226 



THE GENESEE FARMER. 



Oct. 



public schools, (agricultural) are now every where 

 e?tabliphed iu Belgium. Tracts are circulated in 

 our rural districts — now implements are imported — 

 Bocieties are organized to carry out your system of 

 draining ; and in fact, every effort is made to come 

 up to your standard of improvements. I have no 

 doubt that each of my collengues, (other foreign 

 ministers, among whom was Mr. AbbotLawrenck) 

 would be able to draw a somewhat similar picture, 

 because there arc few governments that have not es- 

 tablished public institulioits in which those tvho are 

 destined for the af!;ricuUurttl calling nun/ receive 

 their instrvction in all its branches ; and such is their 

 praise-wnrthy eagerness for information from abroad, 

 that in many a diplomatic dispatch, dissertations on 

 the breeding and fee. ling of cattle, and on the drain- 

 ing and manuring of land, have usefully taken the 

 place of the idle and dangerous political gossip of 

 former ages.'' 



This agricultural statesman — this educated practi- 

 cal farmer — made the speech of that great entertain- 

 ment. Our minister spoke, but alas, what could he 

 say in favor of the " public institutions" of any State 

 in. the American confederacy designed to teach the true 

 principles of agriculture ? Has Massachusetts one ? 

 Has New York one ? Is there one founded by any 

 government in the New World ? We cling to the 

 military statesmanship, and lawyer politics of Charles 

 the II. Experimental farms and agricultural schools 

 are incompatible with our "old established, empiric 

 traditions ;" and no legislature, either national or 

 state, dare invade the feudal faith of the 17th cen- 

 tury. If an American minister were to send home a 

 diplomatic dispatch containing nothing but a treatise 

 on manures and the breeding of cattle, politicians 

 would demand his recall instanter. Some few 

 friends of agricultural improvement in Congress pro- 

 posed that the U. S. government should send a gen- 

 tleman, (as the legislature of New York did) to rep- 

 resent the farming interests of the Republic at the 

 World's exhibition ; but the measure was volel 

 down five to one, and this great national interest had 

 no national representative there to sec justice done 

 to it. The secretary of the N. Y. State Agri- 

 cultural Society, perhaps, did all that the public had 

 a right to expect, under the circumstances with 

 which he was surrounded ; but the friends of agri- 

 cultural progress in this country must have a more 

 perfect organization, or we shall soon become the 

 by-word of the civilized world and stand as a '• warn- 

 ing" for our over-weening conceit and neglect of sci- 

 ence. If we will not estimate the amount of fertili- 

 zing elements annually extracted from American 

 soil and sent to the seaboard by our rivers, lakes, 

 canals and railroads, never to return, foreigners will. 

 In ten years, at the rate we are now extending our 

 tillage, the injury done to our cotton, tobacco and 

 grain lands, will involve a loss of at least five hun- 

 dred million dollars. Had the United States a hun- 

 dred agricultural statesmen where they have ten 

 thousand mere politicians, what the soil annually 

 parts with and what it gains would soon be known 

 to every man in the Union, of common intelligence. 

 The loss and gain in fertility in all arated, meadow 

 and pasture lands, is a question of the highest pub- 

 lic concernment. It is not enough to follow the 

 the English practice and barely estimate the earthy 

 ingredients removed in crops harvested, and in the 

 grass eaten by cattle, horses, sheep and swine. In 

 our hot summer climates, not a little of the organic 



and mineral elements of vegetables is washed out of 

 soils into ditches, creeks and swamps, by sudden and 

 heavy rains. Of course all the elements of fertility 

 which rise into the atmosphere from decomposing 

 vegetation, mould and manure, and all the matter 

 borne oft' mechanically in muddy water and in solu- 

 tion, is so much loss in addition to what crops and 

 domestic animals remove from the soil. To our 

 mind, the case is clear that the raw materials for 

 making crops can never be properly husbanded, until 

 not only all farmers, but the entire population of 

 cities, villages, and agricultural districts, understand 

 how the fruits of the earth grow, and the chemical 

 efTects of tillage. This knowledge they do not now 

 possess, and never can acquire without due study 

 and the needful opportunity. The principles of rural 

 Economy are as fixed and enduring as the rule of ad- 

 dition or any problem in Euclid. They can no more 

 be changed in all time to come than iron can be 

 transformed into gold, or dry sand into water. — 

 There are many facts relating to cultivated plants 

 and animals, which the wisest do not comprehend ; 

 but the things consumed by nature in forming their 

 bodies are in the main well understood ; and the 

 principles deduced from well-established facts, areas 

 certain as that fire will burn Avood, or carbonic acid 

 extinguish fire. Now, until all the ingredients ne- 

 cessary to form 100 pounds of grain, cotton, roots, 

 hay, and tobacco, are generally known, they never 

 can be saved from needless loss and waste. How 

 can any person in town or country save ammonia, 

 which is worth ten cents a pound for the production 

 of wheat, before he has some knowledge of this sub- 

 stance as its elements exist in nature, and especially 

 in his daily food ? In the saving of this valuable 

 element of fertility, neither English nor Scotch far- 

 mers do materially better than American. Hence 

 the reproach of Messrs. Johjnston, Blackwood and 

 others, is alike uncalled for and oft'ensive. Prof. 

 Way estimates the fertilizers wasted every day in 

 London as worth at least £2000 or $10,000. At 

 this rate, the loss is a million of dollars every 100 

 days. It would be easy to demonstrate that the peo- 

 ple of England throw avi'ay more of the elements of 

 iiuman food according to population, than the people 

 of the northern states do in this country. At another 

 time we may bring forward the statistics of this topic. 

 At present we shall conclude by expressing our be- 

 lief that as artists, American farmers are more skil- 

 ful than any to be found on the east side of the At- 

 lantic ocean. We have better implements of tillage 

 and reaping,more active horses and oxen for plowing, 

 and can produce 1000 bushels of wheat or maize, or 

 1000 lbs. of cotton or tobacco, with less labor of 

 man or beast than any other natio* in the world. — 

 Never was a man more egregiously mistaken than 

 Prof. Johnston in his views of American agricul- 

 ture. We heard his lectures in Washington, and 

 conversed with him on agricultural subjects, and 

 saw thrt he had fallen into grave errors, but was so 

 confident of the correctness of his opinions, that all 

 idea of a change was hopeless. Englishmen have 

 been over 20 years in this country without under- 

 standing either the citizens, the institutions, the soil, 

 or climate of the United States. With such, all is 

 wrong from the begiiuiing to the bitter end. We 

 have no unkind feelings toward Mr. Johnston. — 

 With strong and incurable prejudices, he arrogates 

 to himself a degree of consideration as a discoverer 

 in the NewWorid, quite ridiculous. 



