men in office, despite all financial crisis, there is with us a feeling of security. We have little or no fear that our possessions will be wrested from us, and therefore enjoy what we have without anxious thought for the morrow.

And there is this peculiarity of our social condition, that it is attended by a general diffusion of competence and of the means of prosperity. As every man is a sovereign, so he may live and enjoy as a sovereign. Hard times may occasionally overtake us, it is true; the clouds of adversity will gather now and then, and there will be financial storms and shipwreck. It is not given any of us to always sail on smooth seas, nor to dwell in the eternal sunshine; no doubt it is a wise ordination that storms should alternate with the calm, and that after a smooth path should come a steep and rugged hill-side to climb. No oaks are raised in a hot house manner; all that is of real value grows out in the open air, takes the weather as it comes, frost and sunshine, snow, hail and rain-have to wrestle with all

THE WINDS OF HEAVEN,

and to bear the thousand fold wrenchings of blast and tempest; of none, therefore, may it be said, that they have nothing for which to be thankful; and none may justly complain that in the dispensation of mercies, or in the lavish bestowments of the Divine Hand, they have been overlooked.. Always is there a supply for every man's necessities, and for real incurable poverty and wretchedness there is but little anywhere among us.

Continually we see men and families, rising from comparative indigence to competence, to wealth, to elegant living; from stint of even necessary things, to comfort, to luxury, to profusion. There is one bank that never fails, although it may now and then suspend payment. Its capital is the productive soil; its stockholders and depositors the independent farmers of the state; its dividends the fruits which fill the land with plenty and with wealth. Gentlemen, perhaps I magnify our high calling. I may call it a sacred calling. It bears the marks of a more than human appointment. Of even the digging of a ditch it may be said that there is a sort of divineness about it, and of the

mending of a garment, or the sweeping of a floor, that it is as sacred as the preaching of a sermon, for every sort of work or service into which men put the best that is in them, possesses a religious character. I can see, indeed, that a man may so employ himself in the affairs of life, may so pursue his calling or trade, as that it shall be little more than a drudgery and weariness to him, and going aside from the real intent in his occupation, carrying into it nothing of a right spirit, he shall get from it nothing of the discipline it was designed to furnish, and therefore shall be hindered rather than helped by it, dwarfed rather than greatened.

I have intimated that farming is of a sacred character, that it is really a divine appointment. To me it seems, therefore, strange that it should ever have been regarded as a low and disreputable calling, and be set down as among the drudgeries and unsacred things of the world. No fact can be plainer, than that with a fitness and relish for his occupation,

A FARMER

will not only achieve success in a material sense, and dignify and magnify his art or profession, but will greaten and glorify himself, and hold more intimate relations with all divine things.

It is not to be forgotten, we will not forget, that valuable as may be the helps furnished by the agricultural school, the discoveries of science, the results of experiment, and the labors of societies, the great body of farmers, the strong right arm of the state, must determine whether the superior interest we represent shall take high or low rank-shall be promoted or retarded. The noble calling they have chosen will go up or down, will go forward or backward, will be glorified by success or disgraced by failure, according as they are intelligent and progressive, or are content with the knowledge of their fathers and the blundering and hap-hazard methods of the past. In this brisk age they must be pushing forward or fall behind in the march. The world is moving, and they must move, or be distanced in the race. No doubt there is a large and growing appreciation of this in the minds of considerable numbers of our brethren, as seen in the evidences of enterprise, thrift, and the better knowledge put to better

use. But of the larger class, I fear it must be said, that the considerations just offered meet with only a blind recognition, and that while in instances there is a going forward, it is after a slovenly and wasteful fashion.

