SECRETARY'S REPORT. 133 



cannot be commenced too early, for they are the germs of all 

 future development, the vitality of which is never lost, but 

 they must be planted early, if it is hoped to reach a full 

 harvest. 



If a person, who had the ability to perform whatever he 

 undertook, should offer to the people of this Commonwealth a 

 secret, by which in twenty years the productive value of the lands 

 throughout the whole State would be doubled without any more 

 outlay than is now required, what would that secret be worth ? 

 The diffusion of general agricultural education, such as the 

 committee propose, would, in their opinion, accomplish this 

 object, nay, go far beyond it, in less time than has been named, 

 and at an expense so trifling as to be hardly worth mentioning 

 in view of the benefits which would flow from it. There is no 

 other way to effect this so easily, so cheaply, and so advanta- 

 geously to the moral as well as material wealth of the State, as 

 by commencing this education at an early period in the future 

 farmer's life in our public schools. 



Constant complaint is made that the pursuit of a farmer is 

 unpopular with the young. That it is all hard work with no 

 corresponding reward. That a farmer does not rank as high in 

 the estimation of the community as other classes and professions. 

 There is much truth in all this, and there are good reasons for 

 it. Let us compare the education of a farmer with that of other 

 professions. The boy who is to become a farmer leaves school 

 at 16 or 17, and commences work upon the farm, — mere work, 

 without one idea ever given to him as to the nature of the soil 

 out of which he is to obtain his livelihood, without a thought as 

 to the various processes connected with the beautiful laws of 

 vegetation, without the slightest idea of races and breeds of 

 cattle, and with not one general principle to guide him and to 

 make intelligent the labor he is performing. Now this cannot 

 be said of any other profession or industrial pursuit, although 

 this one, more than any other, demands all the previous prepara- 

 tion which it is possible to give, by instilling into the mind, 

 when young and perceptive, those general principles and teach- 

 ings which lie at the foundation of all success, and of all that 

 future knowledge which future practice and observation would, 

 with a proper previous training, be sure to give. 



