328 STATE BOARD OP AGRICULTURE. 



approach of night, and seemingly awake invigorated at the coming of the 

 morning. I know the sunflower bends its stalk to follow the sua. It is said 

 that certain plants catch insects that come to gather of their honey; so that 

 ■we may with almost certainty say that the plants perceive and feel, and I doubt 

 not that some close observer will yet find those that hear. So I have been led 

 to inquire, is there not a conscious life in plants, and is there not a reciprocal 

 consciousness existing between them and animals? May not some one of 

 us whose soul is in sweet harmony with nature discover this connecting myth 

 and tell us of it in words as full of harmony as the music of the trees? 

 While there is neither bread nor butter, nor the accumulation of either in 

 thoughts like this that border on the realms of fancy, yet a fine appreciation 

 of nature, finding expression in essays, will lend a helping hand to lift our 

 people into a broader and more complete realization of ideal life. 



My home having been for a number of years in the dwelling places of our 

 people, it has given me an opportunity to listen to conversation, and to study 

 quite carefully the mental capacities of both men and women, and I am yet to 

 be convinced that there are any civil or political rights given to men that may 

 not with equal safety be shared by women. Inclined to the opinion that men 

 have more originative genius than women, yet this is fully met by their quicker 

 perception, so that should each enjoy equal advantages, and each be barred by 

 equal restraints, it would bo difficult to say which possessed the better mind. 

 Now, as we all consider the mind as the essential element in man, if we for 

 once admit its equality in woman, what shall we say? Is it not folly to argue 

 her physical disabilities as a bar to the enjoyment of equal privileges? To be 

 sure, I would not wish my wife to be a doctor, or a lawyer, or a township super- 

 visor, but have not the least objection in that my neighbor's wife should enjoy 

 one or all of these. Not a whit less generous than the man who was willing 

 that all his wife's relation should go to war. If, then, the girl possesses the 

 same qualities of mind, and, for what you and I know, the same quality and 

 aptness as the boy, why should the doors of the Agricultural College be closed 

 against her admission ? 



The following explanation suggests itself : Slow have been the steps out 

 from barbarism to that civilization which would admit both sexes to the higher 

 schools and colleges. Does it seem possible that there yet exists in the minds 

 of some the idea that the sister in an agricultural community is not equally 

 advanced in civilization as the brother? 



Admit both brother and sister, Why? Agriculture and horticulture and 

 floriculture are fast coming to take places by the side of the other sciences. 

 The master minds engaged in these occupations are soon, if not now, to stand 

 with those of divinity, medicine, and law; not that they — divinity, medicine, 

 and law — have descended from their high estate, but that agriculture has risen 

 to the level of them. 



Said a public speaker in his lecture on the " World's To-morrow :" ** Great 

 men are as great to-day as ever in the ages past, but they appear not so, for 

 the people have risen to the height of great men." So, too, has agriculture 

 risen to the height of the other professions. Now, if we are to have a school 

 in agriculture at all, we want one that will educate the girl in horticulture and 

 floriculture as well as the boy in soil-tilling and stock-raising. The time is not 

 far distant when men and women will no longer be simply accumulators and 

 treasurers of the surplus productions, but the full enjoyers of those treasures. 

 Some of the hours now given labor will be devoted to leisure. A slow and 

 gradual change is taking place in society. The warm-hearted friendliness that 



