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not in that way to be applied. We have no masters controlling large 

 bodies of laboring men. But if we are to educate the farmers of. this Com- 

 monwealth, it must be by educating the great mass of them. The majority 

 must in some way be reached. It will not do to give to certain individuals 

 the science, with the expectation that certain others are to apply that sci- 

 ence without knowing something of the reasons which exist for its appli- 

 cation. 



We are, then, to carry the knowledge to the great mass of the people. 

 And the question is, How is it to be done? If we educate a few men, it 

 may happen, and very likely will happen, that from the nature of their pur- 

 suits, they will be unable to approach and communicate with the mass, so 

 as to make their knowledge available in this department of industry. 



It is not more than twenty years since, that we had two classes of 

 teachers in our public schools. And it is not too much to say that they 

 entirely failed. The one class was composed of young men sent out from 

 our colleges into the interior towns and small districts of the State ; and, 

 as a general thing, it may be said that they failed to produce the result 

 which good teachers ought to produce. 



We had another class which acted as teachers. They came from the 

 mass of the people. They possessed some of the qualifications for teach- 

 ers, but they were deficient in many particulars. Neither of these classes 

 met the wants of the community. Now it may happen that we shall con- 

 stitute a class of men who, in some respects, will resemble the young men 

 who went out from the colleges to the district schools ; and if we do, they 

 will most certainly fail to accomplish the results which we expect. 



We have instituted, with regard to our common schools, and, I take 

 it, we can reason somewhat from analogy, we have instituted Normal 

 Schools to furnish instruction to young men and women as teachers. They 

 go there for the purpose of qualifying themselves as teachers. And, I 

 take it, these institutions have accomplished most perfectly the object which 

 the State and their patrons had in view at their establishment. 



Now we are. in some way or another, to connect the science of the col- 

 lege and the laboratory with the labor of the farm. And the great ques- 

 tion I apprehend is, How is this to be done ! It was said here, the other 

 night, at the Legislative Agricultural Meeting, that if you take young men 

 and send them to college, for the purpose of instructing them in science, 

 with the expectation that they would go out and instruct the farmers of the 

 State, they would fail. I thought there was some force in the remark. 



Now we want, in the agricultural system of education, a class of men 

 who shall combine the science of the school with the labor of the farm. 

 Now, to my mind, it, is apparent that they must be drawn in the main from 

 among the farmers themselves. 



You must begin with the farmers, and work up, infusing into the great 

 mass of the people an increasing desire for scientific knowledge, which 

 shall enable them to apply agricultural sciences to agriculture itself. 



In what way, then, can you reach the great body of the farmers of the 



