26 QUARTERLYJOURNAL. 



found with writers because they will call it gypsum ; a name suf- 

 ficiently unscientific to please any one. 



But it is not after all, the names which most concern the farmer, 

 although in order to be a rational one he must understand them. 

 The substances themselves are what he is interested in, and their 

 application in his business. He ought to understand the relative 

 value of different manures and their adaptedness to partic\ilar soils 

 or crops ; the preparation, improvement and management of ma- 

 nures in order to secure their highest effect ; the composition of 

 soils and plants and the effects produced by the latter growing in 

 the former, to exhaust them and render them unproductive ; in fine 

 he must know the whole relations of the vegetable, mineral and 

 animal world. The farm should be regarded an out-door laborato- 

 ry where every process is regulated by rule as strict as the che- 

 mist obeys in his. If we should stop to give instances to substan- 

 tiate the value of this kind of knowledge, we should soon fill a 

 volume, for there is no process in the whole art that would not 

 bear us out. Therefore we need not do it. We are well aware of 

 the prejudice which has heretofore existed against book farming ; 

 a prejudice which is rapidly disappearing and which was the child 

 of ignorance. 



It cannot be possible that agriculture alone of all the arts must 

 stand aloof from the aids offered by science. All other industrial 

 occupations owe their elevation and importance to it. And what 

 may not farming be, when the farmer in the full realization of the 

 dignity of his calling, becomes the thoroughly informed man he 

 ought to be. And there is no sufficient reason why any man in 

 this country should be ignorant of ali the improvements that have 

 been made in agriculture, and equally true is it, that knowing 

 them, there is no reason why he should not put them in practice. 

 We are a reading people. We mingle with each other. What 

 one does, is seen and known by all. The distinction of classes is 

 only nominal, and in all that pertains to the common good, all 

 meet on common ground. The interchange of thoughts and views 

 is free as the air we breathe. The means of acquiring knowledge 

 are cheap and abundant, and in every man's power. 1 say again, 

 there is no reason why any man should not be well informed in all 

 that concerns his business. But before all are so, the barriers 

 raised by prejudice and early training must be broken down, and 



