No. 7. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 263 



spared to make them successful. Trials and inconveniences are en 

 dured by those who labor along these lines that border on the heroic, 

 for he is a true hero only who will sacrifice his own comfort for the 

 betterment of his fellow-man. 



Notwithstanding all the good things that may be said about this 

 great and good work, there has been, is, and always will be some 

 weak spots to be found and opportunity for improvement. The di- 

 rector of institutes has no sinecure. His business is to get together 

 the best material he can and make the best of it after he has secured 

 it. From my own personal knowledge he is besieged for work by 

 men who should be in the pew rather than the pulpit. Men who have 

 the "gift of gab" imagine they are called to the work if the per diem 

 and expenses will bring them in a greater income than a run-down 

 farm conducted in the most disreputable way. Such men generally 

 want to be assigned to districts remote from their homes where their 

 audiences cannot know that they do not practice what they preach. 

 Then there are those who have a political pull or a relative pull or a 

 pull of some kind that make claims for recognition in this, we might 

 justly say, sacred work. God grant that the day is not far distant 

 when politics and work of this kind shall forever be divorced. Men 

 of the first-class or the second-class or of any class that are not fitted 

 for the work should be selected to stay at home until they have 

 learned to do things as well and tell how to do them, for the fountain 

 never rises higher than its source. 



To get down to the subject more closely requires that personalties 

 be indulged in. To be a good institute worker requires enthusiasm. 

 The speaker should be full of it. It should not, however, be all one- 

 sided. Happy is the man who is able to get his audience enthusiastic 

 as well as himself. If it be lacking anywhere let it be in the speaker 

 and not in the hearers. Eloquence is a very desirable attribute of 

 the speaker at an institute. Daniel Webster, America's most elo- 

 quent orator, said that eloquence must exist in the man, in the sub- 

 ject and in the occasion. You are the man, your subject is of your 

 own choosing, and the occasion is always at hand if an audience of 

 farmers have left their fields and flocks or their cheerful firesides to 

 listen to advice as to how to improve their conditions. Eloquence 

 is a combination of high purpose, a firm resolve and dauntless 

 courage, reaching the heart of the hearer. Two things are absolutely 

 essential to eloquence. First, the speaker must know what he is 

 talking about, and second he must mean what he says. That is the 

 whole thing in a nut-shell. There are many men who seek glory by 

 their eloquence, who court popularity by carrying their audiences 

 with them by oratorical effect, by grand-stand plays. Such men lose 

 sight of the truth often and mislead their hearers by substituting 



