A HUNDRED YEAES' PEOGRESS. 301 



riviug their origin from the old "Justin Morgan," remarkable for com- 

 pactness of form, strength, and docility, and unsurpassed for general 

 utility 5 the latter excellent as roadsters, of a high and nervous stj'le of 

 action, a wonderfully elastic step, and a symmetrical and muscular form. 

 These two families of horses have added many millions of dollars to the 

 value of the stock of this country. They infused a new spirit into the 

 whole business of horse-breediug, and gave us such a reputation for 

 great success in this direction as to lead Professor Low, of Scotland, in 

 his "History of Domestic Animals," to say of us: "They prefer the 

 trot to the paces more admired in the old continent, and having directed 

 attention to the conformation which consists with this character, the 

 lastest trotting horses in the world are to be found in the United States." 



But the draught-horse has not been neglected. The Conestoga, a 

 large and heavy breed of horses, used mostly for the purposes of slow 

 work in the drays of our large towns and cities, is extensively raised in 

 some parts of the Middle States, while the Percheron has more recently 

 been introduced and bred in some parts of the West. 



The number of horses in this country, according to the last census, 

 was 8,690,219, of which 7,142,849 were on farms, and the balance foimd 

 in cities and large towns. This was a gain of more than a million in 

 ten years, for, in 1860, the total number was reported as 7,434,688, ot 

 which 6,249,174 were upon farms. The number on farms in 1850 was 

 4,336,719, there having been no effort made to ascertain the number not 

 kept on farms. 



It will thus be seen that the capital invested in horses constitutes a 

 large item in our national wealth ; and to this should be added more than 

 a million of mules and asses, the number returned in the census of 1870 

 being 1,125,415. The extent of our dependence upon this class of stock 

 was never more completely realized than during the prevalence of the 

 epizootic of last year, when the infinitely varied transactions of the 

 country, social, manufacturing, and commercial, were so nearly brought 

 to a stand-still for the want of the services of the horse. 



This brief sketch of the rise and growth of the great agricultiu'al in- 

 terests of the country, involving such vast amounts of capital, giving 

 employment and bread to myriads of men, and producing annually the 

 incredible income of more than 82,447,538,658, would "be incouiplete 

 without an allusion to the increase of intelligence, and the part which 

 science has taken in bringing about such magnificent results. 



I have already referred to the early attempts at associated effort and 

 the growth of agricultural societies. Few and feeble enough at first, 

 and slow in the growth of their influence among the people, they have 

 now become a powerful aid in the progTCSs of all departments of agri- 

 cultural knowledge, and have grown up to a harmonious system of na- 

 tional. State, county, and township organizations, all active, not only in 

 gathering and diffusing information, but furnishing a constant stimulus 

 to new eiibrt and to higher triumphs of practical skill. 



To the earnest spirit of inquiry which these societies awakened in the 

 community is due, in a great measure, the growth and respectability of 

 the agricultural literature of the country. "With the exception of four 

 brief " Essays on Field-Husbandry," liy the Eev. Jared Eliot, of Con- 

 necticut, the first of which is dated in 1747, 1 know of no agTicultural 

 book i^rinted in the colonies previous to the Eevolution ; and all that fol- 

 lowed that event for many years consisted chiefly of the more or less 

 valuable papers submitted to the ]\rassachusetts, the Philadelphia, and 

 the Xew York societies, till the American Farmer was started in Balti- 

 more in 1819. This is believed to have been the first regular strictly 



