SECRETARY'S REPORT. 19 



great pleasure, but was not prepared to give approval to all its 

 details, a resolve, with which the report closed, was unanimously 

 adopted. The resolution reads as follows : 



Resolved, That the views of the Secretary of the Board on ag-ri- 

 cultural education and the methods by which it may best be pro- 

 moted, as set forth in an article on the subject in his last report, 

 (1859,) and particularly on pages 161 and 162, meet the cordial 

 approbation of the Board. 



Mr. Chamberlain, for the committee to inquire into the import- 

 ance of more carefully conducted experiments in agriculture, (sec- 

 ond topic,) submitted a report, as follows : 



"The source of all improvement in agriculture, as in all other 

 arts, is experiment ; and all experiments have their foundation in 

 knowledge. 



'Man conquers nature by observing nature's laws,' is a truism 

 more generally understood and appreciated to-day than when first 

 uttered. 



A learned German has said, ' A trial is a question addressed to 

 nature ; when such a question is properly put, nature will necessa- 

 rily reply either yes or no.' 



It is on ihe art of making experiments that the principal power 

 of man over the material world is founded, and that power will be 

 extended as this art progresses and is carried into practice. An 

 experiment of any kind is not easily made, yet they are in the 

 power of every reflecting mind. Whoever has accomplished an 

 expei'iment and has given a faithful account of it, has contributed 

 to science, and consequently to useful practice, and is entitled to 

 the gratitude of generations. 



In the last few years we have seen a change in the habits and 

 feelings of farmers towards what is termed scientific farming. That 

 host of sturdy men and valuable citizens, who styled themselves 

 ' practical farmers' in contradistinction to the daring experimenter 

 who applied science to practice, and published the results — the 

 host of hand-laborers who thought themselves proof against the 

 seductive wiles of heterodox ideas — the obstinate, perverse, preju- 

 diced men, who clung with foolish tenacity to old notions and old 

 customs, unwilling to yield anything to the progress of the age, 

 have been seduced from their citadels and captured, till there is 

 hardly a baker's dozen left in array in the State. 



That the better spirit of progress prevails, is evident from the 

 increased numbers of books, papers and periodicals on agriculture 



