226 WISCONSIN STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY . 
men who are workers in this great field meet together on common 
ground and speak freely of their experiences, whether failure or 
success has crowned their efforts. In fact, the history of failures 
are as deeply profitable to us as that of successes. I may have 
projects in my mind at this moment, which if fully laid before 
my hearers, I could get counsel which would lead me to abandon 
them at once ; whereas, they will cost me time and labor, and dis¬ 
appointment in the end. I do not think that the influence of this 
convention would be widened nor improved by closing our doors 
and extorting pledges of secrecy. In all true scholarship there is 
brotherhood, not with a select few who have mouthed a formula 
of secrecy, but with the world, with every man, woman or child 
who is moved with a desire to make progress in anything which 
tends to elevate themselves or the human race. No useful facts 
in husbandry or science can be taught grips or signs by which 
they can reveal themselves only to a select few. If the ends 
which we aim at are honorable, let us not place a guard at our 
door and the seal of silence on our lips, for all this is characteris¬ 
tic of the retreat of imposture and quackery. Let us not try to 
persuade ourselves that we have any interests which flourish best 
in the dark. All the legitimate work of the husbandman is best 
done in the broad light of day, and for its full fruition needs 
abundant exposure to the warmth and light of the noonday sun, 
the free course of the restless winds, and the rains and dews of 
heaven. 
This paper was carefully prepared, contains many excellent 
facts and suggestions, and will pay a careful perusal. The writer 
claimed that prices could not be controlled, but production could, 
and that co-operative effort could secure this; but rather repudi¬ 
ated secret societies. 
Mr. Anderson thought the granges were doing much good, 
that their benefits were extending, and that they would aid the 
farmers in many ways ; that the signs and grips were necessary 
to guard against imposters, and that secrecy was the very founda¬ 
tion rock upon which to build substantial and beneficial results to 
the farming interest. That if you desired to put down monopo- 
