The Middlebury galaxy. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1848-1850, 1848-07-11
AGRICULTURAL.
MR.. MARSH'S ADDRESS,
DeliUered before the Agricultural .SOcie-
ty Of Rutland County,
SEPTEMBER 20 1917

4 ~ .
rlcultural Society, its influence is not de,
signed TO be limited to the encouragement
and improvement of the culture of the soil
but its objects are threelold, and embrace
as well the tolls of the herdsman and the
mechanic as the labOrs of the ploughman
| shall, therefore, not be expected 10 con-
line my remarks within narrower range
than your sphere of operations, and
while | shall make no attempt to lay down
minute practical rules for the conduct or
economy Of either OF these great branches
OF productive industry, | shall endeayor
TO illustrate the importance of them all
| considered as means and instruments of
civilization and social progress, and shall
suggest, in a general way, some improve
menls, the promotion of which seems to
me an object well worthy the jealous ef-
forts of the agricultural associations Of
Vermont
Before | proceed to the discussion of
this my proper subject, it may not be a.
miss to notice certain particulars connect
ed with the early history, physical condi-
ton, and fundamental legislation, of the
American Continent. and especially of the
United States, which have had an impOr-
tant bearing on the prosperity of the in
dustral arts, and the social condition of
those who have made them their voca-
ton.
America offers the first example Of the
struggle between civilized man and bar
barous uncnltivated nature. In oil other
primitive history, the hero of the scene
is savage, the theatre wilderness, and
the earth has been subdued in the same
proportion, and by the same slow process,
that man has been civilized. In North
America, on the contrary, the full ener-
gies of advanced European civilization,
stimuli lated by its artificial wants and guild
ed by its accumulated intelligence, were
brought to bear at once on a desert CONT
nent, and it has been but the work of 4
day to win empires from the wilderness,
and to establish relations of government
and commerce between points as distant
as the rising and the setting sun. This
marvellous change, which has converted
unproductive wastes into fertile fields, and
| filled with light and life the dark and ST.
lent recesses of our aboriginal forests
| and mount aims, has been accomplished
through the instrumentality of those arts.
whose trIuEphs you are this day met tc
celebrate, and your country Is the field
where the stimulus of necessity has spur
red them on to their most glorious achieve.
ments. But besides the new life and Wig.
or infused into these arts. by the nccessi-
ty of creating food and shelter aud cloth
ing for a swarming emigration and rapid
ly multiplying progeny, the peculiar char
acter of the soil and of the indigenous pro-
ducts of America has introduced most i'm
| portant notifications into the objects and
processes of all of them, by offering to Eu-
ropean industry new plants for cultivation,
and new and more abundant materials for
artificial elaboration. At the same time.
American husbandry and mechanical art
are totally different in their objects, char-
actor, and processes from what they would
be, were they converSant only with the
indigenous products of our native soil.
TO exempliiy America has given to the
Eastern Hemisphere mlize, tobacco, the
potatoe, the batata, the pineapple, the
turkey, and more lately the alpaca, not
to mention innumerable Towering plants,
as well as other vegetables of less ecnnom-
ical Importance, or the tribute which her
peliry, her forests, her fisheries, and her
mines of gems and the precious metals
have paid to European cupidity she has
received in return wheat, rye, other cerea-
liza, new varieties ofthe cotton plant, flax
hemp, rice, the sugar-cane, coffee, our
orchard fruits, kitchen and medicinal
roots, pulse and herbs, the silkworm, the
honey-bee, the swine, the goat, the sheep,
the horse, and the OK. BY these inter
changes, the industry Of both continents
has been modified and assimilaied, and it
is curious fact, that the greater proper
ton Of properly agricultural American Ia
Dor is devoted to the growth of vegetable
products of Transatlantic origin, while the
workshops and the maritime commerce of
Europe find one OF their principal sources
of empIoyment in the conversion or carriage
of vegetable substances either indigenous
to or most advantageUusly grown in the
soil of America. The colonization of a
new continent under such remarkable
circumstances could not fail to give pow
crful impulse to the productive arts /; and
their increased economical, commercial,
and financial importance has invested
them with an interest in the eyes of states
men, and prominence as objects espe>
cially to be cherished, in every well-regu-
lated scheme of political economy, which
they had never before attained, and the
social position of those who are engaged
i'll them has been elevated accordingly.
Further, there are certain features Of our
institutions and our primary legislation,
which have contributed not little to
raise and improve the condition of those
who pursue the industrial arts, and espe-
cially OF those devoted to agricultural &C
equations. The most important OF these
is the rejection of feudal tenures TO lands,
and the creation of pure allodial estates
| .;,Io ScarceIv known TO the common