Nature," it has been said, "is exacting in her economy, nothing is wasted, but something added for the future supply of her vegetation. A plant grows at the expense of the air and soil, and when its life is ended, it in time returns to the earth a proper compensation for what it has given up with a grateful hospitality. Not so with the average husbandman. Not content with what the earth and air supply, he must have the very return which nature provides, with no equivalent for the future provision which the soil is called upon again and again to make good. By this system of

ROBBERY,

the equilibrium which nature has established is broken, and the harmony destroyed." Reference is made also to another and kindred class of farmers, and we are by no means. entirely destitute of their representatives, whose sole process is that of skinning their farm, or rather eviscerating them. They plunder them of all life and life-giving properties, and convert them at last into barren commons or patches of verdureless desert. Of this class, however, we have not very many. If we ever had them they have for the most part been hopefully converted, and of hardened impenitents there are only a few. Evidently these will eventually die out under the operations of the law of "the survival of the fittest." It may be that they were intended for a wise and valuable purpose as "frightful examples," of reckless and brainless farming, or are set as beacons of warning to any who might venture upon their foolish and ruinous ways.

If, as we hold, and it is widely conceded, the interest we are met to promote, is of paramount importance or out-ranks all other interests, then clearly it is our duty, as having it in charge, to labor for a broader and more out-spoken recognition of its claims, and to secure for it in the councils of the state and nation, the representation to which it is justly entitled. Whatever may

have been the fact in other days, it is not true to-day, that among our farmers there are no men of sufficient learning. ability, and all that goes to make up qualification, worthily and well to fill any place in the gift of the people. I do not mean that we should enter into mere scrambles for office, nor that we should seek representation in a spirit of antagonism to other interests, but only that we unite to secure for our great interest, in the use of right means, an equality of place and privilege, and therefore the right to representation in the persons of men who best know what are its requirements, and how best to speak in its behalf.

Farmers only can truly represent farmers, or the foremost industry of the state and the union; and it is to be added that we but do ourselves honor when we seek to put our representative men, who would dignify and grace any station, into places of legislative or administrative trust and responsibility. I hope there is no treason in this, and that I shall not be accused of undue partiality for a calling which glorifies me as an independent tiller of the soil.

Our thanks are due Governor Rusk for his clear and forcibly-worded recognition of

THE IMPORTANCE OF AGRICULTURE,

and of the high rank to which it should be elevated, not only by those who have adopted it as a profession, but by legislative encouragement and aid.

He says well that it is "the foremost industry in our state, and merits most considerate attention." Having said this. it was only legitimate that he should add, "the societies which have been organized for the advancement of the various branches of agriculture should be liberally sustained." His conception of the value of our society to the state, and of the help it has rendered in elevating an abased profession to the high rank it now holds, might, perhaps, have found expression in stronger and more adequate speech; and yet we heartily thank him for his distinguished appreciation of its worth, and for his cordial recommendation that there be accorded it the "encouragement which its importance demands." We take pleasure also in indorsing the opinion that the time has arrived when means should be provided

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for gathering accurate monthly crop and live stock reports during the growing season, and complete labor statistics, and their prompt circulation among the people." We have here an endorsement on the part of the Governor, of what I said one year ago, of the lack of system in making up the agricultural statistics of the state, and of the great benefit legislation would be to the farmers and business men, which should require a concise and uniform style of report. This we followed with the recommendation that, as a wise measure, looking to the increased efficiency and usefulness of the State Agricultural Society, all legislative appropriations in aid of county and district societies, be coupled with the requirement that the secretaries of all county and district societies make a report to the Secretary of the State Agricultural Society. Such report to embrace all

MATTERS OF INTEREST

in connection with their last annual exhibition, the condition of the crops in their respective counties and districts, the kinds of farming that predominate, viz.: grain growing, grazing, dairying, or what not, with a few figures worked in to show the ratio, of increase or decrease of products within a given time, each secretary to arrange his report as he may deem proper, giving any information of interest connected with the proceedings of his society during the past year, or copies of any papers or addresses read before it; the object of the report being to secure general information regarding the agricultural interest within the state; also that these county and district societies shall make an annual exhibition of the products of their respective counties. and districts at the state fair, each county and district competing as a county or district with all the others; also that they be represented by one or more delegates in the agricultural convention convening at Madison in February of each year. It is very desirable that every county and district society in the state should be represented in said convention, and that their several reports be published in the annual transactions of our society. The importance of these requirements can scarcely be over-estimated. They would help to impart system to what is now loose and irreg