62 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Jan., 



was the way she ended up : " We thank Thee for this sermon 

 that has been preached by thy servant here today. We are 

 thankful that he preached it with courage and said just what 

 he beheved, but more especially than for anything else are 

 we thankful that what he said ain't so." Now, then, you can 

 apply that to what I say here. If you do not feel that you can 

 be thankful, you can be thankful tliUt it isn't so. 



Now, in the first place, my friends, I think we can fairly 

 ask what the farmer's institute is, what it is intended to 

 be, and what it should be. In some places, I regret to say, 

 the farmers' institute has come to be known as a sort of a 

 social gathering, as a time for a picnic, a big dinner, a general 

 good time, and a catering to the bodily and physical wants of 

 man, rather than to the intellectual side of him. In my judg- 

 ment, that is an entire mistake. I say that without any reserva- 

 tion. I do not care how much you may wish to contradict 

 me. That is my honest opinion on that subject. A farmers' 

 institute is really a traveling high school for- the farmer. 

 That is what it was intended to be, and that is what I think it 

 ought to be made. It is an educational institution pure and 

 simple, and should be held to that, and made so if possible. 

 It seems to me a fatal mistake to attempt to make it a place of 

 entertainment, or to have it degenerate into a social club. I 

 will admit that when the farmers' institute comes into our 

 neighborhood it is a wonderful temptation to be able to say 

 that our little girl is going to speak a nice piece, or that our 

 boy is going to have a place on the program. That is very 

 satisfactory to one's pride; to be able to say what a great man 

 am I. I admit that is a wonderful temptation to turn the 

 farmers' institute into a sort of a tableaux, but, my friends, 

 that is not what the institute is for, and in my judgment that 

 is a mistake. That is not what the farmers' institute is in- 

 tended to be. It is not and never should be a literary and 

 social entertainment. It is true that it may be often neces- 

 sary to provide some form of entertainment in order to draw 



