AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION. 27 



if dark, and gloomy, and low, casts a heavy shadow over all 

 his path through life. 



Now, gentlemen, ought not a community of farmers possess- 

 ing such inducements to labor, accomplish more towards the 

 development of agriculture, than any individual however rich 

 and powerful he may be, applying to the same extent of terri- 

 tory a tardy and servile power ? True, the experience of the 

 world may show that this is not the case. There were better 

 farmers in the days of Cincinnatus, and there are better farm- 

 ers at this day in Europe, than are found in our own country. 

 But is there any reason for this ? Are the freeholders of New 

 England just to their birthright, in allowing such a contrast to 

 exist? Do you tell me that our climate is unpropitious? 

 Would you exchange it for the heats and droughts, and torna- 

 does of the tropics ? When you hear of the failure of crops 

 in " the land of the cypress and myrtle," when you learn that 

 the staple product of one whole island, the most genial on the 

 globe, is cut off, perhaps forever, and that from Madeira will 

 come no more the rich and rosy wine " that maketh glad the 

 heart of man," do you not turn with renewed confidence to the 

 land whose seasons have not yet failed, where every man is 

 rewarded according to the deserts of his labor ? 



The soil and climate of New England respond to well 

 regulated industry, and cherish those virtues which belong to 

 a hardy and industrious people, for the absence of which no 

 tropical luxuriance is any compensation. Every thing about 

 us demands that we be good farmers. Every thing about us 

 forbids that we be bad ones. The products of our soil are in 

 proportion to our skill and industry in cultivation. Every rod 

 of drainage brings its inevitable reward to him who constructs 

 it skilfully, with a degree and a certainty unknown to any other 

 branch of manual labor. Every cord of manure judiciously 

 applied, returns to its owner its hundred fold. And if any one 

 of you doubts this, let him purchase an acre of ground and try 

 the experiment, or let him go with me to the profitable farms 

 of those who have already tried it. There is not a mechanic's 

 shop, not a mill in your county, in which actual labor is so well 

 rewarded, as it may be on these acres. We should never 

 repine, we should never complain, we should never be deterred 

 by any of those difficulties which as farmers we are obliged to 



