SECRETARY'S REPORT. H'J 



fatliera, now realizes tbat changes may be made -which shall be 

 greatly to his advantage. True, all changes are not improvements, 

 and no one more than the farmer has need to be cautious in adopt- 

 ing every new thing which is offered as a labor-saving implement, 

 or as a wonderful improvement of any kind, — too often has he been 

 sadly humbugged and spent his money for what was neither bread 

 nor would help him earn his bread ; but if there were really no 

 improvements, there would be no pretence of any, and we have but 

 to glance at the transformations which have taken place within the 

 memory of man in the implements at present in use, to see that great 

 gain has been effected. 



In no department of industry is the ingenuity of the mechanic 

 more busy, than in that of agriculture. The reports of the Pat- 

 ent Office furnish the gratifying information " that the greatest 

 number of patents applied for and issued of any one class, are con- 

 nected with agriculture, and the fewest with that of war," and this 

 in the proportion of ten to one. We may safely ascribe this in great 

 measure to the increasing scarcity of farm laborers and the higher 

 price of labor, together with a growing appreciation in the minds of 

 farmers of the need of employing any machine or implement which 

 shall prove itself labor-saving and economical. It is "an omen of good. 

 When farmers' sons come to realize that science and art are ready 

 to contribute to their necessities, and the t by "gearing mind to 

 matter," they may earn a comfortable livelihood without becoming 

 mere drudges, plodding forever a toilsome beaten track, but reserv- 

 ing time, not for luxurious idleness, but for mental improvement, and 

 may thus assert for themselves and for their profession the position 

 in the estimation of the world which the Almighty has decreed to 

 them, they will be less prone than now, to leave the homestead and 

 business of their boyhood for the glittering and deceitful prospects 

 of city life. 



Mechanical ingenuity has done as much and probably more, 

 towards lightening the labors of the hay harvest, than towards any 

 other department of agricultural labor. The horse-rake and mow- 

 ing-machine, where they have been introduced, have wrought a rev- 

 olution in hay-making. The former, from its simpler construction 

 and more moderate cost, compared with the latter, has come to be 

 very generally used and its advantages to be as uniformly admitted. 



