The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1876-10-20
OF HARTFORD COUNTY.

To the greatest poet of the Augustan ag
the world is indebted for a model treatise
on Agriculture, which like many of til,
masterpieces of ancient genius. has beel
utilized as an elementary textbook o
classical instruction. To those whose ac
quaintance with this immortal work is sug
gestive only ofiuvenile parsing and constru
ing, the mention of the Georges of Virgi
will be like the sound of mournful music
to the soul of Ossian.
propose to avail myself at the outset
of a single quotation from this most ap.
proved and elegant relic of antiquity, and
to greet you, farmers of Hartford County, az
| Virgil saluted the husbandmen of Italy:
0 fortunatoS minimum, sua 81 bona norint
Agric0la!
The quotation, it must be admitted, is
sufficiently familiar. In fact, it has beer
SO often pressed into service as the motto
for agricultural journals ana the text tol
agricultural addresses that it has become
one Of the small coins of this department
OF the literary market, passing current from
hand to hand at its face value, without
| question or close inspection. The use OF
this small scrap of Latin no more involves
the afiectaton Of pedantry than the dep
uty shertf's return of "R0n est " or nUtld
bona to writ Of summons or an eXecu-
ton, although it may be used in the midst
of prize cattle and premium horses, and
fat hogs. Indeed, it may almost he said
to have become the conventional form OF
address in which upon occasions like the
present, iudicious and proper speaker,
not having himself the advantage of being
one of the "too fortunate husbandmen,' y
| is expected to gracefully introduce his sub
J iect and himself to an agricultural audience,
Allow me, then, at the outset, borrowing
the sentiment of the old Roman, and keep
ing in the line of approved modern prece-
dent. to congratulate YOU, first that Won
are farmers, and next, that in the exhibit
ton of your labors, or rather some of the
results of them during the past year, which
has assembled us together, YOU have shown
yourselves to be successful farmers.
congratulate you upon being farmers.
| If YOU are not favored with street cars and
gas, and the police, and Jones' Falls and
the Basin; if you do have tramps and DO
tato bugs, and cabbage worms and cut
worms; il YOU have hog cholera and chicken
| u
hav or a little too dry for corn; if wheat
is always alarmingly short, or disgustingly
cheap; still the old Roman was riuht. Won
are but too well off, if you only knew it.
In the elaborate and complicated struc-
lures of modern society you are securely
lodged upon the ground floor. Lofty and
many-storied the ediiice of civilization
towers above you, but yours is its broad
basis, yours its indispensable, its enduring
foundation Yours is tie labor which
renders possible all other labor. Your in
dustry sets in motion all other industries.
You furnish the mill with its grist. the fac
tory with its fabrics, the carrier with his
| freight. Commerce would shrink into n
shrivelled mummy unless its throbbing mr..
teries were periodically filled with the gen
| ial tide which flows from your fields. and
its veins distended by the return current
which distributes luxury and refinement
to your homes. Manufactures wait upon
your requirements, supply YOUR implements
and consume YOUR products. Aoriculture
commerce and manufactures together form
the great tripod of active manual labor
but the oldest, the wortbiest and the
noblest of them is Agriculture. 1t is di-
vine truth that man does not live bv bread
alone, but it is human truth that he can
not live very long without it. We can
imagine world without commerce, we
can imagine world without manufactures,
But to gain an adequate idea of a world
without some form of agriculture. we must
turn our largest telescopes to the moon.
and there survey a dead planet without
an atmosphere, without drop of water.
and without living organism of either
vegetable or animal Kindred to cheer fine
frigid solitude of universal desolation.
The advantages of husbapdry, viewed
simply as one of the callings or professions
of life, are so obvious and striking that TO
enumerate them would seem tedious and
common place, and vet, strange to sav II
is perhaps of all others the CALLING which
embraces the largest ratio of individuals
who are to q greater or less degree discern
tented with their lot, and ready to exchange
it for some lazer or faster life. IF anv one
will take the trouble to scsn the verse from
the Georges which / have quoted as it
sounded when pronounced in the ears fthe
Roman audience for whom it was immedi-
ately intended, he will find that the emnho.
sis naturally and no doubt desipnedlv falls
upon the word which we translate " if"
"iSua 81 bona norint," if they knew their own
blessings. And by the way it NAV be said
of this little proposition "ifn that for its
size it is the biggest word in our LANGUAGE
or any other. All history is full Of the
battles it has lost, the great men it has
ruined, the destinies it has decided If