178 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



wagons from Oregon headed toward the East ! It wouldn't be 

 strange if there should be a second exodus, before many years ; 

 from an illusory Canaan, in search of which many a pilgrim has 

 lost a home, towards lands and homes less favored in some 

 respects, towards a climate more rigorous and a soil less fertile, 

 yet to a region which, taking all things into account, the physi- 

 cal imperfections, which cannot be escaped anywhere on this 

 planet, and those elements, intellectual, moral, social and spir- 

 itual, which give to life its substantial value, and which, \\'hen 

 withdrawn, render life, to say the least, a questionable boon, — 

 taking all things into the account, a region as desirable as any 

 other, whether to live in or to die in — to live in and to die in — 

 this is what our homes are given us for. We would wish them 

 less transient, more permanent. We feel as the wise man felt 

 when he made great works, builded houses, planted vineyards 

 — when he made gardens, and orchards, and planted them with 

 all manner of fruits, and pools of water, to water therewith the 

 wood, that bringeth forth trees ; he felt it to be " a great evil " 

 that he must leave it all so soon. This is, no doubt, " a sore 

 evil," yet it is the law", by Heaven's decree, to which our homes 

 and our estates are subject. And there is this alleviation in the 

 case, — that what our lives are too short to perfect, and fully to 

 enjoy, may be perfected and perhaps more fully enjoyed by 

 others ; so that we may work with good courage, each adding 

 his mite of influence to make home what it probably will be in 

 the good time to come — more attractive and beautiful in its sur- 

 roundings, and the centre of a higher intellectual and moral 

 life, than it is in this progressive, yet confessedly imperfect time 

 in which we live. 



THIRD DAY. 



Thursday, Dec. 15, 1870. 

 The Board met at nine o'clock, with Col. Eliphalet Stone, of 

 Dedham, in the chair. The following lecture was delivered 

 upon — 



