The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1870-05-19
Thursday, May 10, 1870.
Modern Agriculture-A Word to
Farmers.

foreign and inland trade likely to be de-
rived sherefrom By this city and immcd-
late country, it is well to look now and then
10 those things without which railroads
and commerce would not do Us substantial
and permanent good. If we were surrounded
with prairies, if We had not extraordinary
foreign demands for the produce of our
Iapds. the subject would be less worthy OF
attention; tut it is herculcan task to cut
down and clear of the heavy timber, dig
up the s,umps, and prepare our heavy red
clay and mucky soil for crops, besides many
fold more produce is about to be demanded
of this portion Of the country than has
Lccn heretofore Things are forthwith
coming to such state, that unless our ag-
rcuI,ural resources are greatly increased,
the balance of our progress will not be
preserved. Our farm products must not
only 20 to feed the cast, but there must
he an opposite transportation to feed the
great north west, until it can teed itself
THIS will create demand the like Of which
is not enjoyed by one tract OF country cut
of hundred. One cannot grasp without
q strong effort the importance Of eur aga
,icultural interests to every other branch of
industry, and to manage these interests so
that the greatest good may be got ors OF
them, would be. in our peculiar condition,
70 secure an indispensably necessary pollt-
ical end. Seeing then that such an I'M
usual amount of labor and hardship is
requisite to bring our lands to a state Of
cultivation, aud their products are likely to
be so stringcn,!y demanded and SO we'll
paid for, one thing clearly follows, that
the highest scientific skill should be em-
ployed. and can be afforded to be employed
in the agricultural department of our indus
try. This department is a large one
Agriculture is science and great science,
and one of the most fortunate and vital
changes of modern times, is that from the
degree of banable Indifference to the de
gree of attention and solicitude with which
it has lately SO suddenly come to be looked
upon.
1t has been . prominent and to some
puzzIing fact, that from the sunset of the
middle ages to very near the present time,
while manufactures and inventions have all
along been in a most active ferment of
progress, agriculture has been continually
mostly as it was. To state the difficulty i,
necessary in order to get at the remedy.
Cities are the agents Of the transmission of
the worlds produce. They are, in whole
sale sense. the walters Of the rest of the
world The city takes raw material from
the hands OF the farmer, works it up, and
hands 1t back with charges in its discretion
,llf,, rT5an6adasft q5 cab afAaP Wis6
such charges as it alone sees fit to make.
The farmers Of New England have dug
hard dirt among rocks for a hundred dol
lars year. They are poor slave. to day;
but Boston and other eastern cities have
become immensely rich Boston buttered
the bread of those farmers for two eentur
les, and that is the reason why it was SO
economically buttered. and there was so
much butter lett for Boston For tho rea>
son that people in the city arc near toceth
er and talk with each other every day, the
city always has been the hot bed Of organ
sza,lons, corporations and monapoiies, to Sc
cure high prices to their own industry, and
low prices to Others industry What
traffic o. trade is there in the city in which
men do not directly or indirectly, openly or
clandestinely, combine to secure high
prices tor themselves Railroad compa
MES, express companies, Telegraph compa-
MES, have combined; they long aimed at
and have lately effectuated a startlingly
dangerous consolidation. Cities are vast
leechss, which have stretched and spread
themselves far out over the face of
she land, snd have fattened out of rural
poverty. For these two reasons, as we'll as
several others Of lesser Importance, the
aow of capital, talent and attention has ever
been toward the city, and hence manufac-
turls have enjoyed a rapid advancement,
while agriculture has remained intact.
The wages OF artifcers and manufacturers.
except in China and Hindostan, where cor
rorations and corporation laws are dis.
couragc1. in all countries have continually
been greater than those given for agricul>
turai labor. Nearly every college in the
United States has had both eyes on the
city, and has therefore educated young
inen for city life. They have led them up
the winding stairs of mathematics to the
science of the stars, aud taught them to
soar INTO the smpyrean of abstract phioso.
ply; but they have uniformly mostly neg
lected to teach the science of the soil be-
meath their fee: and of the air around
them.
In this view Of the case it is not surpris-
ing tina! 10 this country as we'll as in other
countries, no class Of literature has exper~
fenced such difficulty in winning i,s way to
popular notice aud patronage, as the asri-
cultural periodicals, and i. Is but few
years ago that their predecessors enjoyed
:.Riy short and prccarious life, But Things