120 WORCESTER COUNTY HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. [1900. 



and proficient in the requirements of artificial society ; but the 

 people who live in the free air and sunshine of the country and 

 grow strong in the exercise of farm work, constitute in the long 

 run the bone and sinew of every great nation. The love of the 

 soil has always seemed to be indigenous to every masterful race. 

 The more deeply we search into the annals of ancient history 

 the more clear becomes the fact that agriculture and horticul- 

 ture were at the bottom of the civilization of those times the 

 same as they are today at the bottom of the enduring forces of 

 society. In the valleys of the Nile and the Euphrates and 

 around the shores of the Mediterranean, where human civiliza- 

 tion and enlightenment first reached a high degree of perfection, 

 the cultivation of the soil was the most common and favorite 

 occupation of the people. Men sound in soul and limb are not 

 usually produced in the neighborhood of foul drains and the 

 noise of factories, nor amidst the artificial excitement and 

 turmoil of the crowded street; but rather on the green earth, 

 amidst woods and waters, and in the wholesome occupation of 

 cultivating the soil. When the Romans exchanged the arts 

 of husbandry for the arts of civic life and traded their rural 

 homes for city lots, the decline of their empire began, and con- 

 tinued until it vanished in the darkness of the middle ages. 

 The strenuous life of the farm and garden produces the physical 

 vigor and the mental strength that are characteristic of every 

 great nation. 



The courageous farmers of brave little Holland fought and 

 won the battle of liberty of the sixteenth century. The yeo- 

 manry of England, under the leadership of Cromwell changed a 

 despotic monarchy into a constitutional government. The em- 

 battled farmers of America dared to resist oppression and to 

 establish a republic on these shores. And today we see the 

 farmers of South Africa holding at bay the imperial hosts of the 

 greatest empire of the world. 



In asserting the advantages of country life I would not be 

 understood as disparaging the advantages of city and industrial 

 life. There should be no antagonism between city and rural 

 life. Each is essential to the other's highest welfare and pros- 



