ON THE ROAD TO PROGRESS. 155 



become as fertile a region as Utah has become ? In view of 

 the progress that has been made in the last fifty years in relation 

 to agricultural implements, and in all the sciences connected 

 with this great matter of agriculture, I believe the time will 

 come when that desert and many other places now regarded as 

 barren will be made to blossom as the rose, and yield food for 

 the sustenance of mankind. 



I have had some experience in relation to the reproduction 

 of animals, which some of my friends have regarded with con- 

 siderable doubt at any rate ; but I think I can state, without in- 

 delicacy, that, so far at least as domestic animals are concerned, 

 the sex may be to a great degree determined by the course that 

 shall be pursued in relation to their treatment. At least, such 

 has been my experience, and I believe it to be a well-established 

 fact. We are yet in our infancy in relation to all these matters. 

 We have advanced somewhat from the condition of the people 

 of the East, where they plough with a crooked stick, but we 

 have been very slow in making these changes. I recollect when I 

 was a boy, my father wanted to get a new plough. He had seen 

 a cast-iron plough, but he was doubtful about its merits, and he 

 went away with the determination to buy an old-fashioned plough, 

 but inasmuch as he could not get one, the dealers where he went 

 having nothing but the new kind of plough, he brought home, 

 with fear and trembling almost, a cast-iron plough. We used 

 it a week in the spring of the year, and if he could not have 

 obtained another, at the end of that week a hundred dollars 

 would not have purchased it. It is just so with regard to many 

 things. We are but in the beginning of progress, so far as the 

 observation and examination of the operations of nature are 

 concerned ; but we are on the high road to progress. None of 

 us will live to see the advancement that will yet be made .in all 

 matters pertaining to agriculture. 



Col. Stone. I have been very much pleased with the judge's 

 remarks on this occasion. He has touched upon a problem 

 which I believe time will solve. I believe in the goodness of 

 God. I do not believe He has ceased creating. He is creating 

 every day, and if we are disposed to look for the evidence of it 

 we shall find it. The gentleman's remarks on that point struck 

 me very forcibly. 



Adjourned to evening. 



