WHAT OTHERS SAY 459 



charge is made, varying from forty cents to fifty cents per year. The 

 exact terms upon which a station in another state will furnish bulletins 

 may be ascertained by a letter addressed " Experiment Station," at the 

 postoffice here given, for the state named. 



AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION. 



Editors Country Gentleman : 



I was greatly surprised to read the article in Country Ge?itlemaH for 

 November 15, from a "Teacher of Agriculture," in reference to manual 

 training at agricultural colleges. It is greatly to be regretted that 

 " Teacher of Agriculture" did not sign his name. The writer says: '-The 

 teaching of practical farm work at a college or school of agriculture is, 

 and of necessity must be, a farce and a humbug." Let me say in reply, 

 that this college, the Michigan Agricultural, has now existed for thirty 

 years. Manual labor has been performed for the whole time, and to-day 

 no feature of the college is held in higher regard, I believe, by the faculty. 

 Board of Control, and by graduates, than this one of manual labor. And 

 when the labor departments have been most successfully managed, no 

 feature has been more popular with the students. These tacts certainly 

 do not smack of " farce and absurdity." The writer says, the student 

 goes to pursue a course in scientific agriculture, and acquire an education 

 that will better fit him to conduct farm operations. We, who teach sci- 

 ence in these days, would utterly rebel were we required to give up our 

 laboratory practice. We demand, that our students shall touch and 

 handle the things about which we lecture. This laboratory work is what 

 makes live, wide-awake,' enthusiastic students. Agriculture takes in all 

 science, and has a literature rich and comprehensive, and its manual op- 

 erations are very varied and complex. How much more then does the 

 teacher of agriculture need a laboratory — his broad fields — to illustrate, 

 vivify, and make interesting what he teaches ! 



The next sentence contains a confession from '-Teacher of Agri- 

 culture." which is very significent. " The chances are that the student 



