38 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Wednesday, June 8—8. p. m. 



Music by the choir. 



After which an address was made by J. K. Gwynn on the World's 

 Fair matters, and a pledge that the Society could count on $10,000 for 

 the Department of Horticulture. 



The Society pledged itself as willing to do everything in her power 

 to help the matter along, and they would prepare to put up a large 

 quantity of fruit in the glass jars for exhibition purposes. 



AGRICULTURE AND HORTICULTURE IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 



" In tbe sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread," was the dictum of the 

 Almighty early in man's career. It still prevails and will so long as man inhabits 

 the earth. This means that the bread we eat will only be obtained by eifort. True, 

 there are many in the world who seem only to have to open their mouths, and they 

 are filled ; but still the fact remains that the vast majority of mankind have to put 

 forth their best efforts throughout their careers to get enough to eat. This absorbs 

 by far the large part of human energy, and promises to do so for ages to come. All 

 effort then to advance the race must take these facts into consideration. Hence 

 it is, believing as I do that mankind is to be elevated and advanced very materially 

 through the intellectual development of our agricultural classes, and that a result 

 of education should be to strengthen us for the battle for bread, that I take the 

 position that the principles of agriculture and horticulture should be a part of our 

 public school instruction, particularly in those attended largely by children of far- 

 mers, the large majority of whom will be the future farmers and farmers' wives. 



Something like 400,000 children are attending the country schools of Missouri, 

 very few of whom but will be obliged to literally eat bread in the sweat of their 

 faces, and that too in connection with agriculture. Should they not be taught as 

 children those things which will enable them to most successfully earn bread to 

 eat? " Why, certainly," says every one, "and is not this a result of education as 

 given?" 



Let us see. Among the things usually taught in our common schools are abil- 

 ity to read from the printed page, to spell, to write with a pen, to analyze, parse 

 and construct sentences, to name the capitals of states, the rivers that empty into 

 the Atlantic ocean, to recite the multiplication table, and possibly extract square 

 root. All of these accomplishments are very desirable, and by no means should be 

 neglected ; but are they not made, in the manner and connection in which they are 

 taught, to contribute too much to the aims and purpose in life foreign to those 

 which fate has set before the most of the 400,000 children of Missouri farmers ? 



To the child who is, as a man, to earn his living by farming, which is the more 

 valuable accomplishment— to be able to read glibly from the printed page, and thus 

 commune with the wise and great of this and other ages ? or to be able to read 

 from the pages of the book of nature, to read in the forests changing from brown 

 to green, in the coming and departing of birds, the flying clouds, the rain and 

 rainbow, in the blooming of flowers and the ripening of fruit, and the myriad 

 phases of life as seen ia the plants, insects and animals with which the farmer has 

 to do, the thoughts, purposes, laws and principles of the Creator? Surely the 

 man who is on familiar speaking terms with nature is in a far better position to 



