114 
Wisconsin state agricultural Society. 
ravages of an insect, or a decline of prices, become at once a public? 
disaster. We have experienced something of this even in Wiscon¬ 
sin in the years that have just passed. The power to endure harcJ 
times, and to rally from them, are much less in a state where pro¬ 
duction is relatively uniform. 
The profits of such farming are also usually smaller, as the mar¬ 
kets are more remote, and crowded with more sellers. Large 
branches of production sink quickly to the minimum ot profits. 
There is also much less intellectual stimulus in uniform produc¬ 
tion. It slips into routine, and men trudge on in the steps of their 
fathers. The exhaustion of the soil is more rapid, with fewer com¬ 
pensations in the cultivation of single products. Abundance of 
manure and rotation belong to the quick interchange of varied hus¬ 
bandry, while a single crop over a large area is a steady draught. 
To introduce, however, an unaccustomed branch of farming, to 
bring it successfully forward, and open up for it an adequate mar¬ 
ket, are a delicate work; it is only the leading spirits in husbandry 
that are capable of it. Many can readily follow where but few can 
successfully lead. Hence the agricultural interests of a state re¬ 
quire not only general intelligence, but special intelligence; not 
only a common school education for all our agricultural population, 
but a more patient and extended training for a portion of it, pre¬ 
paring men who shall be leaders and explorers in tillage. Farmers 
are not interested simply in the common school, but in the high 
school, and college, and agricultural college as well. If we divide 
education, and assign the lower portion to one class of our people, 
we shall find that we have divided wealth and honor in a like way, 
and made a similar distribution of them. They will be hangers 
on at the skirts of society, who are hangers on at the skirts of 
knowledge. No man can be permanently helped but by himself, 
and in himself. 
The horticulture of the state affords an illustration of the diffi¬ 
culty of adjusting even familiar culture to new conditions. Is it 
possible to raise good fruit in reasonable variety with reasonable 
certainty and by reasonable labor in Wisconsin? This is a plain, 
pushing question put to every intelligent horticulturist. The easy 
off hand answer may be, No. It is very possible that the ultimate 
answer of the patient, skillful worker may be an emphatic. Yes. 
Old varieties capable of cultivation may be more carefully chosen, 
