New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1872-12-14
AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.

| Senator MOrrllTs recent speech III FAVOR OF
| the increase of land grants to agricultural
colleges has revived the old discussion re-
specting the actual value of these institutions,
which began with their very existence We
doubt whether there is any subject wherein
men hold more divergent opinions and a
table of popular estimate of value would
probably include those who regard the col
leges as utterly valueless and those who con-
slider them the most benefcent advance i'll
educational matters the world has yet seen.
The character of the colleges, as well as their,
success, differs widely in different sections and
even in adjoining States. In New-England
they have for the most part developed as
schools of technology, training their pupils
in the arts of the workshop and the factory /;
at the West they handle the problems of
ditching aud draining, of fencing and build
ing, that are of such vital Importance TO
newly settled communities; in the Middle
States both these classes of study are included
in the curriculum, and agriculture itself In
literal sense receives larger share of attention.
In chronological training, the success OF ag-
ricultural colleges has been all their warmest
friends could desire. The pressing need of
such education in this country is painfully
manifest to everybody who has occasion TO
employ skilled labor. Belgium and Germany,
by the thorough education of workingmen, are
absorbing the manufacturing business OF all
Europe. England is waking up to her def
cheney in this respect, as she finds various
branches of manufacture leaving her shores,
and is making prodigious Efforts In her slow
and clumsy way, to educate her workmen for
their daily tasks. Here, till the date of our
agricultural college system, there were few If
any educational establishments where boy
could learn the use of the mechanical imple-
ments of any trade, or even of the minor pro-
LESSONS. If only by the great impulse these
colleges have given to training workmen who
thoroughly understand the use of their tools,
the worth Of the system to the nation shall be
measured, the outlay will be amply repaid.
There has been already large accession to
the number of well educated civil and mining
engineers, architects, and constructing machin-
lists graduated at these institutions. We have
need of such men while diamond mine swim
dies and frame Mansards are possible.
But whether the agricultural colleges will
ever educate farmers is still an open ques
ton. The sons of farmers enter the colleges,
glad and willing to learn. There are acres
cultivated by them experimentally, under in
struction, and with cheerful industry They
do their work well, and it is all duly recorded
to their credit, and whatever is produced goes
toward the support of the institution. They
learn good deal of the theory of agriculture
and not q little of its practice. But they
rarely become farmers. When youth has
his mind fairly stored with all that the pro-
fessors of botany and agricultural chemistry
have to teach him, he is apt to seek better
market for his knowledge than the farm pre-
sents. 1t is not that such knowledge is
not useful on farm, but that it is
Of moro profitable use elsewhere. New
ertheless, while learning the best ways
of conducting agricultural operations the stu
dent has doubtless criticised the antiquated
methods of the paternal heritage. Improve
ments are suggested and adopted at the home
steads of the pupils; their soils are analysed,
manures selected, crops varied 10 accordance
with more recent knowledge, and the great
work of improvement in agriculture spreads
from a thousand new centers after every col
lege vacation. The old notion that book
learning was worthless to farmers has almost
faded out of their minds; the belief that men
who cultivate the soil are mere ignoramuses
il no longer IN article of faith with college
professors. The agricultural colleges are doing
on tue whole, q good work. aud they deserve