240 



GENESEE FARMER. 



Oct. 



with equal caje, and, so far as may be in their power, 

 and coasistent with other and paramount duties, should 

 be cherished with equal care. 



Doe€ any one believe, that for generations yet to come, 

 tie agricultural operations of the United States are to be 

 circumscribed within narrower comparative limits than 

 the present ; or that the agricul(m-al productions of the 

 country are to bear a less ratio to our population and 

 oonsumption than they now do ? I cannot suppose that 

 any citizen, who has given his attention to the consider- 

 ations which have been suggested, finds himself able to 

 adopt either of these opinions. On the contrary, I think 

 a fair examination must satisfy every mind that our ag- 

 ricultural surplus, for an indefinite future period, must 

 increase much more rapidly than our population and the 

 demand for domestic consumption. This I believe 

 would be true without the eflxjrts of associations, such as 

 this, to improve our agriculture. The condition of the 

 country, and the inclination and preference of our popu- 

 lation for agricultural pursuits, would render this result 

 unavoidable ; and if this be so, when the impetus given 

 to agricultural production by the improvements of the 

 day — the individual and associated efl^orts constantly 

 making to push forward these improvements with an 

 accelerated movement — the mass of educated mind 

 turned to scientific researches in aid of agricultural la- 

 bor — the dawning of a systematic and universal agricul- 

 tural education — and the immense bodies of cheap, and 

 fre^h, and fertile lands, which invite the application of 

 an improved agriculture, are added to the account, who 

 can measure the extent or duration of our agricultural 

 surplus, or doubt the soundness of the conclusion, that 

 the export trade mu>t exercise a sreat influence r.pon the 

 market lor the agricultural productions a' the country 

 for a long series of years to come ? 



Such is the conclusion to which my mind is forced, 

 from au examination ot this subject, in its domestic as- 

 pect simply ; but there is another now presented of va.st 

 magnitude and engrossing interest, and demanding alike 

 from the citizen and the statesman of this republic, the 

 most careful consideration. All will at once understand 

 me as reterring to the changes and promises of change 

 in the policy of the principal commercial nations of the 

 world, touching their trade in the productions or' agricul- 

 ture. 



By a single step which was nothing less than commer- 

 cial revolution, Great Britain practically made the change 

 as to her trade, and subsequent events have clothed with 

 appearance of a most super-human sagacity, the wisdom 

 wliich thus prepared that country to meet the visitation of 

 famine which has so soon followed without the additional 

 evil of trampling down the systems of law to minister to 

 the all-controlling necessilies of hunger. Changes similar 

 in character, and measurably equal in extent, though in 

 many cases temporary in duration, have been adopted by 

 several other European governments, under circumstances 

 which render it very doubtful how soon, if ever, a return 

 will be made to the former policy of a close trade in the ne- 

 cessaries of human life. 



I>iew markets of vast extent and incalculable value have 

 thus been opened for our agricultaral surplus, the durabili- 

 ty and steadiness of which it is impossible yet to measure 

 with certainty. It is in our power, however, to say that a 

 great body of provocations to countervailing restrictive 

 commercial relations, is now removed, in some instances 

 permnently, and in others temporarily in form; and it 

 woiUd seem to be the part of wisdom, for the agriculture of 

 this country, by furnishing these markets to the extent of 

 the demand, with tlie best articles, at the fairest prices, to 

 show to those countries, and heir respective governments, 

 that reciprocal commercial regulations, if they ofier no oth- 

 er and higher attractions, present to their people a safe- 

 guard against starvation. 



Such is ihe connection, now, between our agriculture 

 and export trade and foreign market ; and these relations 

 are to be extended and strengthened, rather than circum- 

 Kcribed and weakened, by our agricultural advances. The 

 consumption of the country is for short of its production, 

 and caruiot become equal to it within any calculable peri- 

 od. On the contrary, the excess production is to increase 

 with the increase of population and settlement, and the im- 



provements in agriculture and agricultural education. These 

 appear to me to be fac;s, arising from the condition of our 

 country, and the tastes and inclinations of our people, fixed 

 beyond the power of change, and to which theories and 

 principles of political economy must be conformed, to be 

 made practically applicable to us. 



