STATE AID TO AGRICULTURE. 13 



sons? Recently, while passing through the West, I was constantly 

 comino- in contact with Maine men. Yes, Maine sons are scattered 

 broadcast throughout the West, playing an active part in the agri- 

 cultural and manufacturing interests, and also in the political affairs 

 of the nation. Why stand we still with folded arms, unconcerned, 

 and allow this to go on until our own resources and industries 

 are developed? Some one may ask, "What can we do?" Why 

 suffer our young men to repair to the cities, and fill the workshops 

 to overflowing with their muscle, causing discontentment and dissat- 

 isfaction between themselves and their employers, by being obliged 

 to work just so many hours for a bare existence, as it is called, 

 when there are milUons of acres of land mourning for the plowshare, 

 capable of producing the necessaries and the comforts of life, where 

 they can enjo}- the pleasures and emoluments of an honest yeomanry 

 such as the world has never seen, being their own boss, making 

 their houses as long or as short as they please, being an honor to 

 themselves, their friends and the world? Some may ask, "What 

 can we do to obviate this?" Mv answer is this: The times, the 

 fashions and customs, and the state of affairs demand that we do 

 something. Let us build up our agricultural interests by education. 

 Let us build a structure that will be an honor to ourselves, our 

 State and country. Let us throw out such inducements as will 

 smother the idea that there is a better spot on God's green earth in 

 which to live, all things considered, than our own State. Of the 

 three great industries of our country, agriculture comes first upon 

 the list ; let us foster other interests, but by all means build up 

 agriculture first. Who can deny the fact that a prosperous agricul- 

 ture is the foundation stone of a prosperous community or State? 



Assuming; no wisdom above others, I am still free to declare mv 

 convictions that in order for the fa'rraers of our State to receive such 

 an education as the fashions and the times demand, we must have 

 means adapted to the end or fail. We should have our college farm 

 stocked. No sensible farmer would think he was carrying his 

 farm on judiciously unless it was stocked with cattle of some 

 kind. He who cultivates his library and neglects his fields until 

 hunfijer drives him between the plow handles, will find to his sor- 

 row the mastery of pure science, the higher mathematics and the 

 classics cheap accomplishments, to be gladly exchanged for a moiety 

 of learning in the fields of applied science. To make an agricultural 

 school of real value it must embrace a course of instruction and 



