14 Journal of Agriculture, Victoria. [10 Jan., 1919, 



education which will make them efficient in a business way, and which 

 will make them good citizens as well. 



These, then, are the main objects of agricultural education in 

 America — the development of agriculture until it shall be profitable, 

 productive, permanent, until the country districts are comfortable, and 

 the rural people educated. 



Dr. Davenport says that if this development of agriculture were 

 merely the concern of the farmers we might leave them to provide for 

 it themselves, or let matters rest as they are. But in the final analysis 

 the development of agriculture is a public question. The farmers are 

 interested, of course, and for selfish reasons; but even if they were not 

 interested the nation should still insist, for public reasons, that agri- 

 culture be developed to the utmost. Farmers will reap the first advan- 

 tages of such development, but they can realize no advantages that 

 are not shared by the whole community. 



The development of agriculture, then, is a matter of vital public 

 concern, and any money spent on such development 'is not an outlay, 

 but an investment in the safest bank on earth — the soil of the Common- 

 wealth, and the people on whom the nation must depend for its manage- 

 ment. 



What have been the results of the expenditure of America on agri- 

 cultural education? Primary production for the fifteen years prior to 

 the war had been increasing to the value of £90,000,000 annually, and 

 £90,000,000 per annum extra production is a fine dividend to realize 

 on the amount spent for agricultural education. 



Let me briefly review the forms of agricultural education. Agricul- 

 tural education, taken in the broadest sense of the term, may be said 

 to cover all those activities undertaken for the promotion of sound and 

 profitable agriculture of a country. 



These may be classified as (1) instructional work, (2) investigational 

 work, (3) extension work. By instructional work we mean all the 

 formal teaching of agriculture from the primary schools to the Univer- 

 sity. 



Instructional Wokk. 



The investigational work involves the discovery of new facts and 

 principles pertaining to agriculture. 



By publicity or extension work is meant the conveyance and dissemi- 

 nation of agricultural information to those who are unable to take 

 advantage of the formal teaching of the schools and colleges. 



The three great institutions are (1) the Agricultural College, (2) 

 The Experiment Station, (3) the Federal Department of Agriculture. 



The agricultural colleges were born in the throes of the Civil "War — 

 at a time when the very existence of the nation Avas at stake — when 

 doubt and pessimism seemed to reign supreme. 



They have had a chequered career. At first they attracted no 

 students. To-day they are crowded. Forty years of failure and 

 twelve years of dazzling success is the epitome of the history of the 

 colleges. 



Last year 130,000 students were registered in the 53 colleges of 

 agriculture in the United States, and of these 16,000 were undergoing 

 a four years' course for the degree of Agricultural Science, It would 

 take me too long to trace the history of the colleges — but success came 



