THE CULTIVATOR. 
313 
It may be proper to improve the form of a native race, but at the 
same time it may be a very iiyudicious attempt to eniarge the size. 
The size of animals is commonly adapted to the soil which they in¬ 
habit Where produce is nutritive and abundant, the animals are large, 
having grown proportionally to the quantity of food which for genera¬ 
tions they have been accustomed to obtain. Where the produce is scan¬ 
ty, the animals are small, being proportioned to the quantity of food 
which they are able to procure—of these contrasts the sheep of Lin¬ 
colnshire and Wales, are examples. The sheep of Lincolnshire would 
starve on the mountains of Wales. 
Crossing the breed of animals may be attended with bad effects in 
various ways, and that even when adopted in the beginning on a good 
principle ; for instance, suppose some larger ewes than those of the na¬ 
tive breed, were taken to the mountains of Wales, and put to the rams 
of that country—if these foreign ewes were led in proportion to their 
size, their lambs would be of an improved form, and larger in size than 
the native animals; but the males produced by this cross, though of a 
good form, would be disproportionate in size to the native ewes, and, 
therefore, if permitted to mix with them, would be productive of a 
starvlinc, ill-formed progeny. Thus a cross which was at first an im¬ 
provement, would, by giving occasion to a contrary cross, ultimately 
prejudice the breed. 
The general mistake in crossing has arisen from an attempt to in¬ 
crease the size of a native race of animals, being a fruitless effort to 
counteract the laws of nature. 
The Arabian horses are, in general, the most perfect in the world; 
which probably has arisen from great care in selection, and also from 
being unmixed with any variety of the same species ; the males, there¬ 
fore, have never been disproportioned to the size of the females. 
The native horses of India are small, but well proportioned, and 
good of their kind. With the intention of increasing their size, the 
India company have adopted a plan of sending large stallions to India. 
If these stallions should be extensively used, a disproportioned race 
must be the result, and a valuable breed of horses may be irretrieva¬ 
bly spoiled. 
From theory, from practice, and from extensive observation, which 
is more to be depended on than either, it is reasonable to form this 
CONCLUSION. 
It is wrong to enlarge a native breed of animals; for in proportion 
as they increase in size, they become worse in form, less hardy, and 
more liable to disease. 
From the Southern Agriculturist. 
AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION. 
Our prosperity has been derived entirely from our agriculture, im¬ 
perfect as it has ever been; and without any visible improvement in 
our arts of management, labor, or experiment, we have presented, 
through the agency of a productive soil and atmosphere, the appear¬ 
ance of a people which has always continued to improve. % A11 our in¬ 
terests, whether they affect our gain, our society, our politics, local or 
foreign, take their complexion from our agricultural pursuits, and are 
prompted by them. All professions in our country are moved by those 
of the planter. In his success, they succeed—in his losses, they suffer. 
In his fate, the fortunes of merchant and mechanic, lawyer and doctor, 
freeman and slave, have their governing principle, and his importance 
is to be estimated by their dependance upon him, not less than by his 
own individual character and influence in the community. His success¬ 
es determining, in a great measure, theirs, does it not follow that in 
proportion as he is weak or enlightened, they will falter or succeed. 
In proportion as he is intelligent and industrious, will be their hopes 
of fortune, and their capacity for enterprise. In proportion as he is 
skilful and reflective, will be their skill, their reflection, their readiness 
for adventure, their elevation of pursuit and character—their virtue 
and their patriotism. The intimate connexion and close dependance 
of all pursuits upon those of agriculture, are happily comprised by Lord 
Bacon in a simple and brief sentence, in which he sums up the whole 
history of national prosperity: “There are three things,” says he, 
“ which one nation selleth to another—the commodity as it is yielded 
by nature, the manufacture, and the vecture or carriage; so,” says he, 
“ if the three wheels go, wealth will flow in as a spring tide.” He pla¬ 
ces the three things in their proper order. The planter first, the ma¬ 
nufacturer next, the shipper third; and the sentence might very well 
be stuck over the door of every cotton and counting house in the coun¬ 
try.* But there is yet a greater than planter, manufacturer and ship¬ 
per, whom Bacon has not classified with the rest. He must be set be- 
“The words of Bacon have been rhymed as follows : 
“ Let. the earth have cultivation, 
Let its products have creation, 
Bid the seas give circulation, 
And you build the mighty nation.” 
And yet, unless you give the people education, they would be knocking out 
one another’s brains with their own working implements. 
Vol. III. 15* 
fore them all. He is Labor —a huge, heavy-handed giant, striking like 
a blind Cyclops, imperfectly and uselessly, until Art, a gift from Hea¬ 
ven, which should be protected, if not worshipped by man, comes to 
his aid, and directs his efforts, and makes him equally important to 
agriculture, to mechanics, and to commerce. Through him they all 
triumph, without him not one of them could succeed. 
