382 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



In some of the items, where the last returns have been 

 procured from the census office, the comparisons have been 

 brought down to 1880, and malve a most favorable showing 

 of a large increase over 1875, which has necessarily been 

 taken as the basis of most of the prices. 



If we had the completed returns of 1880, we should find 

 this amount increased to fully thirty millions. 



And when to this are added the millions expended iu re- 

 claiming land, in planting trees and vines, in good houses 

 and grand barns, and in improved agricultural implements, 

 machines, and appliances for lightening labor, it would seem 

 that in a material point of view the question. Has agriculture 

 declined, is answered, Most decidedly. 



Much of this talk of the decline of our agriculture is 

 engendered by some of those living on poor farms, or in the 

 hill-country, and in regions a little remote from convenient 

 railway-stations and a market, and perhaps themselves lack- 

 ing in some of the elements Avhich are necessary to success 

 in any occupation. Judging from the scope of their own 

 limited vision, they think that the number of farms, value of 

 farms and farm buildings, and acres of cultivated land, must 

 have been greatly reduced. But let us see how this is. 



Comparing again the Federal census from 1850 with the 

 State census, we find that the number of farms has in- 

 creased from 34,069 in 1850, 35,200 in 1860, 26,507 in 1870, 

 44,549 in 1875 ; the average size being 99 acres in 1850, 94 

 in 1860, 103 in 1870, and 76 in 1875. 



The value of farms and farm buildings during the same 

 time has increased from $109,076,347 to $182,663,140, or at 

 nearly the rate of -13,000,000 annually.^ 



If an occasional deserted house or tumble-down barn is 

 pointed out, and cited as evidence of decline, there are to be 

 seen, for every one of those, scores of pleasant, commodious, 

 and attractive farmhouses, and large, handsome, and conven- 

 ient barns and out-buildings, to prove the negative of any 

 such assertion ; and perhaps there could be no more convin- 

 cing witnesses against the fallacy of that proposition than 

 the hundreds of pretty and comfortable schoolhouses sprin- 



1 In 1850 the average .value of the farms was $3,205, and of machines and 

 implements on each farm $94. In 1875 the average value of each farm was 

 54,100, and of machines and imi-dements on each farm $120. 



