100 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



2cl. Practical instruction in survcj'ing, mensuration and drawing. 



3d. And by lectures— in botany, geology, zoology, comparative 

 anatomy and natural philosophy. 



Some of them, — indeed all of them, if desired, — might be pursued 

 practically, and with the use of apparatus and specimens. 



This course contemplates a period of study of from one year to two 

 and a half years, according to the qualification of the piipil at the out- 

 set. He appears an hour each day at the blackboard, where he shares 

 the drill of a class, and where he acquires a facility of illustration, 

 command of language, an address and thorough consciousness of real 

 knowledge, which are of more value, in many cases, as you know, 

 than almost any amount of simple acquisition. He also attends on 

 an average about one lecture a day throughout the year. During the 

 remaining time he is occupied with experimental work in the labora- 

 tory or field. 



The great difficulty with students of agriculture, who might care to 

 come to the Scientific School, is the expense of living in Cambridge. 

 If some farmer at a distance of three or four miles from college, 

 where rents for rooms are low, would open a boarding house for 

 students of agriculture in the Scientific School, where the care of a 

 kitchen garden and some stock might be intrusted to them, and where 

 a farmer's plain table might be spread at the price at which laborers 

 would be received, we might hope that our facilities would be taken 

 advantage of on a larger scale. As it is, but few, comparatively, 

 among our students, come to qualify themselves for farming. 



I am, very truly yours, 



E. N. HOBSFOKD. 



Hon. Geo. S. Bouiwell. 



I should, however, consider the arrangements proposed as 

 temporary, and finally to be abandoned or made permanent, as 

 experience should dictate. 



It may be said, I think, without disparagement to the many 

 distinguished and disinterested men who have labored for the 

 advancement of agriculture, that the operations of the govern- 

 ment and of the state and county societies have no. plan or 

 system by vvhich as a Avhole thoy are guided. The county 

 societies have been and are the chief means of influence and 

 progress ; biit they have no power which can bo systematically 

 applied ; their movements are variable, and their annual exhi- 

 bitions do not always indicate the condition of agriculture in 

 the districts represented. They have become, to a certain 



