No. 4.] FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY. 41 



spell, he would make an excellent farmer. What need of 

 science? The good old way of his fathers was sufficient. 

 It was only the old story told by George Eliot in the "Mill 

 on the Floss," and it is Farmer John who speaks : "What 

 I want," said he, "is to give Tom a good eddication, — an 

 eddication as 'ud be bread for hmi. That was what I was 

 thinking of when I gave notice for him to leave the academy 

 at Lady Day. I mean to put him to a downright good 

 school at midsummer. The two years at th' academy 'ud 

 ha' done well enough, if I'd meant to ha' made a farmer of 

 him, for he's had a fine sight more schoolin' nor ever I got. 

 All the learnin' my father ever paid for was a bit o' birch at 

 one end and the alphabet at the other." 



And even our good Governor, who has charmed us this 

 morning with his reminiscences of the past, is reported as 

 saying that all this matter of agricultural education was 

 mere nonsense, — that he had alwa3^s said that the agi'icul- 

 tural college would be a fiiilure ; that it could not succeed 

 in the nature of things, for as soon as you educated a boy, 

 he would leave the farm. Consequently, the conclusion he 

 came to was, that all the education a farmer got he would 

 have to get at the tail of a plow. 



At the very first intimation of a movement in the national 

 House of Representatives, looking towards the establish- 

 ment of colleges for the benefit of agriculture and the 

 mechanic arts, the Board of Agriculture promptly placed 

 itself on record. At a meeting held April 7, 1858, it was 



Resolved, That this Board do most heartily approve of the objects 

 of a bill presented in the House of Representatives in Congress, 

 Dec. 14, 1857, by Hon. Justin S. Morrill of Vermont, requesting 

 Congress to donate public lands to each State and Territory 

 which may provide colleges for the benefit of agriculture and the 

 mechanic arts ; and that our Senators and Representatives in 

 Congress be requested to render their best aid in securing the 

 passage of said bill into a law ; and that our secretary be requested 

 to serve each of our Senators and Representatives with a copy of 

 the above. 



At a meeting of the Board, Jan. 8, 18G1, Mr. Levi Stock- 

 bridge of Hadley oftered the following resolution : — 



