Greenville, South Carolina; W. H. Holland, Louisville, Kentucky; Joseph A. Mudd, Washington, District of Columbia.

Much important business was transacted, the constitution was revised, and a general agreement was arrived at in regard to business methods among the different agencies. The meeting was entirely satisfactory to all concerned.

The following officers were elected :

J. B. Dines, President; W. L. Peek, Vice-President; Oswald Wilson, Secretary; J. K. P. House, Treasurer; M. D. Coffeen, Member of Executive Committee.

Adjourned to meet at the place designated by the National Farmers' Alliance and Industrial Union for their next annual meeting.

No one can estimate the benefits which may be derived from this national association, if properly managed. It can protect the weak and bid defiance to the strong, and thereby save millions to the hard-working farmer. If space would permit, a report from each State business agent, as to the volume of business, benefits derived by the brethren, and the prospects for the future, would be both instructive and entertaining. Suffice it to say that a great work is being done by these agencies. Millions of dollars are being saved to the members, and true business principles are being taught to the order. In many respects these agencies are made an auxiliary of no little importance, in the education of the brethren, regarding the correct doctrine of the Alliance. That they are an important factor in the Alliance movement, no one should deny, and that they should be patronized and supported, every one should concede.

DIVISION III.

AGRICULTURE.

CHAPTER I.

HISTORY OF AGRICULTURE.

NOTHING, perhaps, would be more interesting to the American farmer than a correct detailed description of the agricultural methods of antiquity. It would serve to mark the progress that has been made in that pursuit, and disclose the fact, which many seem to doubt, that the steady, plodding farmer has performed his full share in bringing about the civilization of the present, by making rapid strides in the development of every branch of his vocation. It would also be gratifying to know how the nations of the long ago tilled the soil, sowed, planted, reaped, or gathered; what crops they cultivated, and by what methods they were converted into use. Such information, however, has been withheld, as the records which have come down to us are all but silent upon these topics.

The fact that agriculture, as an industry, antedates all others, is admitted by every one. The first want of man is food, and his first resource for it was the ground. Whether herbs or fruits were resorted to must have depended upon their relative abundance in the locality where man began his career upon earth. Doubtless the fruits were preferred at first, until the use of fire, in the preparation of the herbs, was discovered. Upon this hypothesis, the first care and labor of man would have been bestowed upon fruit trees, and hence gardening may be said to have been the art of earliest invention.

But man is also a carnivorous animal, and this propensity of his nature would soon lead him to attempt to domesticate such animals as he found most useful in affording him milk, food, or

clothing, or would assist him in his labor. From this may have come the origin of pasturage, and the industry of raising stock. The invention of tilling the soil must have been coeval with the discovery of the use of the cereal grasses, and may be considered as the last step in the invention of husbandry, as well as the most important. Such conclusions, while simply conjectural, are nevertheless based upon sufficient reason to warrant a respectful consideration.

In the earlier stages of civilization, these branches of economy, in common with all the arts of life, would naturally be practised by every family for itself; but the great advantages of separating the occupations would soon present themselves, and the result, no doubt, is the present designations of farming, gardening, grazing, etc.

The importance of agriculture is obvious to every thinking person, not only by its affording the direct supply of our greatest wants, but as the parent of manufacture and commerce. Without agriculture, there can be neither civilization nor population. It is not only the most universal of all the arts, but the one which requires the greatest number of operators. The larger portion of the inhabitants, in every country, are employed in agricultural pursuits; and the most prosperous and enlightened nation is the one whose agricultural population are the best remunerated for their labor.

In the earlier ages of the race, before tillage was invented, doubtless the surface of the earth was held in common by all the inhabitants, and every family pastured its flocks, pitched its tent, or erected its hut where it seemed best; but when tillage came into use, it must have become necessary to assign to each family or tribe a portion of territory, and of this portion that family or tribe became the recognized proprietors and cultivators. From this, perhaps, came the beginning of property in land; of purchased cultivators, or slaves; hired cultivators, or laborers; of farmers, or proprietors; and the various laws and customs, in regard to ownership and occupation of landed property, which, in a modified or intensified form, obtain at the present time.

After a careful examination of numerous authors upon ancient agriculture, I have selected the writings of Mr. J. C.