xxii REPORTS OF DELEGATES. 



of their enfeebled condition. Now, loss of population alone does 

 not indicate deca}', unless it is carried so far that the industry of 

 the locality begins to suffer. The general condition of the industry 

 itself, and the prosperity of the population which remains, should 

 not be lost sight of. I could name one cit}' in this Commonwealth 

 which lost in the last decade, nearly eight hundred of its population, 

 and yet no one would pretend to sa}' that its aggregate wealth is 

 diminishing, or that its industries are declining. It lost a margin, 

 easily affected b}' a local accident, and not involving its vital force. 

 And so with regard to our farming towns. So long as the farms 

 themselves maintain an air of thrift and the farmers subsist com- 

 fortabl}', with means enough to supply themselves and their fami- 

 lies with what they need and desire, the question of population, 

 except as a matter of depopulation, is secondar3^ There is a group 

 of towns in Franklin County, for instance, in which agriculture is 

 especially vigorous, and where the market for commercial fertilizers 

 is alwa3's lively for the cultivation of tobacco and special crops, but 

 whose population has been reduced in number from a loss of two in 

 some instances, to more than one hundred in others, since 1860. 

 There is no doubt that the wealth of these towns is increasing. If 

 the agricultural resources of a few square miles are as well devel- 

 oped by five hundred persons as by six hundred, and five hundred 

 can produce all that the region is adapted to, why should we desire 

 to crowd those acres with a greater multitude ? A sur[)lus of popu- 

 lation in an agricultural section has alwaj's been relieved in this 

 countr}' by emigration, or by calls to anew employment, and will be, 

 so long IS we have a great unoccupied West, and increasing manu- 

 factories, combined with popular energ}' enough to move. And as 

 time goes on, and our active industries increase, we find an excess 

 of population here, whether in cit}^ or country-, more and more ready 

 to seek relief. Formerl}" this excess was disposed somewhat to 

 remain, especiall}- in the rural districts ; now it is disposed to go as 

 rapidl}' as possible. It flies to the cities or to newer sections of the 

 country, — not always, however, leaving a declining agriculture be- 

 hind, as the towns I have referred to will testify". Besides which, 

 we should remember that inasmuch as the arbitrar}' lines which 

 divide towns- do not control the currents of population, it is but fair 

 that the aggregate development of an industr}^ in a State should be 

 taken as an index of its precise condition, and not the state of afiairs 

 in a single circumscribed locality. 



But as population is made by manj^ a test of prosperity in our 

 agricultural towns, it may be well for those Avho see in the industry 

 of such towns no signs of decay to accept the test, and ascertain, if 

 possible, precisely what it means. That there are towns remote 



