330 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



Boon to dawn upon New England agriculture than it lias seen 

 for the last forty years. 



But the host guarantee for this improved state of things is in 

 the vigilance and activity of our farmers. A manufacturer 

 who should fail to have the most improved machinery, or who 

 should not avail liimself of all the modern discoveries and 

 facilities in the practice of his art, would become a bankrupt. 

 A navigator wlio should build his ship forgetting or neglecting 

 the improvements of tlie last fifteen years, would soon find he 

 had made a sorry speculation. A mechanic who should neglect 

 to use any tools but such as were common a quarter of a cen- 

 tury ago, would soon be compelled to admit himself behind the 

 times, and unable to bear the competition of his wiser neigiibor. 

 So the farmer must avail himself of all the improvements — of 

 all the labor-saving machines; of the best modes of cultivation; 

 he must have the best breeds of cattle, and make himself famil- 

 iar with the progress of his art — or else he cannot reasonably 

 expect success. The age may be a fast one ; but if it is so, our 

 true palicy is not to sit down and complain of it, and get left 

 behind, but to struggle on manfully, and keep up with it. 



I have said that the soil of New England is good — not one 

 that will encourage indolence, but one that requires great labor, 

 and is sure to yield an ample reward. More bushels of corn 

 can be raised on an acre in Massachusetts than in any Southern 

 State, and of a quality at least twenty-five per cent, better. No 

 part of the country produces a better crop of hay or grain. In 

 no place can better cattle be seen than on our thousand hills, 

 and in no place is there a better or surer market for all the 

 products of the earth. We have not the grapes of the Rhine, 

 nor the oranges of Cuba or Florida ; but we have a variety of 

 fruits much better, and of more value than are found in any 

 tropical climate. Our apple has already become a valuable 

 article of export. We have, too, an abundance of stone upon 

 our soil — and in some instances we may have a little too much 

 of a good thing ; but this evil will disappear as the country be- 

 comes more cultivated. It is far less apparent now to a man 

 who has lived upon a prairie where a stone cannot be found, 

 than to us who are on more familiar terms with them. 



Next to a good soil, the New England farmers may find en- 

 couragement in a good climate. Perhaps some will doubt this ; 



