay it honor, and court 

 our favor as they would did they really feel the force of all they 



