INDIANA HOETICULTUBAI. SOCIETY. 311 



horticultural movement of this age is doing far more for the higher civili- 

 zation than all the other business industries in tlie land. 



Let us, then, labor generally toward that millennial day when every 

 cottage shall shine with some of the beauty, and every laborer's table 

 carry some of the fruits of our art. 



Nearly all of us favor the teaching of the elementary principles of 

 agi'iculture and horticulture in our public schools. We can not begin 

 too early in life to train the children in the ai-t of fruit and flower culture, 

 and start them on the way to carve out for themselves the model home 

 of the future. 



If we can not succeed in having these things taught in the common 

 schools, we should have in each county of the State at least one agricul- 

 tural and horticultural high school, where a fairly good education along 

 these lines might be obtained by those who expect to be tillers of the soil, 

 but who can not afford to go to any of the colleges of the country to get it. 



We have our gi-ade and high schools all over the land, leading up to the 

 college and the university, but there is no instruction, no special training, 

 leading up to the agricultural and horticultural college for the fifty per 

 cent, of the rising generation who are to live on farms in the years to 

 come. 



It is cheaper to take the school to the masses than it is the masses 

 to the schools. And the school does much more good when in reach of 

 those who are to be benefited therefrom. It was upon this principle that 

 the Great Master desired His teachings to be promulgated when He said: 

 "Go ye into all the world and teach," instead of saying, "Stand ye here 

 and let the select few come and learn." 



The subject of forestry is one in which all are interested. Many of 

 us were born in a noble woodland that has been destroyed. Those who 

 desli-oyed it gained little, but we and those who are to follow us will be 

 the sufferers. 



There is notliiug better established in physical science than that a 

 good proportion of forest is necessary to maintain equability of climate. 

 We are told by scientific men that at least one-fifth of the land should 

 I>e in forest tc secure the greatest aggregate of field and fruit crops, in 

 many parts of our country we have passed the limit of safety in timber 

 waste, but the worlv of woodland destruction goes on with remorseless 

 energy. And still very little has been done to stop the waste or to pro- 

 mote forest culture. The governments of other countries show much 

 more wisdom than we. They live in the immediate presence of the ruin 

 and national decay that have come to once fertile and populous lands. 



Some one has said that the institutions of civilization have never de- 

 clined in a country that has maintained its forests, nor have they been 

 long perpetuated in any country that has wasted its woodland heritage 

 without repair. 



