45 



to the School-house without asking why agriculture, besides 

 making the most of all existing forms of education from 

 the primary school to the college, — and there certainly 

 ought to be no further delay, it seems to me, in introducing 

 into the higher classes of our rural district schools some 

 succinct and lucid text-book, like that of Professor Nash, 

 for example, — but, besides that, why agriculture may not 

 have a larger school-house, i. e., a college, of its own. It 

 will be a striking case of forbearance, or something worse, 

 gentlemen, if the grand staple business and fundamental oc- 

 cupation of this country is content much longer, without 

 endowed and furnished institutions for training young men 

 up to the highest pitch of agricultural accomplishment 

 possible to the age. When it can be shown how the art 

 of destroying men's lives is nobler than the art that saves 

 them, or havoc and slaughter are better than peaceful 

 production, then the government may be able to apologize 

 for not giving agriculture a West Point, as well as war, 

 and for not representing the soil in the Cabinet. The 

 national policy of maintaining a Central Bureau for the 

 army and navy, with none for husbandry, is much like a 

 man's expending so much on a choice collection of pistols 

 and poisons, that he has nothing left for good meat and 

 flour. 



Of the question, whether a thorough agricultural edu- 

 cation can be got to the best advantage on a private farm, 

 or at some public seminary, there is undoubtedly much to 

 be said on both sides. Probably the true method will be 

 very much like the usual preparation for the professions 

 of law and medicine, where a part of the course is taken 

 among the lectures, and libraries, and cabinets of a uni- 

 versity, and the remainder among the usages of the office. 

 For mastering the science proper, the student will need 

 such resources as few private citizens can afford ; but he 

 must also handle the tools. Without the first, he will be 



