188 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Jan., 



That so many prominent and successful business men begin 

 their career as farmers, is often remarked, and is a well recognized 

 fact. It seems to me but natural, and to be the legitimate result 

 of the early farm education, and it also seems to me natural 

 that so large a proportion of the town and city -bred should never 

 accumulate much property. 



Did you ever reflect on the great difference between the experi- 

 ence of country and city children in all that educates them in 

 forethought and preparing for the future? in self-sacrifice to-day 

 for some future good? — I question if you have, so let us contrast 

 the early education of the child on the farm and the one in a city, 

 in this matter. 



The child on the farm sees the business of the father go on 

 from day to day, as he of the city does not. He sees what it is, 

 and why it is; it is very varied in character, and much of it of a 

 kind that awakens his interest, and at a very early age he begins 

 to take part in it, and becomes, as it were, a member of the firm. 

 He feeds the chickens, and feels big to see them come at his call; 

 he drives the cows; he watches the bars when grain or hay is being 

 hauled, and so on; he has a sense of responsibility in the manage- 

 ment of affairs, and he feels that the success of the establishment 

 depends in part upon him; his own importance is correspondingly 

 magnified, and along with it his sense of worth. He is not a nuis- 

 ance, and made to feel it by his adult companions who wish he 

 could be abolished along with other nuisances, — no, — he is a 

 person of importance, a member of the firm, and helps run the 

 business. As the chickens come at his call, or the cattle flee before 

 his shout, as perhaps he brandishes a great whip when he drives 

 them, he feels in his heart some of the satisfaction of command, 

 like the centurion of old, "I say to this one go and he goeth, and 

 to another come and he cometh, and to my servant, do this and he 

 doeth it." He has an importance and a-use and place in his home 

 that the city child has not. The city boy is made to feel that he is 

 at the bottom of the little social kingdom of the household, sub- 

 ject to all the grades above it. The country child is not; the do- 

 mestic animals are below him, and serve and obey and fear him. 



But more than this; all, or very nearly all the work of the 

 farm he sees going on or takes part in, is for future and unseen 

 results rather than for immediate and obvious ones. Every step is 



