HISTORY OF HORTICULTURE IN MINNESOTA. 165 



the rocks, to deepen and mellow the soil, to enrich and plant it, and blessed 

 b}^ the sunshine and rain of heaven, there will arise in his heart such joy as 

 is beyond purchase.'' 



To those who are now engaged, or contemplate engaging in the pursuit of 

 horticulture, there is another important matter to which I wish to call atten- 

 tion, and that is the great disproportion, in this State, between men's farms 

 and their capital. The capital of the man, who in any manner cultivates the 

 soil, is his skilled labor and his money. If his means are small, he should 

 have no more land than he can thorwighly manage by his own personal labor ; 

 every acre beyond this is an encumbrance. 



One acre, well cultivated, is of more protlt than twenty skimmed over. It 

 is this hunger for more land that keens men poor, and that prevents the State 

 receiving the credit due her rich soil from continual large aggregate yields, 

 which would be the result of systematic and thorough cultivation. 



Small farms are better far than large ones, simply because they are better 

 suited to the average capital of common farmers. 



But large farms with large capital are better than small ones ; but 640 acres 

 of laud in the possession of a man who has capital sufficient only to properly 

 develop 40 acres, leads only to disaster. Either he pays taxes, and probably 

 interest also, on 600 acres of superfluous land, or he spreads his small capital 

 over the whole section, which, so far as results are concerned, is as valuable 

 as a spoonfull of guano scattered over Vermillion Prairie. 



Now, in no branch of soil culture is thorough and systematic cultivation so 

 important and so certain of large returns, as in horticulture. No labor 

 expended on the soil to increase its productiveness, is ever thrown away, and 

 those who desire to increase their incomes, will find more lasting benefit from 

 increased expenditure over the land already possessed and an increased degree 

 of diligence in its ctiltivation, than from widening the boundaries of their 

 possessions. There certainly is a point beyond which little return coitld be 

 expected, but from all the information I have been enabled to gain, by reading 

 and observation, the exact location of such a desired spot, in this State, has 

 as yet not been determined. 



There is scarcely an acre of laud in the State which cannot be made profit- 

 able by the cultivation of some fruit crop. In thousands of acres classed as 

 " swamp," and considered as more than valueless, the cranberry grows wild, 

 which, when cultivated will produce a larger return per acre than the finest 

 wheat laud in the State. But the profit arising from the cultivation of this 

 fruit, as in the case of all branches of fruit culture, cannot be realized, except 

 as the reward of diligence based on practical knowledge : for no man, after 

 having planted trees or small fruits, can sit down in idleness and wait for a 

 bountiful harvest. 



As a further incentive to increased production of fruit, permit me to call 

 your attention to a comparison of apples displayed at the fair of the Amer- 

 ican Institute, in New York, in October and November, 1872. The State of 

 Kansas was represented by three of the best informed horticulturists in their 

 State; and the display of apples, in point of beauty and variety, would have 