We have labor—has art duly prompted and directed his industry? 
This is the question. Surely, these are truths—undeniable truths— 
which we have been uttering. Have our people learned them—do they 
believe them—have they adopted, and do they toil in obedience to the 
precepts which they teach ? How far has South Carolina recognized, 
and how closely has she practised upon them? Let us ask the ques¬ 
tion. Let us look into the truth. 
It is humiliating to know that we have made no such inquiries—we 
have been too regardless of these truths. Not sufficiently content with 
the bounty of Providence to forbear complaint, we have yet been too 
well satisfied with what she has given us, to have lahorel at improve¬ 
ment. We have left undone a thousand things which should have been 
done, and we need not wonder, if there should come a time, when the 
wholesome truth comes home to us, and the stern rebuke of heaven 
places our present diminution of the goods of fortune to our own ac¬ 
count; charging us with a neglect of our proper duties of self-instruc¬ 
tion and selfidevotion to our own and the general interest of the coun¬ 
try. Look back at our agricultural history and enterprise, and how 
gross are its defects. What have we learnt?—What do we know?— 
Where are we now ? Are we a solitary year in advance of the first 
settlers in the matter of Agricultural Education ? We fear not. What 
are our improvements ; and what is the estimate which we are accus- 
| tomed even now to put upon agricultural knowledge? Is it not regarded 
as the merest matter of common place industry and effort, which calls for 
an overseer, not a guide—a spy rather than a teacher; which needs no 
art to prune, no precaution to provide against the vicissitudes of the 
season, no reflection to devise new improvements, or convert into pro¬ 
per channels, the well known and the old? Is not such the estimate 
eommonly put upon agriculture—the very first of the arts—mingling 
the necessary with the useful, the useful with the grateful, the grateful 
with the elegant, the elegant with all others? There are very few per¬ 
sons who consider it a profession, requiring any intellectual exercise 
whatever, and, compared with its sister arts, we may venture to affirm, 
that, although the very highest in importance, it is yet the very lowest 
in point of rank. True, we honor the planter as one who is a good ci¬ 
tizen—who has wealth and the influence which wealth produces-—who 
is frank in his intercourse with men—who is hospitable to the stranger, 
and who gives to our society a character and temper, which we would 
not willingly see exchanged for any other. But there is little more. 
His virtues and vices, his toils and his pleasures are, alike, set down, 
and the Agricultural Society may foot them up at pleasure. To him 
it matters not much what is the precise character of the soil which he 
cultivates—he asks not the history, he observes not the constitution 
of the plant from which comes all his revenue. It is not his concern 
upon what principle of mechanics his workmen, his horses, mules and 
oxen, apply their labor; nor does he deem it his part to know by what 
particular tenure he holds his lands—or upon what great principle, his 
rights, as a citizen, are maintained. He is too apt to avoid all trouble 
and concern on these topics. Public opinion expects from him no know¬ 
ledge on any of them, and he may live in total ignorance of the whole 
history of his own country, past and present, yet, in no wise offend the 
judgment of those who move around him. Let him but pay his taxes, 
he may vote—let him but speak civilly, he is a good citizen—let him 
but show a wholesome warmth on the subject of his public relations, 
he is quite as pure a patriot as any in the republic. 
Nor, in public and national respects only, may he live in utter igno¬ 
rance, and live without offending popular opinion. Contract the 
sphere of your observation, and see him at home. He may be totally 
uninformed of those matters which more immediately pertain to his 
own plantation and its government—sometimes, indeed, he may i be 
even found to despise them, as unbecoming in him to notice, or un¬ 
worthy of his esteem. And this course of conduct, though in such ex¬ 
ceeding bad taste, would call for no rebuke from the general feeling, 
and would, indeed, rather accord with, than revolt, the public opinion. 
We are somehow strangely given to regard all labors which employ 
time, and compel exertion, as inconsistent with a proper gentility. 
Noble blood will not trade in merchandize—can it be expected that no¬ 
ble blood will sow and reap, and devise modes and means by which the 
arts of sowing and reaping shall be strengthened and improved ? There 
must be a revolution in our thoughts, in our habits of thinking, before 
we can hope for improvement. Our planter, himself, must make a 
change—he must not wait for the spirit of enlightenment—he must go 
forth and seek it. Public opinion must keep pace, and go with him in 
such a pursuit, for, whatever may be the achievements of the individu¬ 
al, he will inevitably fall back into old lethargies, unless stimulated 
by the belief that the world around goes with him—that all are stirring 
