168 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



But it is over the mechanical condition of soil that the farmer has 

 the most control. The favorable changes which may be produced 

 in the structure and condition of the soil is full of promise to the 

 inquiring farmer. When we realize that an acre of soil that is well 

 pulverized to the depth of two feet is worth more than two acres that is 

 only six or eight inches, and learn that land which is now worthless, 

 because full of stagnant water, is the best of land when properly 

 drained, and that well-pulverized soil will thoroughly absorb and 

 retain the moisture and the fertilizers applied and give them up 

 only to the roots of plants, while in coarse, hard soil they are 

 washed awa}' and lost, — then we begin to see some of the control 

 which the farmer has over the productiveness of tlie soil, and why 

 good farming pays, and why bad farming is always a loss. 



Grecian mythology tells us that when two of her heroes contended 

 for mastery, one lifted the other's feet from his mother, the earth, 

 when his strength left him and he was conquered. It is no myth 

 that habitual contact with the earth gives physical and mental 

 strength. 



The earth purifies the water we drink and the air we breathe. 

 Brother farmers, let us strive to obtain » belter knowledge of 

 mother earth, for just in proportion as our work harmonizes with 

 her ways and requirements will she yield us her bounties. The 

 earth is not the inert mass that it seems. It is a great chemical 

 laboratory in which that wonderful chemist, the sun, with his assist- 

 ants, the air and water, is preparing and sending forth for our use mil- 

 lions of plants, not one of which our most skillful chemists can produce. 

 The bounties of mother earth have supplied all our wants from 

 childhood, through youth and manhood, and will through our 

 declining years, and when the journey of life is end' d she will take 

 us to rest in her bosom. 



