Exhibition—Annual addresses. 
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REMARKS OF HON. C. C. WASHBURN, OF MADISON. 
Gov. Washburn said that after the able and exhaustive address 
to which they had listened from the president of our Agricultural 
College and State University, it would be presumptous in him to 
say anything about farming. The fact was that his knowledge 
about farming was acquired at a time when farming meant work, 
and the knowledge he possessed they would not thank him for 
imparting. Who is there here that knows anything, or wants to 
know anything about a sickle or a flail ? He had a painful recol¬ 
lection of both; and who could blame him, considering that his 
inclination for hard work had never been excessive, if, at the first 
favorable opportunity he had dropped those implements. 
Had the innumerable labor saving agricultural machines which 
now make the labor of the husbandman almost a pastime, been 
in use when he was a boy, he would doubtless to day be “ whist¬ 
ling o’er the furrowed land ” as happy as any of them, instead of 
being called out here, and asked to speak when he had nothing 
to say. 
One of the unpleasant features of holding the office he then 
held, was that the people seemed to think that the incumbent 
must be acquainted with every subject, and that it was his duty 
to speak at all times and all places. 
This he could say, without study or exaggeration, that he was 
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gratified and proud of the exhibition he witnessed on the State 
Fair grounds. 
Few of the older states could present a better show of stock of 
all kinds and farm products generally, and the results of manu¬ 
facturing industry on exhibition they need not be ashamed oL 
Again and again in years past he had urged upon the farmers the 
necessity of co-operation and working more in harmony, and he 
was glad to see that at last they were waking up to their true in¬ 
terests. He congratulated the farmers on their prosperous con¬ 
dition. 
While almost every other branch of industry was now pros¬ 
trate, and fortunes were being swept away in a day which it had 
required long years to accumulate, the farmers are prosperous 
and independent. 
