contributing by its hearty sympathy to the sustaining or develop- 

 ment of that scientific culture which may in the future be in- 

 voked for such material aid. 



Nor is this plea disposed of by the wit which aims its jests at 

 the "fancy farming" of the day. A rich man may toy with farm- 

 ing as he might with manufactures or with trade. There is in 

 all of us a love of the soil, a pleasure in seeing the growth of 

 things which our own hands have planted ; and it is not surpris- 

 ing that this feeling finds an expression in the case of many who 

 suppose that wealth and theory and science will answer for all. 

 Perhaps also that other trait not unknown in human nature comes 

 into play, where one fancies that he can best do that for which 

 nature has expressly disqualified him. At any rate, these ferti- 

 lizers costly as gold duston the soil, these potatoes absorbing every 

 one the value of an able bodied man's long day, these cattle fed 

 upon the fat of the land and making beef too great a luxury for 

 even a millionare's table, are worth laughing at, if we remember 

 that a "fancy" manufacturer or tradesman might be as absurd a 

 sight without destroying the dependence of both trade and man- 

 ufactures for their best attainments on the classified results of 

 progressive knowledge. One thing is certain — a farmer must be 

 made upon the soil. He must learn his business there, not 

 among crucibles and books. But every agricultural journal with 

 which he solaces his leisure, every glimpse of improved methods 

 which he catches at the neighborhood store or the County Fair, 

 appeals to his intelligence to see how science gathers the materi- 

 als for future success out of even the humiliating failures of "fan- 

 cy" farming to pay its way. Even if he goes as ages before his 

 predecessors went to the barn-yard for his only means of renew- 

 ing the vigor of his land, he may learn that it is the very prov- 

 ince of a chemistry, itself more refined and savory than its or- 

 ganic subject, to teach him the only or the best way to preserve 

 or apply the full value of his stable product to the ground. 



