4 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



should be a cessation in agricultural activity'. Forty years 

 ago JSTew England agriculture received a severe blow, at the 

 time of the opening up of the cheap land in the west, when 

 a man could go out there, and take up 100 or more acres of 

 very fertile land at a few cents or a few dollars per acre and 

 raise crops and ship them east and underbid the men here. 

 Then began the desertion of ISTew England farms and the 

 decline of our agriculture. Since that time there has been 

 a great change; the population of the west has increased, 

 the land that used to be open for grazing is now under 

 fence, and the prices there are as high, if not higher, than 

 they are here. I think there is no section of the country 

 to-day that offers a greater opportunity in agriculture than 

 !N"ew England and Massachusetts. 



In 1885 the value of the agricultural products of Massa- 

 chusetts was $42,000,000; in 1895, ten years later, this had 

 increased to $57,000,000; in 1905 it had again increased 

 to $72,000,000; and since 1905 our agricultural products 

 and our agriculture generally have been increasing in even 

 larger ratio. I think there is very little doubt that by 1915 

 we will have reached the $100,000,000 mark. 



During the last ten years the interest in agriculture shown 

 by the people in general and by the farmers in particular, 

 and the interest in cooperating with the agricultural col- 

 lege, have increased enormously. Ten years ago there was 

 very little doing in the office of the State Board of Agri- 

 culture at the State House, and to-day there is a large force 

 of clerks working from morning until night on the inquiries 

 that come in, which are enormous in quantity, and the work 

 they do is tremendous and " all to the good." During this 

 period of growth in the last ten years the name of one man 

 will go down in history as intimately connected with every 

 movement for the growth and the welfare of Massachusetts 

 agriculture. I refer to the Hon. J. Lewis Ellsworth. It is 

 with sincere regret that we have recently learned of Mr. 

 Ellsworth's intention of retiring from office. lie will leave 

 a vacancy which it will indeed be difficult to fill, and we 

 shall all miss him in that office. 



