16 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



I think would convince any one of this fact. For manufacturing', 

 which is to be one of the great aids in advancing the agriculture 

 of the State in the future, we have unlimited resources. The 

 Androscoggin river and its tributaries, the Saco and its tributa- 

 ries, and various other large streams running through this county, 

 furnish water-power which, under the most favorable circum- 

 stances, cannot be fully employed for a large number of years. 



There is another thing to be said of this county. I have 

 remarked that some people regard the State of Maine as good for 

 little else except to raise men and women. It is, I believe, a fact, 

 that Oxford county has been as successful in this respect as any 

 other county in the State. I am inclined to the opinion that you 

 may go into any of the States where the people of Maine have 

 gone, and you will find the "Oxford bears," as they are sometimes 

 called, pushing themselves there as they are pretty apt to do at 

 home. There is something more than this. If you go into the 

 two largest cities of our State, you will find that a very large 

 number of the leading business men are men who went from Ox- 

 ford county. Go to Bangor, and you will find that the Kerseys, 

 the Stricklands, the LTamlins, the Rawsons, the Flaggs, — and I 

 might name a large number of other leading business men in that 

 city, — are men who had their education, who imbibed the first 

 principles of that energy which has so well carried them forward 

 in life, here in Oxford county. Go to Portland, and if you have 

 never thought on the subject, you would be surprised at the num- 

 ber of leading business men there who came from this county. 

 The Smiths, the Twitchells, the Shurtleffs, the Browns, and among 

 the mechanics, the Kimballs, the Kings, the Chases, and a very 

 large number of others, leading business men, eminent in the 

 various professions there, are men who went out from this county. 

 Now, if we could have kept all these men, if we could have had 

 those energies exercised in the development of the resources of 

 our own county, I think we might have had something to boast of 

 in the county of Oxford. As it is, although we have not been 

 able to accomplish in these directions all we might wish, we point 

 you to what some of our sons have done in other parts of the 

 country. 



Thanking you, gentlemen, for the pleasure which your visit 

 affords our people, and for the profit which we expect to derive 

 from the discussions to which we shall have the pleasure of listen- 

 ing to here, I desire to bid you a hearty welcome to the county of 



