176 STATE BOAED OF AGRICULTURE. 



expectations. But wlien they have a2:)plied for the places which they aspired to 

 fill, would lind the entrance thronged by a hungry, voracious crowd who had 

 already preceded them, but of whom only the most determined and persevering 

 conld gain a place. The weaker ones are thus turned back disheartened and 

 discouraged, and thrown upon a society of whose wiles they were ignorant, aud 

 which furnished upon every hand its dens of infamy and its abodes of vice and 

 crime. Into these moral whirlpools many would be nnwarily drawn, fall, and 

 become social wrecks ever after, floating as debris upon the ocean of life. 



Could we be so fortunate as to be able to impress upon the minds of this class 

 of young men the fact that enlightened agriculture is really capable of furnish- 

 ing all of those higher and more solid rational, intellectual enjoyments, and 

 secure for them a larger measure of that true, manly independence that can be 

 found in any other walk of life, we jierhaps could then induce more of them to 

 remain cultivators of the soil. We should then not only benefit society at large, 

 but would be able, with their enlightened aid, to furnish more volume to the 

 impulse of agricultural development. AVere they ambitious of fame and dis- 

 tinction ? Then there is no other field in Avhicli their competitors will be so few, 

 because in no other class so numerous are there a less number who are the pos- 

 sessors of superior educational acquirements. This will contribute to make 

 their success more certain. These intellectual enjoyments are greatly enhanced, 

 and the manifestations of the powers of the mind increased, when allied to 

 health and strength, which is more surely maintained by the exercise and labor 

 indispensable to the joroper cultivation of the soil. 



For so numerous a class, the farmers of this country have heretofore played 

 comparatively a very insignificant part in the direction of its affairs. But the 

 d/Eij, we trust, is not far distant, when they will become more competent to wield 

 the influence in it, and exert the power, to whicli their numerical strength and 

 their just rights shall entitle them. Then those who are the real exponents of 

 agricultural progress will become fitted to stand in its front ranks. There is 

 no other business of life in which ambition has played a less conspicuous part 

 than in farming, nor in no other in which the impetus this aspiring sentiment 

 could give would it become more beneficial. In the jiast, muscle has played the 

 most important part in farming ; but in the years to come another element will 

 become equally as necessary and indispensable, called brain, which will require 

 for its greatest efficiency just as diligent a course of training for its proper devel- 

 opment as the muscular system. What agriculture, then, really requires, for 

 its better development is more of these trained and educated young farmers, 

 who will be capable of becoming more efficient in this respect, and who will 

 bring to its aid a brighter glow of enthusiasm and a more active ambition, — 

 attributes indispensable to the greatest success in any business. 



We have an institution in our own State, munificently endowed by our Gen- 

 eral Government, designed expressly for this class of young men. Being the 

 first of its class established in this country, it has bravely maintained its posi- 

 tion in still remaining at their head. AVe, as the farmers of Michigan, sliould 

 feel 25roud of our Agricultural College, but thus far it has received rather a 

 reluctant and tardy appreciation at their hands. But we are glad to be able to 

 say that it is steadily gaining in the confidences of the farmers. And when its 

 real capabilities for advancing their true interests are better understood that 

 then they will be better prepared to value it more as it truly deserves. The 

 course of instruction marked ou.t for its students to pursue, if diligently studied, 

 will not only constitute them well educated, but has a special reference to fitting 



