122 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



are most vitally concerned. I believe it to be true that there never was a 

 time in our commonv/ealth when cur farmers were so universally pros- 

 perous, so universally happy and contented as they are at the present 

 moment, and therefore you are peculiarly fitted to consider the things 

 which concern your welfare. I have observed that a man in adversity, or 

 in discontent, or in unhappiness, can never propose changes and remedies 

 that are wise; he necessarily is affected by his condition. I congratulate 

 you upon the great success that has heretofore attended your efforts. I 

 refer now especially to your State Fair. I am in the habit of thinking that 

 everytliing that Iowa has is a little better than anything than anybody 

 else has. I am conscious, however, that my judgment sometimes may be 

 perverted by the pride I feel in the magnificent development of our com- 

 monwealth. But, I think I speali not only the opinion of our own people, 

 but I think I speak the accepted judgment of the whole western country 

 when I say that the State Fair of our commonwealth stands conspicuously 

 above the State fairs of any other commonwealth in the Union. I ought 

 to congratulate you, and I do congratulate you, upon the high fidelity, the 

 wonderful intelligence, manifested by the men to whom you have com- 

 mitted this annual exhibition of the fruits and vintage of agriculture. I 

 look upon the State Fair solely as an educational influence. It seems to 

 me that we are rearing in this State a wonderful educational structure. I 

 do not know whether to begin at the top of it or at the bottom of it to 

 describe it. I look upon it as though the Agricultural College stands at 

 the apex of this edifice. Then comes our State Fair, our agricultural 

 societies, horticultural societies, our State and County Farmers' Institutes; 

 and altogether they form one of the most admirable and effective systems 

 of instruction in agricultural science than can be found in any State in 

 the Union, or in any country in the world. I recognize that this fair and 

 these institutes have other objects than purely instruction in the science 

 of agriculture They are made pleasant and beautiful and entertaining, 

 but, after all, the highest and noblest purpose of all is to look up, to 

 ennoble the basis of humanity, the tilling of the soil. 



We have fortunately in this State a high percentage of such as no 

 other State has, and again I am drifting away into expressions of pride. 

 But I believe it to be true that while all other states have some good 

 land — and I am glad of it — there is no other State that has proportion- 

 ately the same quantity of good, splendid, fertile soil that we find in the 

 State of Iowa. I am told that in our commonwealth 971,2 per cent of the 

 area of the State is capable of successful and profitable use in agriculture; 

 and there is no other State in the Union that approaches this percent- 

 age by 10 or 15 per cent. Now that you have committed to you one 

 of the greatest agencies that was ever reposed in human hands, and the 

 splendor, the magnificence of the thing committed to you, measures your 

 responsibility in dealing with it. 



There are two things, as it seems to me, that all agriculturists and 

 all followers of agriculture, horticulture and allied occupations ought to 

 remember. First, it is our business — and I use the word our — for while 

 I am not a farmer, I, together with all others who live in this State, are 

 just as much interested in farming as you are, because it is the coming 



