No. 151.] 273 



On motion of Mr. Lawrence, the Convention adjourned to meet 

 during the next annual Fairs, on a day to be hereafter fixed. 



H. A. S. DEARBORN, President 



T. C. MUNN, 



D. J. Browne, 



Secretaries, 



The following memorial was read and approved by the Conven- 

 tion: 



To THE Honorable Legislature of the State of New- York. 



The Farmers' Club of the American Institute respectfully petition 

 your honorable body for the establishment of an agricultural college 

 and experimental farm, near the city of New* York, under the care of 

 the American Institute. 



Your petitioners believe that in the purchase of a farm and erec- 

 tion of suitable buildings, the State reserving the right of property 

 — no pecuniary loss to the State will ensue on account of the in- 

 creasing value of land near this greatly increasing metropolis. 



We need not tell such men as constitute the majority of your hon- 

 orable body, that to the agricultural branch of national industry eve- 

 ry possible encouragement is eminently due. 



We only endeavor to show that we are of the fixed faith that a 

 republic rests upon agricultural labor not only for its comfort and 

 wealth, but upon the workers of the land for virtue and for perpetu- 

 ity of our great republican system. We wish also to say, that not- 

 withstanding men have always found the true glory of their existence 

 dependent on agricultural labors — yet it has occurred in the history 

 of nations, that a false pride, generated by wealth and prosperity, 

 has been the cause of the decline and fall of empires. When a na- 

 tion has ceased to honor the cultivators of the land it has been con- 

 sumed by the consequence of that neglect. We desire to say that 

 no expense and no effort should be spared to sustain and to honor the 

 labor of the farmer — by public protection, by public notice, by pub- 

 lic rewards renderinof that ambition now more common in the other 

 pursuits of life — greatly more so in the noble pursuits of the farmer. 



And that the highest degree of instruction should be given to our 

 cultivators — so that every product of the farm of the- world may be 



[Assembly, No. 151.] 18 



