has added to tbe landed wealth of the nation $8,753,135,000. /The 

 same returns make the cash value of our farm fixtures and stock 

 $1,862,154,886, swelhng tbe grand total of agricultural contribution 

 to the inconceivable sum of $10,615,289,646. This, it should be 

 noticed, is its accumulations, and is distinct from its annual produc- 

 tions. This amazing sum is the permanent caj^ital of the state, and 

 its peculiar character is really of more importance to it than the 



amount. The other property of the nation in individual hands 



money, bonds, notes, merchandise, real estate of towns and cities 

 is good of its kind in ordinary tinies, when everything moves 

 smoothly, and is available for government use, but in great emerg- 

 encies — in times of national convulsions and war — when the vital 

 strength and enduring power of the state is brought to the test 

 this class of property disappears, or is unsuited to the occasion ; 

 but the vr-lue of the farming lands and their power of production 

 become the real estate security which sustains the nation's credit at 

 home and abroad, and enables it to recover from the gi'eatest disas- 

 ters. France, at the present time, is a good example of this. 

 Crushed, subdued and devastated by the great military power and 

 armies of Prussia, laid under enormous contributions to pay the 

 war expenses of both countries, we are astonished at her unimjiaired 

 credit, and the rapidity with which she is repairing her manifold 

 injuries. This is not the influence of the capital or products of her 

 commerce or manufactures, but the result of long years of wisely- 

 directed effort in creating a nation of skillful farmers, and raisin"- 

 her farming lands to the highest point of value and power of pro- 

 duction. The aid which farming gives to the nation's regular pros- 

 perity, to its annual products, is no less marked than its influence 

 on its permanent capital. In fact, the former, to a great extent, is 

 the result of the latter. Referring again to the last census, I find 

 the appraised value of all kinds of farm products of 1870, while in 

 the hands of farmers, and before any value was added by trans- 

 portation or dealers' profits, was $2,515,593,076. This is the result 

 of a single year's work on our farms, and so quietly was it done, so 

 silently did the ingathering go forward at ten thousand different 

 points, that this enormous value was stored almost without the 

 notice of the bustling, clamorous world of trade and manufactures. 

 That very year they besieged the government for special privileges 

 and direct aid by the adjustment of the tariff, the opening of new 

 hues of communication and new marts of traffic, though the value 



