The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1905-05-31

ii. Stanback.
Band-Instructor e. r. Robson;
Captain. w. c. Piver; First Lieuten-
ant, T. j. Ogburn; Second Lieutenant,
w G. Huband; First Sergeant. j. G..
Hardison; Second Sergeant, w n.
Holt; Captain and Drum Major ID. A.
Cox.
Prof John Hamilton'S Address.
THE Southern planter of fifty years
ago was commonly an educated man.
The Northern schools and colleges
were then we'll filled with young men
from the Southern plantations, and
those of the South almost entirely so
filled. Estates were large, and the
number of laborers was large The
educated proprietor farmed on large
scale. The educated men of that day
who chose the legal profession very
generally became eminent and num-
bered men of national and internal
tional fame. If he became q physi-
clan, he made a good one; and in the
pulpit he made an acceptable preach
er of the gospel. But he was not 50
successful as a farmer, wearing out
instead of improving his land, not in
the South alone, for the abandoned
farms of New England testify to the
same fact. That this was the case in
the hands of educated men showed
plainly that though their education
fitted them for professional life it
had not made farmers of them. The
deterioration of lands north and south
showed that something was wrong in
their management in the hands of the
educated men. Mere mental ability is
not enough to make q farmer. A man
may make a great success as a lawyer
but when he tries to farm he is apt to
make a failure. The farmer needs
special training About the middle Of
the last century the deterioration of
the land caused this fact to be real
lied. Educated men studied the stu
alton and the result was the Land
Grant Act, known as the first Morrill,
bill which set aside 10000 acres of
the public land for each member of
Congress, and these were to be sold
for the establishment of at least one
college in each State, whose leading
object should be, without excluding
ether scientific and classical Studies
and including military tactics, to teach
such branches of learning as arc re-
lated to agriculture and the mechanic
arts" in such manner as the legisla-
lures may prescribe.
For thirty years these colleges
CROPPED their way in the endeavor to
formulate courses of study, but as
teachers were trained and new discov-
cries of science made matters palmer
the new education developed. Fifteen
years of experience showed that means
should be provided for the discovery
of new truths in order that progress
be made. This realization led to the
establishment in 1887 of the Expert
ment Stations in all the States, the
duty of which was declared to be ito
conduct original researches or verify
experiments on the physiology of
plants and animals; the diseases to-
which they are severally subject with
remedies for the same; the chemical
composition of Useful plants at their
different stages of growth; the COM
parative advantages of rotatiVe crop
ping as pursued under varying series
of crops; the capacity of new plants or
trees for acclimation; the analysis OF
soil and water. and the chemical com
position of manures natural or artifi-
cial, with experiments designed to
test their comparative effects on crops
of different kinds; the adaptation ana
value of grasses and forage plants; the
composition and digestibility of differ
ent kinds of food for domestic animals;
the scientific and economic questions