334 Missoun Agricultural Report. 



ment, and we have done it by encouraging the teaching of agri- 

 culture in the public schools of the State. I remember when that 

 was first instituted in my section of the State ; there were a lot of 

 mighty good men who looked upon it with indifference and others 

 who absolutely opposed the introduction, of elementary agriculture 

 in the public schools, but today they have seen the wisdom of it. 

 They inquired, "Why should you teach my boy the elements of 

 agriculture when he has grown up here on the farm and has learned 

 about all there is to know about it?" There were so many reasons 

 for the teaching of agriculture in, the public schools and we have 

 been impressing upon our people as best we could in our own way 

 the importance of such an education. 



There was a girl who had grown to young womanhood in one 

 of the great commercial centers of this country. She had never 

 been out on the farm in all her life, and after she was grown she 

 went down to visit a relative on, a great plantation in the South. 

 After she had arrived there and came out to the dinner table they 

 passed her a fine dish of rich yellow country butter, and she said, 

 "Why, do you keep a cow down, here?" Now, there was nothing 

 particularly bright or interesting in that remark, but before the 

 dinner was finished they passed a dish of fine rich honey, and she 

 said, "Law me, you keep a bee, too, don't you?" It was not the 

 girl's fault; it was the system of education that prevailed in our 

 schools. Now, that is one instance that occurred in the State. I 

 have been told that in a certain county in, Missouri, just a few 

 years ago, a young lady, who was born on the farm and raised up 

 amid agricultural surroundings, was being examined for a teach- 

 er's certificate, and among other questions propounded to her was 

 to give five reasons why a good dairy cow should be kept on the 

 farm, and one of the reasons she gave was that "We would not 

 have to live on condensed milk, which is made from milkweed." 



Then I heard of a lawyer who had lived all of his life in a 

 large city in one of the great states of the country. Close applica- 

 tion to business had undermined his health and he went west to 

 seek health out upon one of the ranches of that country. When 

 he went into the home of the ranch owner he said to the lady of 

 the house, "Now, I have come out here to seek my health; I want 

 to forget business and everything that I left behind ; I want to be 

 one of you; I want to learn your ways and how to do things as 

 you do; and when you have anything to be done call on me just the 

 same as the other folks about the house." One day she said, "All 



