SECRETARY'S REPORT. ^l 



in men and capital. Nor is this a mere matter of belief. It can 

 be demonstrated by the safest rules of sound political economy 

 which time will not allow here to present. 



I am aware, that retrenchment is the order of the day, and I 

 would go for that as heartily as any other man, but as one would 

 arrest the falling of his whole house by setting beneath it a single 

 prop, so may we, by a little attention to the wants of our body pol- 

 itic, place it on a firmer and broader basis than ever before It is 

 for the interest of the whole state that it should be done. He had 

 no doubt that an appropriation could be obtained, — men's views 

 have changed on this subject, and those who a few years ago opposed 

 it, now advocate it. 



The secretary here stated that in 1855, a resolve passed the leg- 

 islature authorizing a continuation of the survey, but it failed be- 

 cause of a requirement incorporated into the resolve, that at least two 

 specimens of soil in each town should be analysed; a requirement 

 at once useless and fatal. The cost of so many analyses would be 

 greater than the appropriation, and had this not been required 

 analyses would, as a matter of course, have been made in all cases 

 where they appeared necessary. 



Mr. Bailey dissented from the conclusions of the report. He 

 thought we ought to urge this measure, and 7iow. The declarations 

 of the report as to the necessity of the survey demanded that it 

 should be forthwith done. Nothing else is of so much consequence 

 to agriculture. The state now does not produce one-tenth of what 

 might be raised. Suppose it costs ten thousand dollars to make the 

 survey, what is that, if by expending it we can produce a hundred 

 times as much ? It is wasteful to delay it longer. It would be the 

 most profitable investment that could be made, and this Board owes 

 it to the interest it represents, to ask of the legislature an appropri- 

 ation to make the survey. 



After some further discussion the i^eport was recommitted, and 

 subsequently reported and adopted, as follows : 



The committee to whom was recommitted with instructions, the 

 following topic : — Is it advisable to recommend a completion of the 

 geological and agricultural survey, report : 



That in this "age of progress," few can doubt that the actual 

 state of the country with its available resources, the origin and 



