farmer soon learns that the careful saving and application of manure, thorough drainage, perfect disintegration and working of the soil, careful selection of seed, attention to meteorological influence, etc., are as much a part of good farming as of horticulture.

Hence, the farmer begins to read and reflect, study the effect of various manures on different crops, and the exact value of each crop in the rotation. He finds that the soil returns value just in proportion as it is fed. He sees again that feeding crops is not the only sustenance necessary to maintain the strength of the land he cultivates, but also that certain conditions of the soil enable it to store up plant food from the great storehouse of nature, the atmosphere. He is taught to study the anatomy and physiology of plants. From this the gradation is easy to that of animals; and hence the present superior condition of horses, cattle, sheep, swine, and other farm stock. At last he comes to know that agriculture is simply an unceasing transition from plant to animal, and from animal again to plant, in which nothing is lost, nothing gained. All was once dust, and to dust it again returns.

WHY ARE FARMERS BEHIND HORTICULTURISTS?

The principal reason, however, why farmers, as a class, are behind horticulturists is, that they have kept themselves isolated; have been too intent on the all-absorbing routine duties of the farm; have moved, plodding along in the grooves their forefathers hewed out; have not kept pace with the times; have neglected the higher education of the mind, to which members of other professions have devoted themselves so diligently; and have carried their not unjustifiable contempt of "book-farming" to an extent that has re

A LITTLE KNOWLEDGE A DANGEROUS THING.

49

dounded to their own injury. They have stood still while others have been moving forward, until the wheel of time in its revolutions has shown them losers in the race of intelligent industry. They have cried "Help, Jupiter!" meanwhile withholding to put their own shoulders to the wheel of the car of progress.

These conditions must exist no longer. Henceforth, being now thoroughly awakened, they must not only labor steadily and with persistent aim, by and through their leaders, but they themselves must help, with brains and money, to work out their plans for emancipation from the shackles of a monopolizing power that seeks to reduce them to a mere serfdom. The ambition of the farmer should no longer be to send his son to a university, where he will be given an education totally unfitting him for rural life, unless he intends to become a lawyer, a doctor, or, as the good old Scotch housewife had it, qualify himself to "wag his pow in a pulpit."

A LITTLE KNOWLEDGE A DANGEROUS THING.

Our cities are too full already of ambitious young men who have received education sufficient only to make them consider themselves above honest toil. Failing to earn a livelihood by other means, they become mere penny-a-liners, or sink into degraded insignificance behind the bar of some saloon; or, perhaps, they mouth vile comedy, nonsense-songs, or worse, behind the footlights of disreputable haunts, where brutish humanity seeks its brutish amusements.

The picture is severe but not overdrawn. There are hundreds of once pure and intelligent young men, who, furnished an education superior to their former playmates, have felt themselves better than mere drudges on the farm, and have

sought the city, where, in their disdain of daily toil, they have gone down, step by step, until they have reached the lowest depths of degradation, and sometimes even of crime. Our penitentiaries are filled with just such backsliders from the ranks of honest industry, who once were good and true, and actuated by high moral principle.

Is there no remedy? Yes! Make home attractive. Cease the tomfoolery of shutting up from year's end to year's end the best room of the house, never to be opened save on state occasions, and then striking a chill to the innermost soul with its uncomfortable grandeur. Use the parlor as a gathering place where all may meet in social converse for mutual improvement. Furnish the room well and plainly, wasting no money on gorgeous furniture, easily ruined and a pleasure only to the eye. Educate the youth of the country to a taste for a literature that shall improve the mind. Fill the book-shelves with works pertaining to every-day life, interspersed with standard novels and poetry, written in the pure style of such writers as our own Irving and Bryant. Let us do this, and then assuredly shall be laid the broad and solid basis of an education that will make the generation next to come better and purer than that of to-day.

CHAPTER IV.

FARMERS' CLUBS IN GREAT BRITAIN.

IN SCOTLAND AND IRELAND.

Farmers' Clubs, publishing their Transactions are no "new invention," but have the venerable age of a full century and a half. In 1723, there was established, in Scotland, a society to which its founders gave the name of "Improvers in the Knowledge of Agriculture." It became extinct in 1755, but was succeeded by another, which was merged into the "Highland Agricultural Society." This association, in 1787 received a royal charter, and in 1834, it was re-chartered. Annual fairs were thenceforward held, at each of which premiums were given to the amount of £10,000.

In Ireland, an agricultural society was established in 1747. From the influence exerted by the members of this organization many others sprang up in various parts of the island, which were productive of great benefit, not only among the aristocratic landed gentry, for whom all these earlier organizations were instituted, but also among the small proprietors and tenant farmers, and, indirectly, among the laborers themselves.

The passage of the Irish Land Act is of too recent a date to enable an authoritative declaration to be made as to its efficacy. Viewed in the light of the steady decrease of emigration from that country since the law was enacted, it

appears to be working well. Ireland seems to be entering on a career of unexampled prosperity, in which the farmers must participate. There has been a substantial increase in the wealth of the country during the unparalleled exodus which has taken place. The Land Act gives the tenant fixity of tenure; that is, they can not be ejected from their holdings until compensated for the money they have expended in improvements. These improvements sometimes amount to much more than the original value of the land. Thus, in some cases, the law amounts to a virtual handing over of the land from the landlord to the tenant, subject simply to a fixed annual rent.

THE FIRST FARMERS' CLUB IN ENGLAND.

In 1777, "The Bath Agricultural Society, of England," was organized, having for its aim the encouragement of agriculture, arts, manufactures, and commerce, in the counties of Somerset, Wilts, Gloucester, and Dorset. Through its volumes, published yearly, it disseminated a vast amount of practical information relative to the culture of the various crops then grown, and especially of those recently introduced. The breeding of cattle, horses, sheep, swine, and other stock, was fully treated of in their reports, which also contained much valuable data concerning manufactures, both general and as relating to agriculture, arts, and commerce.

Among the contributions to its literature we find such names as Dr. Falconer, Dr. Campbell, Sir Christopher Hawkins, Hobhouse, Arthur Young, M. DeSaussaure, Dr. J. Anderson, Dr. Fothergill, Rev. Alexander Campbell, Count De Berchtold, Gen. Abercrombie, and other eminent men of the day. This shows the interest taken in agriculture, in