54 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



shelter, and that cunning hands are busy in our midst to 

 minister to those wants. The young girl, hardly budding into 

 womanhood, and the aged mother whose children have long 

 been men and women, both contend for the prizes. The tables 

 are piled with apples more delicious and beautiful than all the 

 famed fruit of ancient mythology, grapes in richer clusters than 

 Bacchus and all his ancient votaries ever dreamed of. All the 

 fruits and flowers, which New England soil can be made to 

 yield, all the handicraft which fertile New England brains can 

 invent, are gathered in these fairs for our admiration and for 

 our profit, — for the honor and gratification of those whose 

 care and labor have produced them. These fairs, then, are 

 the grand review days of the great peace forces stationed with- 

 in our borders, holding the farm-houses and villages, the school- 

 houses and churches of happy New England. 



All these products represent so much toil of hand and brain. 

 The earth has, indeed, yielded her strength, for all this wealth 

 of fruits and flowers was moulded from her soil. Last spring 

 most of them were dirt beneath our feet. 



All nature has been in action both to build up and to destroy. 

 And it is because man has lent the energies of his mind and 

 the strength and cunning of his hand to secure the favoring 

 influences and to ward off destroyers, that the hills are filled 

 with flocks and the valleys are covered with corn. If this 

 wealth here gathered is the product of the earth, it is also the 

 result of human toil. 



We are ready to maintain the dignity of labor, but it is the 

 product of labor that is the measure of its dignity. There is 

 no dignity in wasted labor. Labor wholly unproductive would 

 become intolerable punishment even to the most industrious. 

 But the hardest toil is lightened when every blow is followed 

 by results, and every blow is honorable that is struck for the 

 physical, intellectual or moral welfare of the human race. 

 Labor becomes dignified just in proportion as it becomes power- 

 ful for good, as it yields greater products which the best civili- 

 zation demands. And all this grand exhibition is to show what 

 means of enjoyment the labor of the year has supplied and 

 how the labor of the coming years may improve such products 

 and give larger returns for the thought and strength expended. 

 The grand problem is to utilize labor, that every hour of toil 



