248 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Several of these State Associations, or People's Colleges, are of 

 only a few years' growth, but they do not need money more than mem- 

 bers, prestige more than friends, influence more than brains or charter 

 more than character. 



They are one of the hopes of progressive Missouri, and the man 

 who joins himself to the association which seeks to develop and 

 dignify his special calling will get more for his efforts, time and money, 

 I trow, than by carrying a torchlight in a political procession or scream- 

 ing his throat sore for a man who reels in drunken debauchery on the 

 floor of Congress. G. B. Lamm, Sedalia. 



TO MEMPHIS AND RETURN. 



We will not consume the reader's time with a long description of 

 the bridge-opening and deep-water convention at Memphis, from the 

 fact these have been elaborately written up and reported through the 

 leading papers. Suffice it to say that the opening of the great bridge, 

 nearly three miles long, over the Father of Waters, was a proud day 

 for Memphis, and a public improvement in which every one should feel 

 a national pride. As for deep water, it now appears that Providence 

 has given the people of the Mississippi valley more water than they 

 need or want. Levees broken, millions of acres of fertile land inun- 

 dated, thousands driven from their homes in a destitute condition, a 

 vast amount of property destroyed, many lives lost, business paralyzed 

 and the government called upon to assist the suffering people who are 

 powerless to protect themselves from the angry sweep of the wild Mis- 

 sissippi. JSoris this the first or the last time such a condition of things 

 may be expected. In view of these facts, together with cheaper trans- 

 portation for the vast products of the Mississippi valley, would it not 

 be wisdom and economy in the long run, and a national blessing, to have 

 the waters of this great river controlled by a larger, more thorough 

 and stronger system of levees, that will insure protection from devas- 

 tating floods and secure deep water, so that ocean steamers may load our 

 products at Memphis and steam proudly away for the ports of Europe. 

 Such a desirable improvement don't seem impossible when we consider 

 that the Concord, an ocean-going war-ship, drawing ItJ feet of water, 

 was present at Memphis to participate in the celebration of the bridge 

 opening. 



Our trip was over the Kansas City, Ft. Scott & Memphis railroad, 

 \yhich runs southeast from Kansas City, by way of Fort Scott, Spring- 



