366 

 ADDRESS 



DELIVERED AT THE THIRD ANNUAL FAIR OF THE OASS COUNTY AGRICULTURAL 

 SOCIETY, HELD AT CASSAPOLIS, ON FRIDAY AND SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 23d 



AND 24th, 1853. 



BY G. B. TURNER, ESQ. 



Ladies and Gentlemen: 



Having been appointed by the Executive Committee of our County 

 Agricultural Society, to address you upon this occasion, I enter upon 

 the duty assigned me with much diffidence — feeling that the task 

 might have been confided to one, in all respects better fitted than my- 

 self, to do it justice ; to one, whose superior knowledge and experience 

 in all that pertains to agriculture, is known and acknowledged, as well 

 by his auditors, as by that community in the midst of which he lives, 

 and gives daily, practical evidence of his ability to instruct or interest. 

 An address, coming from such a source, could not fail of being pecu- 

 liarly interesting and instructive to the working men of oiu- county ; 

 as it is, I can only lay before you the partial results of my reading and 

 observation, together with that very moderate experience which a nov- 

 ice in the science of agriculture is supposed to possess. 



Were I able to discuss thoroughly and understandingly, the princi- 

 ples upon which this important science rests, the discussion would oc- 

 cupy far more time than you could profitably spare, at a single sitting. 

 You can, at your leisure, when the duties of your calhng do not claim 

 your attention in the field, study them in books, in essays, and agricul- 

 tural journals ; and when called to active labor upon your farms, you 

 can, by well tried and judicious experiments, not only prove the use- 

 fulness of your reading, but you can add to that general stock of infor- 

 mation, which makes up the aggregate of agricultural knowledge. 



Agriculture is defined to be, "the cultivation of the ground for the 

 purpose of producing vegetables and fruit for the use of man and beast; 

 the art of preparing the soil, sowing and planting seeds, dressing the 

 plants, and removing the crops." 



The earth, in a state of Nature, unless chilled by an ungenial cUmate, 

 possesses a certain degree of fertility, so as to produce plants more or less 

 'suitable for the subsistence of man and beast; but its spontaneous pro- 

 ductions are small in amount, compared with those which can be drawn 



