SCIENCE OF AGRICULTURE. 107 



mathematician and astronomer. Had the sailor of 

 olden time, who was well acquainted with every 

 rope in his ship, and understood the management of 

 his craft to perfection, but who dared not go out of 

 sight of land lest he should fail to find his way back, 

 been told that men who never walked a deck would 

 one day be able to direct him how to lay his courses 

 so as to reach with certainty any known point on 

 the globe — so as to enable him to explore every 

 broad ocean and unknown sea, and return home 

 again without the least danger of losing his way; 

 with what feelings suppose ye, he would have looked 

 on his informant and how would he have treated 

 such information? Much my dear farmer as you 

 now perhaps feel toward me, and as you are perhaps 

 disposed to treat the subject now under considera- 

 tion. But before you suffer feelings of contempt to 

 gain utterance, before you ridicule my views and 

 assertions, I pray you to hear me and consider. The 

 laws of nature are unchangeable, and when discover- 

 ed, guide the operator unerringly to the accomplish- 

 ment of his object, in all cases where natural forces 

 are made to perform the work. Look at the steam 

 engine. The practical mechanic, however expert in 

 his trade, could never have built it until the man of 

 science had taught him to measure with the utmost 

 exactness the elasticity or expansive power of steam 

 at any given temperature. Without system, which 

 scientific men can alone contrive, the knov/ledge 

 which individuals obtain by personal experience is 

 nearly all lost to the community. 



An old mariner whom I once knew, and who with- 

 out ever acquiring the science of navigation, rejoiced 

 in the title of captain, and guided his vessel as safely 

 as othej more scientific commanders, for a long series 

 of years to and from Salem and Baltimore, used to 

 say his old schooner knew the way to Baltimore. 

 But could this man have put on board his craft ano- 

 ther seaman as skilful in managing a vessel as himself, 

 and who, like him, had spent his life in the coasting 



