1857. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



211 



manufaclurers have introduced into their depart- 

 ments of labor, which has diminished the cost of 

 production ; and it is well worth while for farmers 

 to consider whether, by the introduction of a great- 

 er amount of intellect into their department, they 

 may not increase and cheapen production. This 

 view of the case has some bearing on the subject 

 of discussion to-night, "Farming in New England 

 and at the West." 



If the profits of farming are to rest on two ele- 

 ments only, labor and land — the amount of labor, 

 and the quality of the land — if no other elements 

 are to enter into agriculture, then, of course, Mas- 

 sachusetts cannot claim to compete with the great 

 West ; but if, on the other hand, intellect, culti- 

 vated, active, persevering intellectual labor, be an 

 element in agriculture, then it is a question whether 

 farming is more profitable in New England or in 

 the West. We have, also, in considering the rel- 

 ative profits, to take into view the influence of cli- 

 mate. In Massachusetts, I think it may be stated 

 as a fact, that a man in health will labor, reasona- 

 bly, three hundred days in a year, and be as well 

 prepared at the end for another year's service as he 

 was at the beginning j while I think it would be 

 safe to say that in many parts of the West, a man 

 could not labor to an equal amount more than two 

 hundred or two hundred and fifty days in a year. 

 As an element of the relative profit of agriculture 

 in New England and the West, you have to consid- 

 er that a man will labor from twelve and a half to 

 twenty-five per cent, more here than there. 



And the great fact comes from the constitution 

 of man, which our friends in the West, if represen- 

 ted here to-night, would be unwilling to admit ; but 

 after all, we have the evidence in the nature of man 

 and in all the history of man, that it does require 

 some degree of opposition in man or in nature, to 

 bring out the highest qualities of man. Just in pro- 

 portion as you diminish the opposition of nature to 

 the effort of man in agriculture, just in that propor- 

 tion you diminish his perseverance, his disposition 

 to overcome those obstacles. To be sure, agricul- 

 ture may be so forbidding and discouraging in its 

 nature, and in consequence of the obstacles to be 

 overcome, as to deter a man from engaging in it ; 

 and if agriculture be that kind of pursuit in Massa- 

 chusetts, of course it will ultimately have to be aban- 

 doned. But judging from the experience of two 

 hundred years, we may come to the conclusion safe- 

 ly, that we occupy territorially, as a people, an in- 

 termediate position in this countrj'. Our soil is nut 

 so fertile as to offer to man the means of subsist- 

 ence without labor ; and on the other hand it is not 

 so sterile as to discourage him entirely. It furnishes 

 obstacles and also demonstrates in the reason and 

 experience of men that these obstacles may be over- 

 come. Although I have never travelled in the 

 West, I cannot doubt that agriculture is, in the na- 



ture of the case, and as a matter of fact, a higher 

 intellectual pursuit in Massachusetts than it is in 

 the West ; and I venture to express the opinion 

 that it always will be so. We may well consider 

 that life, in its highest form, is not merely the ac- 

 quisition of money. If the chief end of man be to 

 raise the greatest number of bushels of wheat, or to 

 fatten the greatest number of hogs, then, unques- 

 tionably, Massachusetts is the wrong place to attain 

 the chief end of man. But if the chief end of man 

 be to develop the moral and intellectual qualities 

 with which we are blessed, I cannot see why Massa- 

 chusetts, as an agricultural State, is not as inviting 

 as any of the States of the West. It was my mis- 

 fortune to have to examine some statistics based on 

 the returns of 1850, and it seemed to me a remark- 

 able fact or series of facts, which I have never seen 

 successfully controverted, that Massachusetts, as an 

 agricultural State, is the most productive in this 

 union, including all our interests, agriculture, com- 

 merce, and the mechanic arts, and that Massachu- 

 setts, as an agricultural State, in the amount of its 

 productions, estimated in dollars and cents, is supe- 

 rior to either Ohio, Illinois or Wisconsin. This 

 may seem a remarkable statement, but I believe 

 that it can be maintained. I was led to the inves- 

 tigation by conversation which I had in a railway 

 car with a gentleman from Vermont, who said that 

 the county of Caledonia, Vt., in proportion to its 

 population, was the most productive territory in the 

 Union. I was led to investigate that singular state- 

 ment; and although I found it erroneous in some 

 slight degree, it after all contained the essential 

 truth which my subsequent investigations confirmed, 

 that Vermont and Massachusetts, as agricultural 

 States, are superior to either of the three States I 

 have named ; that is, dividing the whole value of 

 the land among all the people upon the land. Or 

 in other words, taking the agricultural productions 

 of Illinois, and distributing them among the people 

 engaged in agriculture, and those productions in 

 Massachusetts and dividing them in the same way, 

 and I found them to be greater here than there. 



Mr. BucKMlNSTER, of the Ploughman, expressed 

 his gratification at the view presented by the chair- 

 man. He said he had investigated the subject since 

 the last evening. A friend who resides seventy 

 miles west of Chicago, told him that he could pro- 

 duce one hundred bushels of oats to the acre, and 

 corn in great quantities, and he had a ready mar- 

 ket for all he could produce, and got ready money. 

 His land was so rich, that though he had five hun- 

 dred bushels of manure near his barns, he had no 

 use for it. He said it was quite healthy also in that 

 vicinity, and there were pretty good advantages as 

 to schools, churches, &c., but after all, that gentle- 

 man has returned to Massachusetts to live. His 

 family could not be contented there. 



It is sometimes said that it is ditiScult to secure 



