420 SEMI-CENTENNIAL ANNIVERSARY. 



the times. I have nowhere seen men who came nearer exempli- 

 fying the virtues of the "pure in heart." They were true prophets 

 and forerunners of the better time, not so distant, let us hope, 

 when a man may not with impunity assume vices that he denies 

 to woman. As a people, we are beginning to throw off the bur- 

 den of alcohol. Our early heroes were almost to a man as 

 earnest in advocating this reform as they were in their work of 

 spreading the gospel of fruits and flowers. I suppose that it is 

 not too much to hope that in some distant happy day the average 

 man may think it altogether beneath him to befog his mind and 

 defile his person and the air about him with a filthy, ill smelling 

 narcotic. These men of whom I write were as clean and whole- 

 some in their habits as athletes contending for a prize. I re- 

 member that in one important meeting we took a census in this 

 matter, and not a single bad habit was to be found among those 

 present. 



Almost none of these men were blessed with large resources 

 to draw upon in carrying on their experimental work for the 

 benefit of the public. What they accomplished was done with 

 their own hands with the assistance of the members of their own 

 household, and it is astonishing how much some of them ac- 

 complished out of their slender means. I have in special mind 

 Father Harris, of La Crescent. I doubt if any governor of our 

 state has done as much to elevate the home life of our people as 

 he accomplished in his long and faithful service among us. He 

 was simply indefatigable in teaching our people how they might 

 surround their homes with the cheer and comfort of flowers and 

 fruits. In horticultural meetings, at state and county fairs, and 

 in editorial work, he seemed never to lose an opportunity to say 

 or do something for the advancement of the home life of his be- 

 loved state. And he lived the life that he taught in his own little 

 Eden among the bluffs of the Mississippi. His house, shaded by 

 a fine old pine of his own planting, the orchard full of rare varie- 

 ties gathered from every corner of the state, with the vineyard 

 upon the hillside, formed as sweet a picture of a rural home as 

 I ever remember of seeing. I sometimes hear people complain 

 of their opportunities. Let this man shame them. With meager 

 schooling, no capital, no genius but the love of his work, he left to 

 his state a fortune, bequeathed to it day by day as he spent him- 

 self in untiring effort to establish a horticulture in the new 

 north. We cannot all be Carnegies, but we can all be Harrises 

 if we will. 



