PROGRESSIVE AGRICULTURE. 231 



place them among the ordinary necessaries of life, and so 

 perfectly adapted to human wants as to be promotive of both 

 bodily health and the higher mental faculties of our nature. 



The Northmen who came to our New England shores 

 before the days of Columbus found the grape thriving in 

 neglected freedom ; but to Bull and Rogers and our own 

 Captain Moore and other eminent specialists of our day we 

 owe the introduction and development of those luscious vari- 

 eties which gladden our homes during these autumn and early 

 winter days, while the names of Downing and our own ven- 

 erable Wilder are suggestive of wonderful possibilities in the 

 fruit department of farm life. 



The potato, known to the world only since the days of Co- 

 lumbus, has been slow to come into common use, and two 

 or three bushels were considered a liberal winter supply for 

 an old-fashioned New England family. 



Now the annual production of this one crop in our own 

 land can only be reckoned by hundreds of millions of bush- 

 els, while its use for food has become more general on the 

 tables of the rich and the poor than that of almost any other 

 article. 



Indian corn certainly had no place among the stores of 

 those who had never heard of this new world. In our times 

 it proves the one crop suited to our broad lands. 



Farm Stock. 



The ancients had their flocks and herds, furnishing mate- 

 rial for clothing, dairy product and a meat supply ; and to 

 these they were largely indebted for subsistence. It was 

 left for the men of our day to devise and place within the 

 reach of the common farmer those appliances which revolu- 

 tionize the dairy business, and give to the world a quality 

 of product never before known, while improvements in 

 dairy and other farm stock, through efforts on the part of 

 specialists that amount to patriotism, have fully kept pace 

 with those in kindred departments. 



With the aid of chemistry we are able to balance up the 

 feed of the domestic animal, making each part take its pro- 

 portionate place ; and the knowledge and skill of the vete- 

 rinarian give us untold advantages over those of earlier days. 



