328 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 



The child is born who will see a totally different state of agriculture 

 than that which now pervades our country ; he will see not only the sewage 

 of our great city, but all the towns in our land, flow buck to the source 

 from whence the production that made it came. Our millers and manufac- 

 turers will use steam, and our streams will irrigate our fields. Our child- 

 ren will receive at college an agricultural as well as collegiate education, 

 and consequently rank far higher than we, in an enlightened and social 

 scale. The plow and the harrow, both injurious to land, will give way to 

 mighty improvements in the agricultural art. The hungry soil will be torn 

 from its depths, and thrown into the atmosphere in disintegrated particles,, 

 and return not only aerated, but saturated with nitrogen and ammonia. 

 And capital now withheld from us on account of our pernicious and penu- 

 rious system, will be proud to develope its immense strength in our behalf. 



The most permanent source of national wealth arises from its agricul- 

 tural prosperity. The encouragement of agriculture should be a main 

 object with every well constituted government, and it is the duty of every 

 man composing it to use his best endeavors, at all times, thus to promote 

 the prosperity of his country. 



What I have principally attempted to describe in ray remarks to-day is 

 a general outline of practice. To recommend any system as proper, in all 

 cases, and in every situation, would certainly be an act of folly as well as- 

 mischief, because particular circumstances must always guide the practice 

 of the agriculturist. Agricultural theories, I find, much more freqiiently 

 mislead than instruct ; they may, possibly, contribute to the advancement 

 of agricultural science, abstractedly considered from the practice, but to 

 the generality of farmers, they frequently prove more injurious than bene- 

 ficial. Ignorance is always dazzled by the lureing charms of novelty. A 

 theory appears which looks plausible ; agriculturists adopt it, anticipate 

 immense gains, and find themselves deceived. The inevitable consequence 

 is, that they afterwards, invariably, treat what they call book farming, 

 with disdain and contempt, and with disgust reject every improvement that 

 bears any feature of novelty. 



When surface drainage became general, in consequence of extended cul- 

 tivation of the country, and the improvement of waste lands, and more 

 especially when open drains were extensively adopted, it is notorious that 

 the excess of floods increased greatly, and that the streams dried more 

 rapidly in drought. 



The introduction of thorough draining, in place of open drains, has, on 

 the contrary, had a tendency to prevent the excess of flood, because the 

 drops of rain falling on the surface have to fill the vacant places in 

 the drained soil, and consequently require many hours to fully drain off 

 after the shower has fallen, so that the crisis of the flood from water on the 

 surface of the land undrained has passed long before the percolating water 

 arrives to increase its volume. Consequently, thorough drainage will 

 diminish the excess of flood in streams, whilst the mud carried off will be 



