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Like Mount Zion, the college is beautiful for situation, and its 

 government and instruction, as far as they could be judged by 

 the examinations and exhibitions, gave promise that the high- 

 raised expectations of its friends would be fully realized. 

 Farmers of Norfolk ! let this institntion, the offspring of your 

 brain, be cherished by your affection and nurtured by your 

 assiduous support. Make it a point to keep your own homes 

 represented in it by your sons. And make it another point to 

 disinherit any son who, having received its advantages and 

 graduated with its honors, declines to give head and hand to the 

 business of farming. This is the great danger to be guarded 

 against, — that our young men having completed a course at the 

 Agricultural College will turn their attention to something else 

 that promises to be easier, possibly more lucrative, and which 

 some soft-handed dolt regards as more respectable. I ask for 

 the vigilance of the friends of an improving agriculture at this 

 point. I ask that the college itself carefully enjoin upon the 

 young men the duty, and set before them, also, the privilege 

 and distinction of continuing in the fellowship of intelligent 

 and educated farmers, and devoting their energies of body and 

 mind to their noble pursuit. 



It is noble ; and in the springing and growing crop, in the 

 sheeted bloom of its orchards and gardens, — cherry, pear, 

 plum, peach, and apple, rolling their waves and billows of 

 blossoms over the hill-sides and down through the levels, like 

 the gorgeous blossoming of the clouds at sunset, a perfect king- 

 dom of glory, — it is not only noble but most inspiriting and 

 health-giving. Moreover, I am well assured, it is handsomely 

 remunerative ; and with us Yankees that is the prime con- 

 sideration. If the profits of farming bear any proportion to 

 the cost of its products in the market, I should be in favor of 

 paying the national debt by a solid levy on the farming inter- 

 est ! To many it is a mystery why prices rule so high. The 

 thing is easily explained. It is owing to the high price of 

 labor. And that ? — is owing to labor-saving machines ! for you 

 see — this is the way they make it clear to me — the more labor 

 you can dispense with in carrying on a farm the dearer it 

 becomes, and we have to put prices up accordingly! Tliis is 

 the metaphysics of the subject. Perhaps you understand it. 



