28 



The last assignment raises a doubt whether the first cattle did not 

 come over in the Anne, upon which question antiquarians differ. But 

 they agree that Gov. Winslow brought the first cattle. 



The poet, Longfellow whose fancy never recognized a close rela- 

 tionship to fact, in his "Courtship of Miles Standish" pictures Pris- 

 cilla Mullens, the bride, as performing her wedding journey to the 

 home of John Alden on a white bull. Longfellow here made a bull 

 in every sense of the word. In the first place, at the time of John 

 Alden's marriage there were no cattle in New England, and secondly, 

 the first cattle imported were of a dark or red variety. The 

 poet's poetic license was a "white lie" indeed. This bull of Long- 

 fellow's must be the same which crossed the sea with Europa on his 

 back on her wedding journey with Jupiter. It is probably kept by 

 poets for wedding journeys. 



In 1623 the Colony of Plymouth was so straitened by lack of pro- 

 vision that it was reduced to a pint of corn, and lived for months 

 without bread. Game and fish furnished their principal sustenance ; 

 and they gave thanks that they "could suck of the abundance of the 

 sea, and of the treasures hidden in the sand." The first comers had 

 no plows. Their implements were scanty, poor, clumsy and heavy. 

 They at first used a shell for a hoe as the Indians did. Cast steel 

 had not then been invented. Pumpkins, squashes, and tobacco were 

 unknown to them, and potatoes were a luxury just introduced into 

 England. This was the agriculture of New England two hundred 

 and sixty years ago. 



What need of worrying you with statistics of what it is to-day ! 

 The contrast is complete enough if I tell you that by the last census 

 before the establishment of our College, the agricultural products of 

 Massachusetts alone were thirty-two millions of dollars, and the value 

 of her live stock over twelve millions. We have besides repaid the 

 debt to England by the export of sheep, and cattle, and the fast trot- 

 ting horse, and, besides the finest agricultural implements in the world, 

 have added the sewing-machine to every farmer's fireside, improved 

 every loom in the world, and presented its inhabitants with the tele- 

 graph and the telephone, and the fastest sailing vessels which have 

 yet been known. 



From the earliest settlement of this country to the presidency of 

 Washington there is no record of any active efforts to improve our 

 agriculture, except by a few feeble attempts at agricultural journals, 

 and scattering agricultural associations generally of a social char- 

 acter. 



