254 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. [1 Aprin, 1899. 
standpoint. The manner in which the grants were received, bestowed, and 
disposed of would make a book. Out of this grant was founded the great 
Cornell University. Michigan gave hers to her agricultural college, already 
located at Lansing. Illinois founded a new institution at Champaign, Lowa a 
college at Ames, Indiana gave hers to Purdue, and Wisconsin and Minnesota 
to their State Universities. 
Tn many cases the magnificent gift was frittered away in the most senseless 
manner, if stronger words would not better characterise the Operation. Some 
States carefully conserved the grant and showed good judgment. Cornell 
University, Michigan, and Iowa, with others, are on the list of States that 
wisely conserved what the Government gave them. Wisconsin, Illinois, and 
Kentucky are among the States that did poorly with the gift. In 1889, when 
he saw that the income from the land grant was far less than had been antici- 
pated, Senator Morrill introduced a supplementary Act by which the States 
receive 25,000 dollars annually from Government land sales to strengthen and 
supplement these industrial institutions. Pag 
More than a third of a century has passed since their founding, and we 
can now look back and see the crude conditions and the many mistakes which 
necessarily follow such a sudden giving of an immense grant. In most of the 
States the people were not ready for an agricultural college, and the farmers 
cared nothing about it, so that those classically inclined and who were familiar 
with educational effort easily warped tho funds in directions not contemplated 
by the originators. It is not tuo much to say that in those times there were 
very few indeed who knew what an agricultural college should be in equipment 
or curriculum. And even had this been known there were not the teachers 
available to impart the instruction. And, further, had there been both there 
would not at first have been pupils to be taught. Our country was too new, 
agriculture too crude, and the farmers too busy taking up Government land 
and skimming the fertility off its surface to care anything about agricultural 
education. With the marked changes rapidly coming on the whole situation 
is assuming a new phase. Our agricultural colleges are growing in strength 
and equipment, men are preparing themselves specifically for the work and 
learning what and how to teach. As these come on, the young men from the 
farm are turning their faces to these educational institutions, fully appreciating 
the great advantages which may accrie to them from the offered instruction. 
In working out this great problem of agricultural education in America there 
has been an enormous sacrifice of money, energy, and effort, but at last we are 
getting down to business as we should, 
Tt is but natural that over such a wide expanse of country, where so many 
different conditions and views on education prevail, our agricultural colleges 
should take on a wide diversity of effort, and that their success should vary: 
greatly. At first the courses of instruction were almost wholly scientific in 
character. not differing materially from that given the engineer or the 
professional man, the only addition being a smattering of agriculture often 
unworthy of the term. This was because there were neither the teachers, the 
-pedagogical methods, nor the equipment necessary. Year by year our 
agricultural colleges have grown more agricultural and more practical. The 
amount of real training in agriculture in the direction of agriculture which one 
can gain at any of our leading institutions is now very considerable in amount, 
and usually of excellent quality. We are slowly but surely learning what to 
teach in agriculture and how it should be taught. 
In our State universities the four-year course in agriculture is usually a 
combination of true scientific training with more or less agricultural instruction 
and practice. Sometimes it is about all science, but generally there is considerable 
agriculture. Those graduating from these long courses usually do not expect 
to go back to the farm, but look for positions in the Department of Agriculture 
at Washington as instructors in agricultural colleges or workers in experiment 
stations, or choose to follow some technical line in advance, as they suppose, of 
the straight occupation of farming. 
