6 Address. 



into other vocations or migrating to the more fertile West. These 

 and other causes have widely led to a belief that New England Agri- 

 culture is in a much worse condition than it really is. 



Kemember that the vocation is thoroughly adaptive, that it can 

 and will conform its methods and its productions to the conditions of 

 each farm. That is, if the farmer is free to do as he will, and here 

 is the first great advantage which the farmers of New England have. 

 I do not mean an advantage over their immediate competitors in the 

 West, but over the older communities of the Old World. There is 

 no such " Agricultural distress'" here as there is in Old England, not 

 because we have less sharp competition, but because the American 

 farmer is perfectly free to adjust his methods and his crops to any 

 conditions imposed by competition, while the English farmer is not. 

 I have discussed this matter elsewhere, so I need not dilate upon 

 it here. 



The decline in the population of rural districts may be misinter- 

 preted. Remember that various causes in the present century have 

 tended to make city and village populations grow much faster than 

 rural populations, not only in this country but in other countries. 

 The rural population of New England has declined because it takes 

 fewer people to run the farms with the improved implements and 

 machinery ; there is relatively more land devoted to pastures and less 

 to tillage ; much work once done in farm houses is now done in 

 towns, spinning and weaving once went on in nearly every country 

 household, now it is only done in towns ; once wagons and farm im- 

 plements of all kinds were made in small shops scattered throughout 

 the country, now it is done in towns where manufacturing facilities 

 are greater, and we no longer see the road-side shop of the country 

 wagon-maker, harness-maker and tailor. The small manufacturing 

 establishments of the country ; the little grist mill, and carding ma- 

 chine have given way to the larger ones in cities ; roads are better 

 and railroads vein the country, so the country store has gone, and 

 people go to the town to trade, and with them are gone the country 

 lawyers and other professional men, and so on through a long list of 

 facts which explain why rural population may diminish without a 

 corresponding decline in agriculture. 



In 1879 and 1880, in connection with census work, I visited most 

 of the more noted grain producing regions of the United States, so 

 if I quote a few figures you will pardon me, for I have been much 

 employed with them. I will not weary you with reading long tables 

 of figures, but some facts I wish to give. I have made a great num- 



