210 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



and success in finances will depend more or less on the suc- 

 cess in the two mentioned ; and, last but not least, that 

 health and strength which the majority of New England 

 farmers can enjoy if they only will. 



In education we cannot all enjoy the benefits of our agri- 

 cultural colleges obtained by taking a four years' course, but 

 we can make occasional visits to those institutions of learn- 

 ing and experimental farms, and also the many typical farms 

 perhaps owned by wealthy owners and managed by the hired 

 overseer, but nevertheless worthy of careful investigation, 

 and many lessons may be learned that will be of profit to the 

 careful observer and student of nature. I have often had 

 occasion to talk with an old man now past his four-score 

 years. He had no chance to attend college, leaving school at 

 twelve years of age, but he nevertheless was as well educated 

 and better posted than fifty per cent of the college-bred men. 

 How ? By careful reading and close study of nature, nothing 

 coming under his careful eye but what was diligently studied 

 and reasoned out. And the farmer above all others has 

 the opportunity to live close to nature and study how to 

 reveal her wonderful secrets. Who among you has ever 

 taken the kernel of corn and thought of the wonderful 

 changes necessary as we place it in the soil, apparently a 

 dead grain? But no! there is life. Soon the tiny blade 

 appears, and then another and another; then the stalk and 

 tassel and the ears appear ; and the wind has assisted in one 

 of the mysteries of nature, and the grain appears ; and again 

 w^e return to the original type of a kernel of corn. Who 

 cannot find enjoj^ment in studying these wonderful processes 

 of nature, which are constantly being repeated in this won- 

 derful and beautiful world ? Does the merchant, the manu- 

 facturer or the mechanic complete his work with the help of 

 the Divine Being, or must he work out his problems wholly 

 by the laws of mechanics ? 



On the farm there are constantly opportunities to improve 

 the conditions. There is some little corner that is too wet, 

 that needs a few rods of tile or an open ditch ; a stump, that 

 has been neglected and brush started around it, to be re- 

 moved ; or stone that we have banged our mowing machine 

 against for several years ; an old wall that is of no further 



