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SPEECH OF MR. BUCKMINSTER. EDITOR OF THE PLOUGHMAN. 



MR. PRESIDENT 



I am very much pleased by the observations made by His Excellency, 

 the Governor. I think the County Societies have been doing a vast deal of 

 good. I am in favor of your doing something more, of getting up a Board 

 of Agriculture. I am very much pleased that his Excellency speaks of 

 town Societies. We have forty or fifty in the Commonwealth. I know 

 not why they should not be encouraged as well as the County Societies. 

 In the large Counties of Middlesex, Essex and Worcester, there are towns 

 which are not accommodated. They have Societies which have discus- 

 sions. Now I want the Legislature to encourage them, and give them ap- 

 propriations in proportion to the funds they may raise. 



I was surprised to hear the assertion, this afternoon, that we had made 

 no improvement in agriculture for forty or fifty years past. These gentle- 

 men want to set aside the old system and begin anew. What principle 

 are we to begin upon ? The honorable gentleman from Princeton has told 

 you that we must take Professors from Europe and bring them here. I am 

 glad to hear that His Excellency did not recommend that. If there is any 

 useful agricultural knowledge in the country, I ask you where it is. It 

 rests with the practical farmers. They possess all the practical knowledge 

 which is of any value. Chemists may talk as much as they please, with 

 high flown language. The farmers have the practical knowledge. 



The word, science, has been used. Science, we are glad to learn, is 

 knowledge. Farmers understand that. There was one gentleman a little 

 alarmed at science. He would not have it. Now, Mr. President, what is 

 the use of telling us, farmers, that there has been no improvement for a 

 dozen years past ? I live in the vicinity of Worcester. Forty years ago it 

 was the practice there, among all farmers, to let their cattle run at large, 

 saving none of the manure ; and not one man in forty attempted to increase 

 his manure by carting in substances to preserve the essences. Fifty years 

 ago the hogs ran in the road, and no manure was saved from them. Have 

 not we made improvement? Your foreign chemists and your foreign pro- 

 fessors will all tell you that manure is the very foundation of all production 

 connected with agriculture ; and yet gentlemen will tell you, and repeat 

 that we have made no improvement with regard to farming, even when we 

 produce four or five times as much on a given piece of land as we used to 

 make forty or fifty years ago. I want this thing well understood. Let us 

 look at the fact. The gentleman from Brookfield has told you some facts 

 with regard to what we have obtained from foreigners. We have been led 

 astray ten times by chemists where we have got real information from them 

 once. 



But I would not undervalue chemistry. A farmer cannot do any thing 

 unless he makes more from his farm than he spends. What we want is to 

 circulate the knowledge we possess. I know there are some farmers who 



