No. 7. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 133 



Governor, came the gentleman who is placed upon our program for 

 this address of welcome, the soldier, the General, I should say, the 

 Governor and the Jurist, three in one, bearing a trinity of honors. 

 Still later, to honor the county and honor the State^ and honor the 

 Nation, came another, and the last that I shall name of these hon- 

 ored governors, Daniel Hartman Hastings, recently deceased, the 

 ciear-headed, brilliant Hastings. So I say, we of Pennsylvania ought 

 to feel honored to meet in Centre county because it is and was the 

 home of so many great and good men. 



There is another reason why we ought to feel at home here in Cen- 

 tre county; this was referred to in the address of welcome. Here 

 in this county is established and has been organized for many years, 

 the School of Agriculture, treating and giving lessons upon the great 

 problems with which you and I have to deal with upon our farms all 

 over this great State. This School of Agriculture affords you and 

 1 and our families, so far as we can improve it, the opportunity of 

 attaining a knowledge of the greatest benefit to our occupation. My 

 fellow-farmers, have you ever stopped to think just what botany 

 and chemistry and a knowledge of these scientific questions as they 

 have been developed within the last ten or twelve years, has done 

 for agriculture? How little we knew fifteen years ago of this soil 

 we cultivate! We regarded it as almost dead, inert matter. Chem- 

 istry has taught us that it is alive, living^ moving matter; it deals 

 with the principles of plant life and animal life, and all vegetation. 

 The question of bacteria and questions of all these things relative 

 to the soil, chemistry has developed for the farmer. These schools 

 have developed them, and we must draw from them the knowledge 

 we require which it would be impossible for the farmer out on his 

 farm pursuing his labors there, to acquire from any other source; 

 hence we are at home here in Centre county, because we are pushed 

 right up against that great school that is doing more and will do 

 more for the farmer than any other school that we are likely to have, 

 unless the day should come that in these country schools out all 

 over Pennsylvania there should be established a system of teaching 

 the elements and principles of agriculture to our little boys and 

 girls, thus laying the foundation for this broader culture and develop- 

 ment to be obtained at this College of Agriculture. 



Now, my friends, it is not fitting that I should continue this talk. 

 We have assembled for a very important purpose and upon your 

 shoulders and mine rest a responsibility, an obligation to duty. The 

 State government has established within our bounds a Department 

 of Agriculture. It has placed within that Department a Division 

 of Farmers' Institutes, and because of that act we are assembled to- 

 day to devote a week to the study of the great problems associated 

 with agriculture; and when I say agriculture, I mean every division 



