AGRICULTURE A LEARNED PROFESSION 13 



came into possession of what was called land script, 

 that is, orders on the public domain in any locality 

 where preemption had not already taken place. As it 

 is possible to divide men into wise and foolish, so it 

 was soon possible to divide the States into wise and 

 foolish. Some of the States, notably New York, lo- 

 cated their land script and kept the land, which of 

 course has increased immensely in value. Others, and 

 among them my own State, Indiana, sold their orders 

 on the public domain at a fabulously low price. Indi- 

 ana had, in round numbers, nine hundred thousand acres 

 of public land assigned to it for purposes of agricul- 

 tural instruction, not excluding the mechanical arts and 

 military tactics. This vast amount of script was sold 

 for less than four hundred thousand dollars, in other 

 words less than fifty cents per acre. What a mine of 

 wealth the State would have possessed had it located its 

 lands and kept them for leasing purposes! Probably 

 to-day the annual income of the State from this source 

 would have been greater than the whole of the money 

 received for the sale of the land. 



But in spite of the wastefulness with which these 

 grants were handled, the purpose for which they were 

 made has been realized. In every State and territory 

 of the Union to-day there is an agricultural school, 

 which also teaches the mechanical arts and military 

 tactics in harmony with the law of Congress, and these 

 schools are all endowed, partially or fully, by the pro- 

 ceeds of the land given under the Morrill act. In 

 some States the fund has been divided, so that there is 

 more than one college. This is the case especially in 

 some of the Southern States, where a college has been 

 established both for whites and blacks. It is difficult 

 to estimate to-day the total income in the interest of 



