76 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
March 
assist on the farm, under the immediate supervi¬ 
sion of the instructor. The necessity for manual 
labor will be apparent, without argument; for the 
college is for working farmers, men who need the 
bone and sinew of physical strength, as well as 
the acumen and activity of intellectual power. In 
connection with this department, there should be 
a smith’s and carpenter’s shop, where the students 
can familiarize themselves with the use of tools, 
and, if mechanically inclined, learn to manufacture, 
alter or repair their farm implements. In short, 
the college should be furnished with all the con¬ 
veniences and appurtenances of a well appointed 
farm, establishment. 
2. Natural Science. —The department of na¬ 
tural science, is quite intimately connected with 
the other, and it should be taught with special 
reference to its bearing upon agriculture. A trai¬ 
ning in the fundamental principles of Chemistry, 
Geology, Botany and Entomology, would be ne¬ 
cessary, but the mode of instruction should re¬ 
semble the one detailed above. It has been said 
that such a course of tuition is superficial, but 
without just grounds. The student of Chemis¬ 
try, however well drilled in his text book, must 
go into the laboratory before he becomes a chem¬ 
ist-—the student of Geology and Botany must go 
out in search of the facts which uphold his princi¬ 
ples, and see their application, before he can lay 
any claim to being an adept in the sciences. It 
is at this point, that so much of what is termed 
education, fails; and we insist upon this system of 
teaching as the only one fitted to the purposes of 
an agricultural college. 
During the summer months, these two depart¬ 
ments would be all the institution would require, 
but in the winter and early spring months, when 
there is little opportunity for practical labor and 
observation, instruction should be given in Mathe¬ 
matics, Veterinary Surgery, and Pathology. 
3. Theoretic and Practical Mathematics.-^ 
As a means of discipline, theoretic mathematics 
stand foremost, and if the student is not already 
well acquainted with the principles of the higher 
branches, time cannot be spent more profitably 
than in acquiring a thorough knowledge of them. 
It should be borne in mind, that the student is 
supposed to have mastered the primary mathe¬ 
matics in his academical course. It is also highly 
desirable, that the farmer should know enough 
of practical surveying, to come to a correct esti¬ 
mate of his own farm, enough of civil engineering 
to lay a drain scientifically, and enough of me¬ 
chanics to understand the working of his imple¬ 
ments and the relative power of machines. The 
method of teaching in this department should, we 
think, be somewhat different from the one usually 
adopted in our academies and colleges, and made 
more simple and practical. The knowledge and 
experience of a thorough mathematician, would 
suggest means for accomplishing this. 
4. Veterinary Surgery* and Pathology.— 
The importance of instruction in this department 
is too much a matter of every-day experience 
to demand explanation. Lectures on animal 
physiology and anatomy, illustrated by skele¬ 
tons of the domestic animals, and giving a sy¬ 
nopsis of the diseases to which they are subject, 
with the best modes of treatment, are quite indis¬ 
pensable to such an institution. 
In the winter term, courses of lectures in the 
first two departments should be given, embracing 
a. systematic review of the subjects pursued in 
the summer term, which, with the last named de¬ 
partments, should be made accessible to those who 
have not the time or the means to avail themselves 
of the entire course of study, by the payment of 
a small sum for each course of lectures. This 
would at once furnish the popular element in the 
college, and make its influence more universally 
felt. It would open the institution to a large class 
of young men, who are under the necessity of la¬ 
boring during the summer, and who could gather 
here in the winter to their great advantage. 
With regard to the means of carrying such an 
institution into immediate operation, and the ex¬ 
pense attending it, the following plan and estimate 
are suggested as feasible and within bounds. Let 
the Legislature grant an act of incorporation to 
certain individuals, and endow the institution with 
a sum not to exceed $30,000, to be paid when an 
equal sum should be raised and invested perma¬ 
nently by the corporation of the college. Allow 
the farm, with the necessary buildings, implements, 
stock, Sec., to cost $30,000; a library, apparatus, 
Sec., fora commencement, $5,000; then invest the 
remaining $25,000 as a fund, which at 6 per cent in¬ 
terest would yield an income of $1,500,which might 
be applied to the salaries of professors, or otherwise 
to the purposes of the college. The farm, with 
prudent management, would more than pay the 
expense of carrying it on, and ought to afford pro¬ 
fit enough to pay the salary of the President. 
This income, with the funds derived from the tu¬ 
ition of students, would place the institution above 
embarrassment, and secure its permanence. If 
there are not friends of an agricultural college suf¬ 
ficiently interested in the plan, and sufficiently 
convinced of its availablity to furnish the $30,000, 
we may safely conclude that the time for founding 
such a college has not yet come. 
Having thus briefly sketched the outline of a 
course of study, which can be modified by those 
who have the college in charge, and the means of 
carrying it into effect, we ask, have we not a plan 
which is at once comparatively simple and inex¬ 
pensive, and positively effective and useful? We 
will not say that everything desirable is comprised 
in the sketch, but it is a working model of a sys¬ 
tem which can be enlarged and rendered more 
complete, as the wants of farmers require it. It 
would demonstrate the principle which we as¬ 
sume at the outset, that an education of the 
right stamp is essential to the progress and per¬ 
fection of a complete and rational practice of ag¬ 
riculture. The practical effects of such an insti¬ 
tution might be slow, but they would of necessity 
be sure; for a man that begins right—begins at the 
foundation, and goes on rationally, systematical¬ 
ly and under standingly, must be making constant 
progress. The endowment of it would, in a cer¬ 
tain sense, give farming a dignity it has not now; 
it would say that agriculture has its science as 
well as its literature and art, and that the cultiva¬ 
tors of the soil are entitled to the rank of educated 
men, and the honors and emoluments of a culti¬ 
vated mind. It would give farmers’ mind* an 
impulse in the right direction, and stimulate them 
to a higher ambition than the mere digging for 
pecuniary profit. It would engraft upon a healthy, 
well-rooted stock, the scion of Improved American 
Agriculture, which would, in consequence, bear 
fruit more abundant, more worthy the rich, free 
soil in which it is planted, and the sturdy, inde¬ 
pendent character which belongs by right to the 
American farmer. 
