AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION. 21 



White of Cornell has been twice here, and always refers to the college as one of the best. 

 Mr. Cornell himself was here, and spoke of it in terms of high praise. President Angell, 

 coming Into the State from Vermont, is reported in the Free Press of Nov. 16, 1871, to have 

 paid, "The Agricultural College was recognized as the best of its kind in the United States." 

 He is said by tbe same paper to have added that " he bad for tbe last five years been en- 

 deavoring to discover how best to establish an agricultural department to the institution with 

 which he was connected, and in tbe time he bud found out how remarkably little interest 

 wa* felt in the application of science to agriculture." 



Geo. Geddes of New York, whose name is familiar to agriculturists, has written to tbe 

 N. Y. Tribune more than once, praising Its experiments, its general management, and pivin:; 

 an account of his visit to it. He says, "I spent more than two weeks in tbe Stale of .Michi- 

 gan, and took considerable pains to inquire of doctors, ministers, and farmers as to the 

 opinions of tbe people generally in regard to their Agricultural College, and in all cases was 

 told that it was rapidly growing in public favor; anJ I beard nothing except in approval. " 



Mr. J. J. Thomas of the Country Gentleman visited tbe college last year, and has taken 

 pains to express his approval of it in several papers. In his address at Adrian, be 

 "Tbe Agricultural College of lb State has long stood in the front rank of the most efficient 

 institutions of the kind in the world, and the labors of its able professors have been attended 

 with eminent success." 



The California State Grange, in a memorial to tbe Legislature criticising their own uni- 

 versity, says (1874) : " To Michigan belongs tbe honor of establishing the first Agricultural 

 College, as long ago as 1855. Never since have the objects of such an institution been more 

 lully comprehended." 



Joseph Harris, author of "Walks and Talks," visited the college, examined its general 

 management and the experiments going on, and has always referred to the college in terms 

 of praise. His papers and his conversation testify to the high value he set upon our ex- 

 periments. 



In 1871 tbe National Bureau of Education commissioned Mr. Gillman, then a Professor in 

 Yale Scientific School, to visit and report on the National Schools of Science. He reports 

 of Michigan Agricultural College that its " success bad been assured for many years past." 



The American Agriculturist, Country Gentleman, Prairie Farmer, Michigan Farmer, and 

 other papers whose managers were personally acquainted more or less with it, have fre- 

 quently given a word of praise, and the press in general has been for the last few years de- 

 sirous of aiding it. Tbe Detroit dailies have, since tbe question of location stands settled, 

 looked upon the college as one of the important institutions of the State, in whose doings 

 the public has an interest; and I may safely say, no agricultural college stands higher iu 

 the country than our own. 



ITS COST. 



The institution has, no doubt, been costly, and the State liberal ; and considering the un- 

 settled questions of location and usefulness, very liberal. But if you leave out these con- 

 siderations, and the reluctance to invest largely in a novel experiment, tbe appropriations 

 have not been so large as they should have been. The sum expended looks exceedingly 

 large in the aggregate, as did the long years of ticking and swinging backward and forward 

 to the discontented pendulum, seen in one view. 



But there is another way to look at the facts. General Ely, the Auditor General, reported 

 to tbe House of Representatives Feb. 19, 1875, that "tbe amount drawn from the State 

 Treasury on account of appropriations for the Agricultural College up to the close of the 

 fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 1874, is $418,977.18." At tbe same time, Dec. 1, tbe property 

 of the State at tbe college was worth #209,038. Subtracting the value of the property from 

 the total appropriation, and dividing by 18, the number of years the college has been in 

 active operation, and the average annual expense to the State has been less than 911,664. 

 If, before dividing, we add all that has been received (Dec. 1, 1874) from the Agricultural 

 Interest Fund, the annual expenses will not equal $13,825. If, again, before dividing, 

 you add all that has been received from tbe sale of swamp lands, the average an- 

 nual expense will not equal 915,825. Surely no college could pretend to give scientific 

 instruction in the various branches of agriculture, horticulture, chemistry, botany, 

 entomology, and the other necessary branches of an agricultural college at a k-s 

 annual expenditure than this, wbetber to a dozen students or 500. 



While, therefore, in one view tbe State has been liberal, in another view the school has 

 not had sufficient for a high development. Tbe students yield practically no income, as al- 

 most nothing is required of them that does not go back to them. And while the farm has 

 been a help, on the other hand all improvements on lands and buildings have been inven- 

 toried, as they always are, at far less than cost. The inventoried properly in Michigan 

 would not bring it from a wilderness into its present condition. If the State could aflurd 



