xxii BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



eflBciency to the agricultural feature of the course. These views 

 are also entertained by the entire Faculty, who would hail such an 

 improvement with satisfaction — but it is impossible to say to what 

 extent the Legislature will coincide with these opinions of the 

 Trustees, or how far they will enable them, by appropriations, to 

 put them into successful operation. It is safe to say, that should 

 the Legislature in its wisdom, appropriate the needed funds to 

 carry out the scheme which will be presented to them for consid- 

 eration, the Trustees will endeavor to place these departments of 

 the Institution in a position to command the confidence and sup- 

 port of every friend of industrial education in the State. The 

 report of the Trustees and accompanying papers will be presented 

 to the Legislature at an early day, and will, I hope, be generally 

 circulated among our people. Its reading can but strengthen the 

 good opinion in which the College is held by every intelligent 

 person in the State. 



The reports from the cheese factories in the State during the 

 past year, show a considerable falling off in this departnient of 

 farming, or a failure to make returns to this office. In part it is 

 no doubt owning to the former, and in part to the latter cause — 

 for as there is nothing to compel factories to make returns, being 

 really private corporations, many may object to having their 

 doings made public However this may be, I have reports from 

 but thirty-five factories this year, against sixty in 1875 — although 

 I cannot believe that the interest in this branch of farming as 

 represented by these returns, has depreciated to the extent indi- 

 cated. The cheese factories should on no account be neglected, 

 and I counsel a steady, constant, determined attention to dair^'ing 

 and cheese making as one of the sheet-anchors of Maine farming. 

 A two or three years' trial of the system is not sufficient to de- 

 termine its adaptability to our State : it must be diligentl3' fol- 

 lowed for a term of years, before its highest advantages can be 

 obtained. It is a system which, well followed, cannot but result 

 in improved agriculture — but to accomplish this it must not be 

 followed in an intermittent manner. On no account should the 

 cheese factories be neglected the coming season. I present here- 

 with condensed reports of those factories from which returns have 

 been received : 



