SECRETARY'S REPORT. 33 



this is all. It is much, however. And when we remember 

 that excellent farmers have been reared, without any other 

 training than tliis, we shall understand the true foundation 

 upon which we are to build all theoretical knowledge, and the 

 kind of intelligence which is to be developed and guided by 

 agricultural schools. 



The interest manifested in agricultural colleges throughout 

 our country has led me to these reflections. The practical 

 result of these colleges must be, an improvement on that kind 

 of information which I have delineated. These very young men 

 of whom I have spoken, sons of farmers, must be returned to 

 their fathers' farms after receiving the education of a college, 

 better farmers than those fathers were before them, or the grand 

 object of the institution will fail. It is not alone overseers, and 

 bailiffs, and farm-stewards, that we would educate, although a 

 capable foi'eman is not now easily obtained, and the necessity 

 for them somewhat increases. It is not the sons of merchants 

 and capitalists alone, who should receive the benefit of a thorough 

 agricultural education, in order that they may manage their 

 own estates. But it is a farming community, even now suffer- 

 ing from the want of deeper knowledge, which must receive the 

 largest benefit. Even if an agricultural college cannot make 

 wiser and better farmers than we have already, it should make 

 more good ones, and thus elevate the standard of agriculture 

 universally among us. And whatever may be the class from 

 whom most of the students in such an institution are to be 

 drawn, and whatever may be the subsequent career of these 

 students, it is evident that while the theory of farming in all its 

 highest branches forms a part of the education, the practice of 

 farming in all its minutest details, should form a larger, as it 

 must a more important, part. 



It would at first sight appear difficult for a single institution 

 to perform all this. And yet it may he done, it seems to me, 

 directly and indirectly. The institution itself should undoubt- 

 edly aim at the highest standard of education in all branches 

 connected with agriculture. It should not deal with the rudi- 

 ments of a general education. There is no more reason why 

 algebra, and geography, and grammar, and the classics should 

 be taught in an agricultural college than in a law school, or a 

 theological or medical school. Each of these institutions has 



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