ANNUAL WINTER MEETING. 71 



from your ranks, and are now receiving, some of our very best institute 

 intructors. I am here to-day at the request of your secretary, to tallc to 

 you a little while concerning the work of horticultural instruction as con- 

 ducted in our institutes,and,undoubtedly, I could make a very long report 

 if I gave you a detailed account of what we do; hut I think this is hardly 

 from the fact that many of you have already attended our institutes and 

 necessary know what the work is. I have thought, however, it would be 

 very proper for me to discuss some principles which I think should be kept 

 in mind in conducting this work in our farmers* institutes. I am pretty well 

 persuaded that there are some, at least, who fail to understand the true 

 situation of the case. The work in this line in our state has very natu- 

 rally taught me some things; yet I am fully persuaded I have a good 

 many more to learn. 



The first point T will make with you is this: in order to conduct 

 this work successfully in our institutes, there is great need of tact. 

 The speaker before me has very truthfully and attractively outlined 

 the situation in Wisconsin, which is very like that which we find 

 in Minnesota. The average farmer takes but very little interest in 

 horticulture, and consequently has done little or nothing in the line of 

 fruit growing. When you approach him in a public meeting on this 

 matter, you must use a good deal of tact. I think we can best illustrate 

 this matter of tact by telling a little story which some of you may have 

 already heard and forgotten. This story is about a little incident that 

 occurred in the life of that great family which is sometimes called the 

 third department of the human family, namely, the Beecher family. I 

 always had a great admiration for them. It is said that Henry Ward 

 Beecher was at one time attending a ministerial meeting where they had 

 been discussing at some length the great difficulties attendant upon the 

 planting and the growth of this grand gospel, and they laid many things 

 up to the charge of old Adam and to the Devil, in general. Henry Ward 

 Beecher sat there in their midst undoubtedly thinking that there were 

 many things charged by men to old Adam that should be answered for by 

 themselves. So he rose and said, "Brethren, we are taught we are fishers 

 of men, and my own experience has taught me that there are two kinds of 

 fishers. One of them takes a very finely polished pole, with a very fine line, 

 and attaches it to a neat hook nicely baited and approaches the stream 

 with soft tread, throws his line and hook carefully and gracefully and 

 skillfully over into the water, catches his fish and returns at night with 

 his basket full. There is another kind of fisher who cuts down a big pole 

 and ties on it a big coarse line and a big hook, and he dosen't even expect 

 to bait it, but walks up to the stream with a sort of authority and 

 threshes the water, saying, "Now bite, or be damned." (Laughter.) Now, 

 I told that story to illustrate what I would call, on the one hand, tact, 

 and, on other hand, the lack of it. 



Now, then, the next point I want to make is this: In order to exer- 

 cise tact you must have a pretty fair conception of the kind of fish you 

 are going to catch, and as a rule men are exceedingly shy. They belong 

 to the trout variety. I am well aware that there are some mullet heads 

 among them, (laughter) but my experience in life has led me to entertain 

 very much respect for the average man. It is not wise to discount him. 

 Now, I want to bring before you a Minnesota farmers' institute, and, first, 

 I want to tell you how they are brought together. A happy thought 

 came to my friend, who acts as our assistant, in connection with a book that 



