52 • BOARD OP AGRICULTURE. 



respiration in us, produces putrefaction in them. What our lungs 

 throw off their lungs absorb ; what our bodies reject, their roots 

 imbibe." 



Such are a few of the strange and interesting workings of Na- 

 ture, to which the exercises of a Farmers' Club will lead, and 

 make it an Educational InstiluHon. 



There is no knowledge useful to any, which would not be ser- 

 viceable to the farmer — none but will increase his intellectual 

 powers. What, perhaps, may be important to some, is that there 

 is scarcely a physical science, a knowledge of which would not 

 tend to put money into his pocket. 



How many valuable lives of cattle, sheep and horses might be 

 saved by a little study in tlie curative art. How many household 

 conveniences enjoyed, repairs made and bills escaped, by a slight 

 knowledge of the use of carpenters' tools. It is more important 

 for him to understand something of various trades, because he 

 cannot conveniently call in the aid of others to assist him. If 

 farmers, therefore, would become self-instructed in science, art 

 and literature, in a larger degree than they have yet attained, no 

 profession would be more popular, nor more ardently sought for 

 by the progressive of all classes. Instead of young men rushing 

 from the country to the city, the city youths would yearn to be 

 farmers ; and instead of the chief emulation being who should 

 save most money, the strife would be who should accumulate most 

 by the profoundest experiments, most successfully carried into 

 practice. By these means, farming would cease to be a "dirty- 

 handed industry." Every operation would become scientific, 

 based on great principles, breeding new thoughts and new resuHs, 

 and ending in valuable acquisitions. Instead of the poet describ- 

 ing the farmer as one who 



" Wandered on, unknowftig what he sought, 

 And whistled as he went, for want of thought," ' 



we should have farmers themselves distinguished authors of valu- 

 able works — scientific, at least, if not poetic. 



Mr. Emerson says : — " If city young men miscarry their first 

 enterprise, they lose all heart. If the young merchant fails, men 

 say he is ruined. If the finest genius studies at one of our colleges, 

 and is not installed in an office within one year afterwards in the 

 ^cjty or suburbs of Boston or New York, it seems to his friends 

 and to himself that he is right in being disheartened, and in com- 

 plaining all the rest of his life. A sturdy lad from New Hamp- 



