3Q MAINE STATE SOCIETY. 



and rivulets, and so our aim should be to fill tlie offices of herdsmen 

 and shepherds. 



I long for the day when vast herds of cattle shall graze on these 

 hills ; -when all these lands shall be alive with horses and sheep. 

 This picture before me, of pastoral beauty, of spring-time verdure, 

 or summer luxuriance, or autumn ripeness, interblended and dotted 

 •with the busy life of men and the increasing groups of the noble 

 and beautiful beasts given into the power and management of men, 

 is to me like a vision of prophecy ; and while I contemplate it, I 

 confidently hope for and call my fellow countrymen forvrard to its 

 realization. 



You think, perhaps, of the obstacles of winter. But take a 

 second thought. Are there really any serious obstacles in the way 

 of stock-raising, here, in this season ? Rather than to complain of 

 the cold and the snow, and of the trouble of gathering our crops into 

 barns, and of housing and feeding our stock, ought we not to con- 

 sider that the rigor of winter partly occasions our physical firmness 

 and strength, and that we acquire more than enough of profit to 

 ourselves and our property to compensate us for our toil and care 1 

 The blessings of good shelter, of comfort and neatness, are enjoyed, 

 where the buildings for man and beast and the garnering of crops, 

 are the necessities of the climate. The best disposition we can make 

 of our principal crops, is to devote and deal them out to the wants of 

 our several kinds of stock. In this process, we do not in the begin- 

 ning of our operations so quickly turn our produce into money, but 

 we neither impoverish our farms ; we do not send off from our fixrms 

 a great part of the food and nourishment which they require and 

 which is their due ; and in the long run we become the gainers in 

 wealth and power. In this method of life, our own condition, our 

 families' condition, the condition of our property, is immeasurably 

 better than if we lived on the banks of the Mississippi, making no 

 use of barns, leaving the cattle exposed to the freezing winds and 

 the blinding storms of the prairies, and losing our own sense of noble- 

 ness, comfort and refinement in indolence, carelessness, slovenliness 

 and scorn of economy. 



A side-department in farming is that of the dairy. Though but 

 a side-department, it is neither an unessential nor an insignificant 

 one. It is an adjunct of stock-raising, and its usefulness is appre- 



