8 BOAED OF AGRICULTUEE. 



these gross discrepancies run all through the agricultural 

 productions as given in the census returns for this Common- 

 wealth. 



The inference, therefore, that our agriculture has been 

 declining during the last ten years, so readily taken up and 

 reiterated by the public press of the country when the cen- 

 sus statistics first appeared, is entirely false, and is not justi- 

 fied by the actual facts, as will clearly appear on a more 

 complete analysis of the census and a comparison with the 

 oflicial returns of the several towns, unquestionably the most 

 reliable and trustworthy authority. So far from this, the 

 aggregate value of the farm-production of the State has 

 largely increased, even though a few of the old staple crops 

 may have fiiUen off", which is by no means certain. 



But the most marked and apparent change is to be found 

 in the methods of conducting farm operations, especially in 

 the extensive use of machineiy in the place of hand-labor. 

 Twenty years ago there was not a thoroughly efiicient mow- 

 ing-machine in the State, and probably every machine now 

 used has been patented since that time. The practical econ- 

 omy of the mower was not then fully established, nor had 

 the great mechanical obstacles to its use been fully overcome. 

 Few farmers, indeed, had faith that they could be overcome 

 so far as to relieve them from the necessity of the use of the 

 hand-scythe. The work of these machines at some of the 

 great public trials of that day, was hardly admitted to be 

 good enough to be tolerated in comparison with the scythe, 

 while the draught in them all was very great, with a side- 

 draught which was destructive to the team. 



But the inventive genius of the country had been stimu- 

 lated to great activity by the partial success attained, and the 

 rapid grovrth of this important branch of manufactures, so 

 intimately connected with the prosperity of our agriculture, 

 may be dated about the year 1855. At that time the draught 

 in most of the machines had been materially lessened, though 

 most of them still had a side-draught that was so great as to 

 be very objectionable. But they could not mow fine grass 

 without a constant liability to clog, and none of them could 

 start in the grass without backing to get up speed. But from 

 that date improvements rapidly multiplied. The celebrated 



