98 agricuIvTure; of maine:. 



talking about them as there is for the clergyman down here next 

 Sunday to talk about the better life, higher conditions and bet- 

 ter work for mankind to fit himself for the coming world. The 

 dairy cow will never wear out. The clover plant will save our 

 agricultural interest from wearing out. I firmly believe that 

 it is the dairy cow, in the hands of our best agricultural men, 

 that will preserve the fertility of our soils and save Maine's 

 great agricultural resources. I know it would seem to be 

 unnecessary to hold a farmers' institute or to have a State Dairy 

 Conference, to talk about clover or the cow, but just as long 

 as sin is in the world we have to preach against it; just as long 

 as man loves his ease more than he does to get out and hustle 

 and do better and have more and be more, we have got to have 

 these institutes, no matter what my Brother Ellis did 40 years, 

 or 30 years or 20 years ago. He attended some of my meetings 

 this year, and he tells the people there is just as much work for 

 us to do and it is just as necessary that we should put on the 

 whole armor and preach the agricultural gospel today as it ever 

 was. I do not know what you want me to say or what I ought 

 to say, but I know what should be said and that is that the Maine 

 dairymen should take more interest in their work. Brother 

 Gowell has been telling us that these things were talked to the 

 farmers 30 years ago, and they ought to know about them and 

 do them without having any new pressure brought to bear upon 

 them. I ought to be a better man ; I ought to sin less, and 

 sometimes I resolve that I will, but still sin is within me and 

 I fall by the wayside. In spite of what I can do, I am not doing, 

 myself, what I ought to do with my dairy cows. I am not put- 

 ting that personal work into superintending my own dairy herd, 

 testing my cows and weeding them out, that I should. The 

 truth is that I do not stay at home long enough. But I tell you 

 this question needs the best that is in us. Insead of having one 

 dairy conference we ought to have four over the State of Maine, 

 and instead of having one dairy instructor, if we keep abreast 

 of some of our western states, we should have several. Such 

 men as Brother Gowell are wearing themselves out in the work. 

 No man in the State is recognized as better authority than 

 he. Yet there is a great work to do after he has done all he 

 can. One of my friends recently sent me a newspaper from 

 Iowa, that great agricultural state, and in it I read that the 



