40 [Assembly 



praise, and I render it with peculiar gratification. And here, at 

 this particular point, I would again urge upon the Institute the 

 propriety, and even necessity, of taking another step forward. 

 Comparisons are said to be odious ; some are so decidedly, and I 

 do not mean to make them ; but I do take upon myself to say, 

 emphatically, that in some particulars the premiums offered in 

 this department are still of too low a grade, and altogether in- 

 adequate, not only to the merits of the articles shown, but to the 

 labor and loss sustained by the exhibitors themselves ; and I will 

 add, that, comparatively, they are less than in any other depart- 

 ment of the Institute. Let the importance of each, and its bear- 

 ings upon the wants and necessities of mankind, be borne in 

 mind, and then tell me if there are not some articles in the Hor- 

 ticultural Department quite as deserving of a gold medal as a 

 Daguerreotype. I repeat that the time has arrived when it be- 

 hooves the Institute to take another step forward in the path of 

 justice and liberality, and it can now afford to do so. Should I 

 be connected with this department another year, it will become 

 my duty to present to the Institute a premium list, so modified 

 as to meet an existing necessity, and which, I entertain not a 

 doubt, will receive its approval. I think this can be done so as 

 to subserve the ends of justice without materially increasing our 

 expenses. 



I had hoped, in presenting another Report, that I should have 

 the pleasure of eoiigratulatiig the Institute en the incorporation 

 of an Agricultural College, but the hope has proved a vain one. 

 Some inquiry has convinced me that, for the present, the project 

 must be laid aside, but not abandoned. I have examined most 

 of the arguments urged against such an institution, but, to my 

 apprehension, none of them are insuperable. I am still of opi- 

 nion that an Agricultural College, properly planned, is a great 

 desideratum, and I shall therefore do what I can to keep the sub- 

 ject fresh in the public mind. I have heard a plan suggested? 

 by which many of the advantages of an Agricultural College can 

 be secured in a very desirable way ; but as the gentleman who 

 has this project in hand will soon bring it before the Institute, I 

 ^kall not forestall him. 



