.*N OUILCGK ON VEC ETABI E CAREENjNG 



47 



same as the graduate of a medical college takes his hospital practice, 

 or the graduate of a college of architecture goes into an architect's 

 office, or the graduate of a college of law reads law. The college can 

 give instruction in the underlying principles and the reasons. It can 

 teach principles of soil fertility, of plant-breeding, of farm manage- 

 ment and of a great number of other matters that cannot be directly 

 taught on a farm. The farm and the college supplement each other; 

 one does not take the place of the other. The college is engaged in 

 education. 



There is the greatest misapprehension as to what a college can 

 teach. It is commonly supposed that every college of agriculture 

 should teach a man to plow. Now there are more than fifteen 

 hundred students in this College of Agriculture. Probably not one 

 of them knows how to plow as well as he ought. Let us suppose that 

 not more than half of these students should have instruction in 

 plowing. No man really knows how to plow unless he has plowed 

 more than one acre of land. If, however, we should set aside one acre 

 of land for each of these students to plow, we should need to have 

 more than seven hundred acres for this purpose alone. It would 

 require more than seven hundred days in which to do this work. 

 Of course, more than one field might be plowed at the same time, 

 but it is hardly conceivable that all these students could be given 

 instruction in plowing within the days of one year. In the meantime, 

 about all that would be happening on a good part of the area would 

 be plowing, and very few crops could be grown. In other words, 

 it is a physical impossibility for a college of agriculture to teach all 

 its students how to plow or how to milk a cow or how to build a fence. 

 Certain students will be taught these things and certain other students 

 will be taught other things. The fact is that these practical manipu- 

 lations ought to be learned on a farm. A college can teach a man 

 the reasons for plowing, why the operation is necessary, what are the 

 physical, chemical and biological results, and the like. It can also 

 teach him the physics of the plow. The special manual skill is a 

 matter of practice. 



You can readily see from these remarks that it is not possible 

 for a college of agriculture to make skilled vegetable gardeners of its 

 students; but it is perfectly feasible for it to educate young men 

 and young women by means of vegetable gardening subjects. 



It has b^en my privilege to welcome many organizations to the 

 College of Agriculture. I am particularly gratified to welcome this 



