The Madisonian. [volume] (Washington City [i.e. Washington, D.C.]) 1837-1845, 1843-08-10

said that he the greatest beneactor his
try who caused two blades Of grass to grow where
only one grew before. (Hear, hear,) 1t does not
become me, my lord will not say stranger, for
by your courtesy you have permitted me TO lay aside
that name cheers but your guest, TO enter in
any details this occasion in reference to the i'm
portan subjects which has called together; but l
could not fail to be struck in going the round of your
implement and stock yard this morning, with the fact,
that how much cause might have existed in for
mer days for complaining OF The deficiency and want
OF Improvement IN the construction OF agricultural
implements, or any other department OF agriculture,
there was no now for making similar COM
plant 1t seemed to me that there amount
OF SCIENCE OF mechanical skill, of practical sagacty
OF couhtenance and attention the part of the higher
orders and OF diligence and the part
Oh tIe Iaoorng classes, all in degree of close
plhauoh ior .he promotion and development of agri-
culture, mat has never been equaled in the history
OF the world. (Great cheers) NV lord il is re-
markabe fact if may be pardoned for general re-
Election of this kind, that till lately all the great i'm.
Provements IN agriculture seem to have been the pro-
duet of the earliest infancy of mankind Who can
tell when that useful instrument, which lies at the
basis OF all civilizatiOn-who can tell when the
plough was invented? Who can tell when man FIRST
called in the humble partners Of his toll the horse
the OK, the COW, the swine, and the sheep and took
them into profitable alliance with himself? If it
were possible to discover the name Of the man who
caught the first wild dog, and taught it to assist in
the tending OF the Sheep you should raise monu-
ment of brass or marble to his memory-a nobler
monument than has ever been raised to monarch or
to hero. Who is able at this date of the worlds his
tory to tell the period when the olive or the vine
when any of the cereal grains, generous fruits
the escuent roots, first brought into their pre-
sent state There but one of these viz the potato
the history of which is known The story of the rest
Iuns back into those recesses of antiquity into which
we cannot penetrate. They were first cultivated
when our common ancestors were roaming over the
morasses of this now beautiful and free, and merry
England, (cheers) painted savages, through the
land, and when even the Greeks and Romans
subslstng upon the beechnut and the acorn (Cheers
1t would seem that men, in their agricultural prog
ress, nave followed, to some extent, that curious
law TO which Professor Owen so happily alluded and
SO clearly illustrated at the council dinner Of yeser
day, that governs some Of the Illuminating animals
within the tropics He pointed out to US that the
Illuminating animals of these fervid cmes have
large hump oil fat upon their shoulders During the
first five months of the year this excrescence is nour-
ished and increases, while the animal feeds upon the
food which is then plentfuly provided for it, On
the store of fat thus laid aside, it were for sea-
son OF scarcity they manage to subsst for the re-
naming months of the year. when the heritage is
parched and fails Such precisely seems to have been
the case with mankind as regards their progress in
agriculture. In the early infancy of the race they
made these great Improvements, like the fat hump
described by Mr. Owen, and for nearly three thou
sand years have they subsisted little cse (Great
laughter) We read in the Georges of the plough,
as in use in his day, but the very plough which we
read of there is to be found still used in the south of
Europe We see the same plough yet in the hands of
the peasantry there we behold it in bas rel eff in
their marble relics of antiquity, and as far as i'm
provement was concerned, the plou lhman in the
marble has done as much the ploughman in the
field. 1t is certainly most pleasing subject of re-
Election that the revival of agriculture in these latter
days is the work of that Ango-Saxon race of which
you, my lord, have just spoken. 1t has been left to
you, and, if may be permitted TO say so to us--liv-
ing though we do in these austere climes and be-
meath these ungenal SKIES weeping they are, as if
in penitence for their own rgor-[ the rain was fall
ing in torrents on the roof of the pavilion
(Great cheering) For US, my lord, it has been re-
served to do what they have not yet accomplished in
Greece or in Italy, with all their sunny cmes. This
is mainly attributable to the want among us Of those
tropical luxuries and those enervating though balmy
breeZes of the south, in the enjoyment of which
should not have been possessed of that hardhood of
frome-that perseverance, character and resolution,
that are worth all the spices and perfumes of Arabia
prolonged cheers) 1t is that which enables you to
make The boast, in which hope my country may be
permitted to join that
"Man is the noble growth our soil supplies
And souls are ripened in northern skies"
[Cheers.] beg pardon of the company, and you,
(Great cries of "No, no )" ''go on go Only And,
IN concluding, after thanking you for the indulgence
you have manifested towards me, and the patience
with which have been listened to- would assure YOU
all that when these shouts shall be heard across the
Atlantic-as they will be in eighteen or nineteen
days hence-they will be echoed back again from
hearts as warm yours. The honorable gentle
man, on sitting down. greeted with storm of
applause which lasted for several minutes