186 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY, 



pies?" The^^ said, "Oh, you know how, and you have nothmg 

 else to do." 



Mr. G. J. Kellogg: I am learning s'^mething while I am 

 here. I thought you were head and shoulders above any other 

 state in the matter of agricultural knowledge. We distribute 

 tons of literature at our farm institutes, and the people take 

 everything we give them. 



Col. Stevens: I think one reason for that is, that the annual 

 issued by the Wisconsin institute is much more tasty than ours. 

 Ours is gotten up in a cheap style, and the people think it is 

 cheap literature. 



There has been some objection to our annual on account of 

 the bad covers and being printed on poor paper. If they had 

 been neat and tasty like the Wisconsin annuals, they would 

 have been read more. 



Pres. Underwood: I do not want our Wisconsin friends to 

 go back home with such a poor opinion, and I find it necessary 

 to defend the publication of our farmers' institute annual. I 

 am one of the board of managers of the institute, and I think 

 Mr. Somerville and Mr. Wedge will bear me out when I say 

 that there is no session of the institute that is so well attended 

 as the one that is advertised as giving avx^ay to every one pres- 

 ent one of the publications. I have been at an institute and 

 seen the room just crowded when the thermometer was 40 or 50 

 below, and you would not suppose a farmer would go anywhere 

 that day — and I have seen the room packed with farmers and 

 men from the country, and they were all ther<-^ to get those 

 books; and just as soon as the morning session was over and it 

 w^as announced that every one present could have a book, it was 

 hardly possible to get enough books. I have seen Mr. Gregg 

 look at a young man, considering whether he had better give 

 him a book or not, as he thought he was too young to make good 

 use of it. I told him to let him have the book; he wanted that 

 book to read. I have got an entirely different impression of 

 the farmers from what some of you have. I believe they like 

 good literature, and 1 believe they read our reports and publi- 

 cations. There may be some that do not read them, but I am 

 surprised that this opinion prevails that farmers generally will 

 not read them. I wish to say that the best thing Mr. Wedge 

 can do possibly is to see thatour literature is distributed among 

 the people at the institutes and to solicit membership for this 

 society. That is a missionary work he ought to do— and to 

 distribute bulletins from the state school. They want the 



