IQ BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



man has been there, and it is no use for me to oflfer him an article 

 that is not just as good as anybody else can offer." 



So of edge tools and all the manufacturers of steel and iron. 

 The Dunn Edge Tool Company cannot afford to let the Douglass 

 Company make a better axe than themselves, and Hubbard & 

 Blake must produce as good a scythe as Phillips, Messer & Colby. 



So of the thoroughbred horse or bull. The people have been to 

 the fair and have seen the best, and Mr. Percival must show as 

 good a Shorthorn as Mr. Dow, and Mr. Underwood as fine a Here- 

 ford as Mr. Burleigh, or they must at once come down from the 

 proud position they now occupy. So you see, when an article or 

 animal is offered as first-class, it needs no wai-ranty, for in this 

 day of so general diffusion of useful knowledge, no one but a fool 

 would throw away his reputation by offering anything else. 



Again, no one will deny but that the agricultural societies are 

 the parents of the agricultural papers which are so plentifully 

 scattered through the land, and if so, who can compute, or 

 imagine even, what they have done for the intelligence of the 

 people, not only in regard to agriculture and mechanics, but in 

 the general knowledge of the world, for a weekly paper is a sort 

 of encyclopedia of useful knowledge, political, religious, industrial 

 and general, and every school boy or girl to-day may be, and the 

 most of them are as well informed and as much interested in the 

 researches of Dr. Hayes in the frozen north, and Dr. Livingstone 

 on the burning sands of Africa, of the rebellion in Cuba and the 

 revolution in Spain, the Suez canal and the Pacific railroad,, as 

 were their grandfathers with the road to Hallowell or Wiscasset. 



There is a story told of a lady formerly living in this county, 

 which illustrates the scanty diffusion of the knowledge of passing 

 events of that day. Soon after the treaty of Ghent, this lady 

 went to spend the afternoon with Mrs. Chapman. Esquire Chap- 

 man, who was one of the leading men of his day, told lier that a 

 British minister was expected over right away. The old lady laid 

 down her knitting-work, raised her spectacles above her eyes and 

 exclaimed, " Of all things ! well there, if lie preaches at Whittier's 

 Mills, me and my old man must go and licar liiin." To-day any 

 school boy will tell you Mr. Thornton is not a preacher. 



I trust what I have said may suggest to your minds something 

 of the importance of this part of my subject, and other gentlemen 

 present may take up and discuss the points which I have omitted. 

 One thought more: The lecture of Prof. Goodale on the "Con- 



