AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION. 397 



vided that, " before any premium shall be delivered, the person claiming the 

 same, or to whom the same shall be awarded, shall deliver in writing, to their 

 respective officers, as accurate a description of tlie process in preparing the soils, 

 including the quantity and quality of the manure applied, and in raising the crop 

 or feeding the animal, as may be ; and also the expense and product of the crop, 

 or of the increase in the value of the animals, wilh the vicxo of shoioing accurately 

 the profit of cultivating the crop, or feeding or fattening the animal." Too truly, 

 however, has the enlightened Secretary of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 

 to whom the Reports of the Societies of that State are made, remarked — " But 

 the misfortune is that these rules are imperfectly or not at all complied wtth.''^ — 

 These statements, in detail, should not only be rigidly exacted by the Trustees, 

 but they should undergo deliberate examination, and be either ratified or subject- 

 ed to strict and impartial commentary and criticism. The vagueness of these 

 statements, where they are made at all, often takes away from them all charac- 

 ter and pretension to usefulness ; and the carelessness, not to say partiality with 

 which the premiums are too often awarded along with them widely sows feelings 

 and expressions of dissatisfaction, "not loud but deep;" and this accounts for the 

 great difficulty of making up the required subscriptions, and for the final discon- 

 tinuance of many of these associations. 



To return to the character of these shows. It may be alleged that, without 

 the multifarious and attractive elements employed in " getting them up," the 

 people could not be brought together ; and therefore we must needs take the 

 frivolous along with the useful — that those must be amused with the shadow 

 who have not sense enough to distinguish it from the substance. And this may 

 all, to a certain extent, be admitted, until by degrees public opinion shall be re- 

 formed by better systems of agricultural education, and these associations for use- 

 ful purposes shall cease to be mere gull-traps. In the mean time, all men of 

 sense and of exalted and patriotic views, taking part in the direction of such in- 

 stitutions, will earnestly lend their thoughts and their influence to a gradual cor- 

 rection of the public taste in these respects — leading it to seek for the useful 

 instead of the showy — the intellectual in preference to the ridiculous — until, in 

 process of time, valuable instruction and solid scientific advancement in Agricul- 

 ture shall take the place of prodigiously prolific patches of grain and vegetables, 

 and fat hogs, and cows with three calves, and other wonderful phenomena of the 

 animal and vegetable kingdoms. Thus may we expect to see reason and philo- 

 sophical deduction take, in Agriculture, the place of custom and prejudice — as 

 superstitious star-gazing has given way to astronomy, and the reveries and pre- 

 tensions of the alchemist have been superseded by the noble science of chemistry. 



In this view of these subjects, it was well observed by Mr. Bryant, in a Report 

 to the Hampden Society in Massachusetts, remarking on great crops of vegeta- 

 bles — " But in order that we may have these results, to any extent, under our 

 control, the science of Agriculture, in all its hidden recesses and wonderful mys- 

 teries, needs to be explored." 



Much as these remarks have been extended beyond our expectations, we must 

 yet take room to refer to another most propitious sign, in the declaration, by the 

 •' Farmers' Clue of the American Institute," that " there are 7iow constant 

 inquiries by wealthy merchants, professional men, and others, for schools of this 

 character, engaged in a safe and healthy employment, free from ciiy habits and 

 temptations." Something of a solecism, it is true, is observable in this declara 

 tion, when connected with the averment, in the same petition, that " the City of 



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