The San Francisco call., 1898-04-29
More Room for Them Than Lawyers and
 Physicians.
Professor Hilgard Of Berkeley on Agricultural Edu-
 cation.
Deplores the "Snobbishness Which Looks Down Upon the Farm
 CTS Pursuit"

BERKELEY, April 2s-Professor E. w.
 Hilgard. head of the agricultural depart
 ment of the university, has made an in- teresting study of the problem why so
 few college students are preparing them
 selves for agricultural pursuits. His con- clusions are set forth in the recently pub lished report of the department for the past two years. He deplores the "snob-
 bishness" which looks down upon agricul- ture as a vocation of inferior degree and declares that it is only by elevating the farmers pursuit to higher plane, boIn intellectually and (by the aid of such as- sociations as the Grange and Farmers clubs) socially, that this can be overcome. Professor Hilgard's comments are in part as follows:
 It is truly remarkable that in republican
 America prejudice should be allowed a foot
 not show its face The strong and influential | representation of the agricultural element in trast to the manner in which the farmers in- tereStS made to take a back seat'' In our
 farmers are not there, but rather because for | lack of training they cannot make themselves 1 felt as against their well-eQuipped fellow-mem-
 bers of the politico-legal profession. It Is only i by correspondingly thorough training, connect 1 ed with their own pursuit, that this state of | things can be remedied.
 l We have been told that farmers do not send their sons because they fear they will be "edu- cated away from the farm out as a rnat,-r of fact a very large proportion of our univer- slty students are farmers sons, already
 shown; and they are sent by their parents
 to other departments literary. scientific and
 other professional courses, giving their own
 profession the go-by. It is the old story of
 cities, where more fun and Supposedly less
 work can be had than the farm. That is well here.
 50 long as our soils continue to produce re-
 out imperative need of fertilization rotation etc, and new lands remain to be occupied the
 attendance at our colleges of farmers sons | intending to return to the farm will be com paratively slight; but the shoe be-
 gins to pinch. and intelligent and frugal hus- i bandry becomes a necessity, our agricultural | colleges and schools will receive a corre- l spondingly Increased attendance. The begin 1 ming in such Q movement is already seen in | often of mature age, who intend to engage In agricultural branches. requiring professional l information, training for observation and edu-
 cated Judgment. It is the relatively slight de- 1 rnand for agricultural experts in this country graduates to few persons annually. Yet even
 now in certain cases the demand exceeds the ment stations and colleges in the United States l as well the Agricultural Department at Washington, are frequently unable to find the
 right man for place it is desired to fill. There certainly Is much mere room for agri-
 more lawyers and physicians, for in the ab- . sence Of sufficient number of trained ex- perts it has become necessary to fill many places with narrowly educated specialists in- stead of men with broad education.
 In California the fact that investments in orchards and vineyards are permanent for a
 number of years and bring about one-sided wear of the soil makes it necessary to work on rational lines sooner than is mostly done elsewhere. Horticulture requires in an emi- nent degree the of knowledge and brains and 1t is from horticulturists that most of our students now come Besides the large area of the State and its indefinitely varied climates and soil call for the exercise of an unusual degree of Judgment and brains, the more so as in large number of cases there is DO prece- dent to so upon. It would therefore seem ] especially needful that young men intend- 1 ing to be farmers should be trained to use ali l the resources that agricultural science places
 at their command. to save themselves from costly mistakes In their practice.