creased in spite of the ravages of war. After the war, the man- 

 ufactured products of England again found an open door, and 

 encountering the infant manufactures of America in free compe- 

 tition, the latter being unable to sustain themselves, the industry 

 which had sprung up and prospered during the war, was extin- 

 guished. 



Our manufacturers were ruined. Our merchants, even those 

 who had hoped to enrich themselves by importations, became bank- 

 rupt, and all these causes .united had such a disastrous influence 

 upon agriculture that a general depreciation of real estate follow- 

 ed, and failure became general among proprietors. American 

 industry must have perished in that struggle, if the embargo, and 

 afterwards the war of 1812, had not come to its relief. In this 

 period as in that of the war of Independence, the industrial arts 

 received an extraordinary impulse. 



Long experience has taught us that agriculture could not arrive 

 at a high degree of prosperity without manufacturing industry. 



As Jefferson said : " The prosperity of the country can only be 

 fixed upon a solid basis where the manufacturers are placed side 

 by side with the agriculturists." 



Allow me to quote from Mr. Allen's most excellent address given 

 before the Society last year. He said : " The stimulus given to 

 production by the late civil war, causing high prices, induced such 

 an increase in the manufacture of agricultural machinery and im- 

 plements as to more than fill the place of the million of men drawn 

 into the ranks of the army. And the consequence was that 

 this nation exhibited an example such as has been never seen in 

 all history, of a people supporting a consuming army of a million 

 in the field of war, yet not only filling the gap, but actualby so 

 increasing their domestic products as to create a larger surplus 

 for exportation than ever before. As compared with 1860 and 

 the years previou, sthese exports, except cotton only, were actu- 

 ally doubled during the war, and thus our agriculture not only 

 supplied food for the masses of the people and for the army and 

 navy, but gold for the public treasury. What a proud monument 

 is that to the skill of our mechanics and the enterprise of our 

 farmers. For who can say that but for this wonderful spirit aroused 

 and developed in agriculture, our soldiers could not have been 

 sustained and the war might have been a failure." 



1 think I have shown you that the cultivators of the soil stand 



