AGRARIAN LAWS 



92 



AGRICULTURE 



AGRA'RIAN LAWS. The word agrarian 

 is derived from the Latin ager, meaning field, 

 and was applied to all those laws enacted in 

 Rome for the division of the public lands. 

 Originally the right to the use of public land 

 belonged only to the ruling class, or patricians, 

 but latterly the plebeians, or commoners, were 

 allowed to hold it, though they were often 

 unfairly treated in the sharing of it. Hence 

 arose much discontent among the plebeians, 

 and various remedial laws were passed, some 

 of them giving rise to the fiercest struggles 

 which disturbed the Roman State. Few of the 

 agrarian laws were ever seriously put into 

 execution. 



AGRICOLA, a grik' o la, GNAEUS JULIUS (37- 

 93), a Roman statesman and general, whose 

 Life, by his son-in-law Tacitus, is considered 

 one of the most perfect biographies ever writ- 

 ten. As governor of Britain (77-84) Agricola 

 reduced the greater part of the island to sub- 

 jection, and although he was the twelfth Ro- 

 man general who had been in the island he 

 was the first who in any degree reconciled 

 the Britons to the Roman yoke. He con- 

 structed the chain of forts between the Forth 

 and the Clyde, to afford protection against the 

 barbarians from the north, and sailed around 

 the island, discovering the Orkneys. His char- 

 acter was blameless. 



THE STORY OF AGRICULTURE 



G'RICULTURE is the art of culti- 

 vating the soil to produce material for feeding 

 and clothing the human race. It is the oldest 

 of all occupations. "The first farmer," says 

 Emerson, "was the first man, and all historic 

 nobility rests on possession and use of the 

 land." Agriculture is also the most widely- 

 extended of all occupations, and it lies at the 

 foundation of all other industries. Daniel 

 Webster once said, "When tillage begins, other 

 arts follow. The farmers, therefore, are the 

 founders of civilization." Unless man were 

 fed and clothed the race would perish. 



Illustrating Its Importance. Mr. and Mrs. 

 Adams with their children, John, aged 14, and 

 Mary, aged 12, lived in the city. Like many 

 other city children, John and Mary knew but 

 little of the country, and did not seriously 

 consider farming or anything connected with it. 

 Their father and mother, however, had come 

 from the farm, and they decided to help John 

 and Mary to obtain correct ideas of the coun- 

 try and of a life such as they lived in their 

 younger days. 



"John, where did this bread come from?" 

 asked Mr. Adams, at dinner. 



"Why, mother bought it at the baker's, I 

 suppose." 



"Very well, but where did the baker get it?" 

 "0, I know," said Mary, "he makes it." 

 "But what is it made of?" continued the 

 father. 



"There is flour in it," said John, "and water, 

 and and lots of other things." 



"A boy never knows anything about cook- 

 ing; let me tell," said Mary. "Bread is made 

 of flour, water and yeast and what else do 

 they put in it, mother?" 



"I don't see as you know much more about 

 it than I do," said John. 



"You children can learn how to make bread 

 some other time," said Mr. Adams; "I want 

 to know where the baker got his flour." 



"He bought it of the wholesale grocer," re- 

 plied John. 



"Well, where did the grocer get it?" 



"That is about -as far as I can go," said 

 John. "I have often wondered where all the 

 things we eat come from, but I have so many 

 things to study in school that I don't have 

 time to read about anything more." 



"Well," replied the father, "suppose we make 

 a little study of these things at dinner. Let 

 us begin with the bread. What you and Mary 

 have said is true, but we need to look into 

 the subject a little further, if we would 

 know the real source from which we obtain 

 bread and all other articles of food. The real 

 source of all these is the farm, and were it 

 not for the farmers all the people who live 

 in the city, as we do, would soon be without 

 food." 



"Why, I never thought of that before; I 

 never supposed the farmer amounted to much, 





