4 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



physical labor, its study will be neglected, its highest attain- 

 ments remain undeveloped, and its greatest treasures continue 

 buried in the earth. But if we raise it to its true dignity, to 

 that of an ait and a science, our highest mental faculties be- 

 come interested and invigorated in its study ; and we ourselves 

 become ennobled in its practice. And why may it not be 

 recognized as a science? Certainly the ascertainment of natu- 

 ral laws, and their relations to each other ; their physical effects 

 in the production of vegetable and animal life is one of the 

 greatest of sciences, and the application of these laws to the 

 uses of man is truly an art requiring systematic knowledge, and 

 to which men of the highest intellect may well and honorably 

 devote their labors. 



Creation exhibits the power of Omnipotence. Yet how near 

 to creation is that power which has produced from the wild 

 crab apple that splendid fruit which adorns our orchards ; from 

 the thorny and acrid wild choke-pear the many varieties of that 

 delicious fruit which have graced the tables of this society ; which 

 lias produced the powerful dray-horse, the fleet courser, the 

 docile and spirited carriage-horse, from the single span which 

 Noah took into his ark ; which has produced the great varieties 

 of useful and domestic kine from the wild cottle of Tartary, and 

 the highlands of Scotland ; which has tripled the fleeces of 

 sheep, and which has brought into existence tliose endless varie- 

 ties of fruits to indulge the taste, and of flowers ta delight the 

 eye. Where can limits be placed beyond which the power of 

 man may not extend ; or where is the bound which can be 

 set to the advancement of science in the production of useful 

 vegetables and animals, for the comfort and luxury of our race ? 

 The Duke of Argyle, in a speech of great eloquence delivered 

 in August last, at Kelso, before the Highland and Agricultural 

 Society of Scotland, said : " The interest which he took in tliese 

 agricultural shows was always the interest that arose from the 

 extent to which the power of man was exhibited over the animal 

 and vegetable worlds, in creating almost, as it were, new species 

 for his own benefit and his own use. He would not say the 

 power was unlimited, but he would say it was a power of which 

 the limits were not known, because the end had not been 

 arrived at, and probably never would be." Science, in its 

 researches, is constantly developing new treasures and inviting 



