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that I have done something in carrying the hod, while to others 

 may belong the far higher honor of laying the corner-stone, and 

 of erecting the noble columns, and adorning them with the 

 beaatifal embellishments of architectural taste, in this grand 

 edifice of public utility and national honor. 



To those persons, who estimate every good in life by a pecu- 

 niary standard, will it be discourteous in me to propose a few con- 

 siderations l Suppose that the Agricultural Survey may have 

 been, or may prove, instrumental in inducing, upon an average, 

 by improved cultivation, an increase of one hundred bushels of 

 corn to every town in the Commonwealth. This, at 75 cents 

 per bushel for corn, and ten dollars per ton for corn fodder, 

 would be upwards of 28,000 dollars. Suppose it may conduce 

 to the production of an average of one hundred tons of compost 

 manure, in each town in the Commonwealth, which must be 

 valued at one dollar per load. This would exceed a yearly in- 

 come of sixty thousand dollars, to say nothing of the permanent 

 improvement it would effect in the soil. Suppose that it may 

 conduce to the redemption of 1000 acres of peat bog, which 

 is now worthless, converting it into productive meadows 

 yielding two tons of hay to the acre, and keeping up its condi- 

 tion. This would be little more than three acres to a town ; 

 and, rating its value by its income, (it cannot be estimated at 

 less than 150 dollars per acre,) this would be an increase of the 

 property of the State, which may be safely called an actual crea- 

 tion of land, to the value of 150,000 dollars, and a permanent 

 income of more than 20,000 dollars per year. Here is no ex- 

 travagant calculation, to say nothing of many other forms in 

 which the influence of the survey may be felt ; and among 

 other testimonials of approbation, in the highest measure grati- 

 fying to me, has been the opinion of one of the most intelligent 

 c 



