FAKMERS' INSTITUTES. 125 



butter never comes amiss winter or summer, in the family) more than for the 

 profit, considering the hihor required the whole year round, but they constitute 

 an important branch of mixed husbandry, and cannot be dispensed with. We 

 have a large country to produce from, and our markets are generally tilled ; but 

 when a scarcity occurs in any one branch we are apt to neglect others at our 

 own expense. Success in our calling depends on being posted as to what branch 

 the majority are neglecting. Wheat, corn, and oats can be carried over some- 

 times to good advantage, if the farmer is unincumbered. 



A few words on the manural question may not be out of place. Formerly 

 there was an idea prevalent at our agricultural department that the farm must be 

 kept in good condition by the compost or forage of the farm exclusively. Clover 

 was of no account whatever. This I learned by interviewing one of the former 

 foremen of the Agriculture farm who lectured in our neighborhood. The state- 

 ment which he made was, he would have enough of compost to do it, if he had 

 to buy forage from his neighbors. The thought struck me at the time, "Rob 

 Peter to pay Paul." I cannot believe that such is the case at the present time. 

 The verdict of every farmer in the State (at least of intelligence) would be 

 against it. The farmer who sows from 40 to 80 acres of wheat, and other crops 

 in proportion, wdll say that all the manure of his farm animally will not dress 

 20 acres. It is one of the impossibilities to keep the grain farms up without the 

 use of clover. Clover, used for manural purposes, gives us our best specimens 

 of wheat, — that is when we turn it under, and do not remove it and exhaust the 

 soil still more by so doing. The reason is obvious : it carries more potash back 

 to the soil than any compost which we use. Such is the verdict of those who 

 liave taken an analysis of its properties. 



As to the stock of our country, I would like to see the good qualities of all 

 the thorough breeds, as they are termed, centered in one. True, it would 

 require time to do it, but what a great convenience it would be for the farmer ! 

 Equally as much or more than combining all of the good patent improvements 

 of reapers and mowers in one combined machine for all work. 



Here I leave you to anticipate all that might be said on this point, for I trust 

 your experience is your school-master. I must proceed, for my time is limited 

 to ten minutes on this exhaustless subject. xVnd here let me turn your attention 

 into another channel : farming or mixed husbandry in a higher sense. 



The field of mixed husbandry is broad enough not only for the labor of our 

 hands, but the more pleasing and profitable exercise of the mind in learning the 

 principles and operation of the laws of reproduction. We are not content to 

 plow, sow, and reap, and repeat from year to year, and spend a long life in such 

 a course, and regard not the laws of growth, so sublime in their operation, and 

 essential in our calling. We have had our experience and observation in forming 

 grounds for the working out a problem of great value to us, tracing matter from 

 effect to cause. 



Nature has a multiplicity of forms for our special benefit, and adapted to the 

 law of our minds. She is continually inviting us into her work-house to view the 

 materials which she uses in constructing and reconstructing in variegated forms.. 

 If we understood the nature of those elements, and the laws of their combination,, 

 failure would seldom be written upon our labors. 



To show how near we arrive at the point in question, we instance one thing 

 that all are familiar with : In grafting we take a slip from the sweet bough 

 tree, and insert it in a stock which produces the most inferior fruit of the apple 

 kind ; but the graft, when it comes to bear, gives us the sweet bough. The 



