AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION 



increase, the total attendance being about 

 fifty-five thousand. 



In addition to the work of the agricultural 

 schools and colleges, important fundamental 

 work is being done in many states in the 

 country and even in the city schools, in the 

 way of teaching the younger students the 

 principles of elementary agriculture. In this 

 instruction the student in the country school 

 not only receives, by the novelty of the work, 

 an added stimulation for his other studies, but 

 he begins to learn the secrets of the life about 

 him, is gradually brought closer and closer into 

 touch with nature in his formative years, and 

 it is many to one that such a course of instruc- 

 tion will bear fruit in permanent interest in 

 and liking for the functions of the farm. 



The most important feature of all this New 

 Earth education is that it carries with acquire- 

 ment of knowledge a strong and abiding in- 

 terest in the learning itself and the things 

 learned about. As this knowledge is now 

 presented, it not only shows, in its more prac- 

 tical aspect, how material interest may be 

 enhanced, but it makes a powerful appeal to 

 the imagination, to the love for the beautiful, 



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