192 



THE GENESEE FARMER. 



JSifoi^'^ I^t)lc. 



AOBNCT IX New York. — C. M. Saxtox, Agricultural Book Pub- 

 Usher, No. 152 Fulton street, New York, is a^ent for the Gejtesee 

 Farmkr, and sutecribers in that city wlio apply to him can have 

 their papers delivereil rogularlj' at their houses. 



AoESCT IN- CiNTisx.vTi.— R. PosT, No. 10 Wcst Third street, Cin- 

 cinnati, i.<; agent for the Genesee Fakmer, and subscribers in tliat 

 city who apply to him can have their papers delivered regularly at 

 their houses. 



" The Slavery of Ignorance and Vick." — The leader 

 in the last (April) number of the Edinburgh Review, is an 

 able and instructive article on Mormonism, in which the 

 writer calls attention to the fact, " that this fanatical super- 

 stition has made more dupes in England than in all the 

 world besides " ; there being at the census of 1851, 30,690 

 Mormons in England alone. After tracing this wonderful 

 success to its true sources, the reviewer offers this pregnant 

 suggestion : " Surely if, among the millions who worship 

 in our churches, we will not say one in five [as among the 

 Mormons], but even one in fifty, were thus animated to 

 exertion, their achievements in rescuing their countrymen 

 from the slavery of ignorance and vice riught at least re- 

 deem the future, if they could not remedy the past." 



" The slavery of ignorance and vice," and we will add, 

 the slavery of prejudice, are the grand preventives of agri- 

 cultural improvement. They exist every where to the in- 

 calculable injury of mankind. Why should millions of 

 church members, and tens of millions of farmers, do next 

 to nothing to abate an evil so wide- spread and so ruinous ? 



The profound indifference of educated persons to the 

 well-being of society is, after all, the greatest marvel of 

 the age. England needs to import about one hundred mil- 

 lion bushels of grain a year ; and the increase of its crops 

 is a matter that vitally concerns every British subject in the 

 United Kingdom. And yet, marvelous to relate, the five 

 or six agricultural papers published in Great Britain and 

 Ireland do not circulate more copies than a few industrious 

 Mormons s^ll of their weekly paper, called the " Millen- 

 nial Star," to its regular subscribers. Among the twenty- 

 nine millions of inhabitants now on the British Islands, 

 there must be nearly a million of tenant farmers and pro- 

 prietors of farming lands, to say nothing of the peasantry. 

 How many agricultural journals does the reader suppose 

 are taken and read in England, Wales, Scotland and Ire- 

 land ? Judging from the list of " stamps " returned bv 

 tliese journals, they have less than thirty thousand sub- 

 scribers ; while the " Millennial Star " alone has twenty- 

 five thousand, according to the Edinburgh Review, 



If the landed interest and the Church of England do 

 little " to rescue their countrymen from the slavery of igno- 

 rance and vice." and prevent their dependence on foreign 

 countries for their daily bread, what better do we in the 

 United States to augment the elements of fertility in our 

 meadows and pastures — our grain, tobacco and cotton 

 fields ? Have we so much as lifted a finger to remove the 

 black pall of popular ignorance which shrouds the jjublic 

 mind, as to the exact loss or gain, of the things in the soil 

 that really supply the nation with food and raiment ? Igno- 



rance, profound ignorance on this great subject is univer- 

 sally cherisiied in the land that has given birth to Moi-mon- 

 ism, and seen its Supreme Court Judges and United States 

 Senators become the votaries of the spirit rappings and 

 table turnings invented by the Misses Fox in this city ! 

 Poor human credulity ! That these things should be true 

 beyond all doubt, is humiliating indeed ; and even now 

 while writing this last paragraph for the June number of 

 the Farmi:k, there comes to us from the city of ISew York 

 a handsomely printed sheet, asking an " exchange," called 

 the " Christian ^Spiritualist," which, we dare predict, wUl 

 soon wax fat on the " slavery of ignorance and vice." 



Mental slavery has become a permanent American insti- 

 tution ; the people having, apparently, adopted the Hudi- 

 brastic maxim — 



"Because the pleasure is as great 

 In being cheated as to cheat." 

 How else can we account for the almost uniform success 

 that rewards shameless political, religious, medical and 

 agricultural quacks and impostures ? Bold, dashing, lying 

 impudence is always popular. By it thoiisands of really 

 ignorant men have attained both power and fortunes. 

 Such characters, whether the leaders of a church, of a po- 

 litical party, or of an agricultural society, are the greatest 

 tyrants in the world ; and what is more remarkable, the 

 masses cheerfully sustain these despots, as they do Louis 

 Napoleon in France, in perpetuating their own degrada- 

 tion and virtual slavery. The French are not the only 

 worshipers of the " one man power." Human nature ap- 

 pears to be governed by a law having the force of instinct, 

 which makes the few shameless empirics — the many 

 their willing dupes. 



PkOPO-SED ExrERIMENTAL FaRM AT MoUNT VeRNON. 



— The subjoined Report on a subject highly interesting to 

 our readers, was submitted to the Senate on the 10th of 

 May, by JNIr. Morton, from the Committee on Agricul- 

 ture : — 



" The Committee on Agriculture, to whom was referred 

 the memorial of the JIaryland State Agricultural Society, 

 submit the following report : — 



" That they have had under consideration the said me- 

 morial (which, it appears, has been adopted by the United 

 States Agricultural Society, recently convened in the city 

 of Washington), proposing the establishment of an agri- 

 cultural school and experimental farm at Mount Vernon, 

 under the auspices of the General Government, and ap- 

 prove the design of the memorialists, and ask for it the fa- 

 vorable consideration of the Senate. 



" The United States, while they lead the civilization of the 

 age in almost every other useful art, are far in the rear of 

 the rival States of Europe in tliat which relates to hus- 

 bandry. England, Scotland, Ireland, France, Germany, 

 and even the minor States of the continent, have agricul- 

 tural schools, with experimental farms attached, to blend 

 science and practical skill in forming a model system of 

 cultivation. A systematic education is deemed indispensa- 

 ble to improve the art of husbandry, as it is found essen- 

 tial to imjjart progress in every other pursuit of civilized 

 life. We have no schools of agriculture, and receive only 

 from report and very remote example the impulse which 

 has led to renewed efforts in this country to imitate the 

 cultivation abroad that has, in some degree, redeemed it 

 from the rudeness which threatened to condemn us to per- 

 petual inferiority. 



" The lf)nging in the public mind for scientific teaching 

 and experimental proof and example, which contrasts the 

 improvement of Europe so strongly with ours, is so gener- 



