206 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



might serve; but its object is quite distinct, being to promote the 

 interests of agriculture in the community ; and when the inquiry is 

 made, how this can best be done, at what points in the vast field 

 before them, and by what agencies a given amount of expenditure 

 and of efifort will accomplish the greatest results, it is evident, that 

 however valuable is an intimate acquaintance with the theory and 

 practice of farming, it is not the only requisite. 



To illustrate this, let us imagine what is similar to, or identical 

 with, what may have occurred heretofore. The Board after assem- 

 bling and organizing, begins to ask, what can we do ? what shall we 

 recommend ? This seems at first a question very easy to answer, 

 for a thousand things can be done, or recommended, and every one 

 of them good, perhaps very good. The difficulty lies not in finding 

 something, but in selecting the most feasible — that which shall 

 accomplish the greatest practical results, and results best adapted to 

 our present actual and most pressing needs ; and here, minds differ- 

 ently constituted and with previous unlike training, have each their 

 own views. And Mr, A. replies, let us adopt means to advance agri- 

 cultural science, by employing some competent person to engage in 

 analytical investigations and original research^ and so increase 

 the amount of actual knowledge which shall be at the command of 

 the farmer. Certainly a most desirable object, as all will readily 

 admit ; but Mr, B. expresses the opinion that a more urgent and 

 pressing need of our condition as a farming community, is, a thorough 

 and complete diffusion of what knowledge is already attained, but 

 not yet well understood and practiced by the masses ; and this view 

 commending itself as judicious and sensible, the next inquiry is, 

 how shall this be attempted I Shall we endow an Agricultural 

 College where some, and comparatively few, shall be thoroughly 

 educated and made to reach the highest practicable attainments, and 

 then go forth and be scattered abroad in the community, settling 

 down to become so many teachers or centres of influence, from each 

 of which, by both precept and example, knowledge shall be radiated 

 to the many ?• or shall we begin our efforts at the common schools, 

 and there attempt to elevate the many to a more moderate standard 

 of attainment / or shall we have both and seeure the benefits of each 

 and of the connection between the two, (they being in some degree 

 mutually dependent and parts of a system,) or is there danger of 

 losing all by attempting too much at once. 