I simply propose to inquire as to a fact, which must con- 

 trol the application of theories and principles of political 

 economy touching this point, to our country and its agri- 

 cultural population, without raising any question as to the 

 wisdom of the one, or the soundness of the other. Is the 

 consumption of this country equal to its agricultural pro- 

 duction, or can it become so within any calculable period 

 of years? How is the fact? May I not inquire without 

 offence, or transcending the limits I have prescribed for my- 

 self in the discussion ? Can a fair examination scrupulous- 

 ly confined to this point, take a politiral bearing, or disturb 

 a political feeling ? It is certainly not my design to wound 

 the feelings of any member of the Society, or of any citi- 

 zen of the country, and I have convinced myself that I may 

 make this inquiry, and express the conclusions of my own 

 mind as to the result, without doing either. If I shall prove 

 to be in error, it will be an error as to the fact inquired af- 

 ter, and not as the soundness of the principle in political 

 economy dependent on the fact for its application, because 

 as to the soundness of the principle, I attempt no discussion 

 and olTer no opinion. It will be an error as to the applica- 

 bility of a theory to our country and not as to the wisdom 

 or policy of the theory, when it can be practiaally applied, 

 I studiously refrain from any expression, as inappropriate 

 here. With the indulgence of the Society, I will inquire 

 as to the fact. 



Our country is very wide and very new. It embraces 

 every variety of climate and soil, most favorable to agricul- 

 tural pursuits. It produces already almost every agricul- 

 tural staple, and the most important are the ordinary pro- 

 ductions of extensive sections of the country^ and are now 

 sent to the markets in great abundance. 



Yet our agriculture is in its infancy almost every where, 

 and at its maturity no where. It is believed to be entirely 

 safe to assume that there is not one single agricultural 

 county in the whole Union, filled up in an agricultural sense 

 — not one such county which has not yet land to be brought 

 into cultivation, and much of which is to be materially im- 

 proved, before it can be considered as having reached the 

 measure of ite capacity for production. If this be true of 

 the best cultivated agrictiltural county in the Union, how 

 vast is the proportion of those counties which have entire 

 towhships, and of the States which have not merely coun- 

 ties, but entire districts, yet wholly unpeopled and unre- 

 claimed from the wilderness state. 



When to this broad area of the agricultural field of our 

 country, we add our immense territories, organized and un- 

 organized, who can compute the agricultural capacities of 

 the United States, or tii a limit to the period when our sur- 

 plus agricultural productions will increase with increasing 

 years and population ? Compare the census of 1830 and 

 1840 with the map of the Union, and witness the increase 

 of population in the new States, which are almost exclu- 

 sively aguricultural, and who can doubt the strong and re- 

 sistless inclination of our people to this pursuit? 



Connect with these considerations of extent of country, 

 diversity of soils, varieties of climate, and partial and im- 

 perfect cultivation, the present agricultural prospects of 

 this country. Witness the rapid advances of the last dozen 

 years in the character of our cultivation, the quality and 

 quantity of our productions from a given breadth of land, 

 and the improvements of all the implements by which the 

 labor of the farmer is assisted and applied. Mark the vast 

 change in the current of educated mind of the country, in 

 respect to this pursuit ; the awakened attention to its high 

 respectability as a profession, to its safety from hazards, to 

 its healthfuluess of mind and body, and to its productive- 

 ness. Listen to the calls for information, for education up- 

 on agricultural subjects, and to the demands that this edu- 

 cation shall constitute a department in the great and all 

 pervading system of our common school etlucation, a sub- 

 ject at this moment receiving the especial attention, and 

 being pressed f.irward by the renewed energies of this So- 

 ciety. Behold the numbers of professors, honored with the 

 highest testimonials of learning conferred in our country, 

 devoting their fives to geological and chemical researches 

 calculated to evolve the law-^e of nature connected with ag- 

 ricultural production. Go into our colleges and institutions 

 of learning, and count the young men toiling industriously 



