414 STATE BOAKD OF AGEICULTURE. 



selves without a home ; their children perhaps have fallen into the habits of 

 village loafers, too indolent to work, and too proud to beg, and in the end 

 become patrons of whisky-shops, jails, and jorisons. This is the experience of 

 many families following the noblest and most independent of all occupations. 

 They become weary of its labors, or discouraged, or hope to gain a livelihood 

 without digging it from the soil. They have sold out and rushed into j-our 

 villages and cities to add to the number of drones in the hive of human 

 industry, and to give their sons a preparatory course in the whisky-shojDS, to 

 insure their admission sooner or later into the penal and reformatory institu- 

 tions of the State. But I am impressed with the belief that these sad lessons 

 of change from farm to village life are growing less frequent, and the spirit of 

 inquiry and progress that now so generally exist in our farming community are 

 rapidly leading our rural population to a better knowledge of their pursuits. 

 Not only do they begin to appreciate its substantial securit^^, but the sturdy 

 independence which tlie farmer enjoys, so that instead of looking upon his 

 labors as toilsome drudger}^, it will become inviting and attractive, and in the 

 light of a higher and broader intelligence, with the constantly increasing labor- 

 saving machines, the employment of the agriculturist will be regarded with 

 favor and give him leisure to study the processes of nature by which the pro- 

 ducts of the earth are brought forth to feed and bless mankind. Then, instead 

 of sowing his fields at random he will know what land is ready for the plow, 

 and what grain with a fair season it will bring to the harvest Avorthy of the 

 sickle. I have no doubt your own experience has demonstrated that the same 

 acreage of ground by proper care and cultivation has produced double the 

 amount with but a trifling increase of labor or expense, so that you have been 

 enabled, like the merchant or manufacturer referred to, to enter the market 

 with a better article and at less cost than your less enterprising neighbors. 



I can appreciate fully the embarrassment Avhich some farmers labor under 

 from lack of means to make the improvements they desire, and that especially 

 when they purchase lands that are badly impoverished. Their recuperation 

 must be slow unless considerable of an outlay is made ; but some progress can 

 be made witliout seriously interrupting the labor of the farm by gathering ma- 

 terials for beds of compost at odd Jobs and by a little extra care in gathering 

 and saving your manures and by adding such fertilizing substances as are wasted 

 and thrown away. But whether I am right in this or not, one thing you may 

 rely upon, that you will never improve your condition by starving your lands 

 any more than by starving your stock. You could sell your hay and grain and 

 starve your cattle and sell their hides in the spring, and in tlnit way get two 

 crops a year if you think that is profitable. 



I am aware also that experience demonstrates that the margin of profit is 

 always the largest wlien the lands are kept in the best condition and under the 

 most thorough cultivation. In this connection may I not suggest that the kind 

 and different breeds of stock that are to be kept and reared upon the farm 

 is worthy of your consideration. But it would be useless to get thoroughbreds 

 unless you are prepared to give them good keeping. If you expect them to 

 endure the storms of winter without shelter and live on thistles and buckwheat 

 straw, then keep scrubs. They will stand it without food as long as Jonah did 

 in the whale's belly. I am satisfied from my own experience that there are 

 great advantages in keeping the improved breed of hogs ; that there is a saving 

 of from thirty to fifty per cent in the cost of fattening between the Essex or 

 Suffolk and the old fashioned lop-eared, long-snouted races that were formerly 



