CHANGES IN AGRICULTURE. 35 



confidence of those who are concerned in its application. 

 For the most part, farmers have neither the disposition nor 

 the means to try experiments, and they have so often been 

 the victims of imposition that they are suspicious of new 

 projects, and they hesitate to engage in new undertakings. 



For the first time Massachusetts was this year visited by 

 the Colorado beetle, and our farmers were left to experiments 

 and to crude suggestions, when, as I am informed, the best 

 methods of resisting its ravages were understood in the West, 

 and particularly by the officers of tho Agricultural College 

 of Michigan. The absence of this information, which might 

 have been given with authority, so as to have commanded 

 universal confidence, must have cost the State many thousand 

 dollars in crops and in fruitless experiments. 



The Agricultural College at Amherst is in existence, and 

 it should be made as beneficial as possible to the interest 

 which it represents, and which it is designed to promote. 

 The suggestion which I make to-day to the farmers of Nor- 

 folk is, that they consider whether the power of the college 

 may not be greatly increased without serious additional 

 expense to the State. Whether its force of professors might 

 not be so enlarged that a number, three or more, might be 

 constantly employed among the farmers of the agricultural 

 sections of the State. The summers could be devoted to 

 observations and to examinations of soils, crops, tools, cattle, 

 modes of culture, markets, and, indeed, to anything touching 

 the production and disposal of farm products ; and the win- 

 ters to lectures and conversations to and with the formers in 

 the agricultural districts upon every topic concerning their 

 progress and prosperity. 



The farmers are already active in the work of self-culture, 

 but they cannot take the lead in improvements which are 

 purely scientific, nor can they always wisely judge the value 

 of suggestions made by others. Scientific men, accredited 

 by the State and by the college, would be entitled to their 

 confidence, and I cannot doubt that the results of the labors 

 of a small number of such men would many times exceed 

 the cost. The competition of the hands — of the hands merely 

 — is nearly over in this country, and in the countries with 

 which we are in commercial relations. The competition is 



