There is an old proverb that has become somewhat hackneyed in agricultural address, That he who makes two spears[?] of grass to grow where but one grew before is a public benefactor, but this is also true of other industries. He that by his effort adds to anything esential to the public good, is entitled to appreciation and gratitude. Whilst we are technically here[?] to advance agriculture fair we are virtually here on a broader basis we are here to encourage general industry, and we can be most helpful to all by inspiring in each that feeling unselfishness that recognizes a common interest, and by mutual consent yeildsing the highest honor to the largest usefulness. The world owes us nothing that we do not owe to the world. The Creator has designed us for mutual support, and what God has joined let no man put assunder Cast in business or trade or calling is no more heaven ordained than is cast in social life That is the best community where individuals live best and are most careful to help others prosper a healthful community is made up of parts like the members of the human body each of these parts have their own functions and each must perform well its appointed duty part or all suffer It would not do for the hands that labor and produce the food to say we have no need of to the teeth. They produce nothing but is it but is it not their business to break bulk that the stomach the great consumer may better receive and assimilate the food to the body and send strength back to the hands a body all turned into hands could not live a moment we must help build up our neighbor that he may have ability to help build us up. An old tavern keeper a good deal annoyed by competition said if only everybody else was dead what a grand thing it would then be to keep tavern. The various industries must be careful not to make the old tavern keeper a type of their feeling. The fact is if only all the other industries were prosperous what a grand thing it would be to farm.

I am probably a little off the track for an agricultural speech but I never have been a believer in ruts I want to take my own course and if it does not suit, the Society must next year get somebody that will do better. I know that it has on occasions like this become the custom to flatter We are address[ed] as hard boned honest tillers of the soil just as through no other toil was as honest as ours. Our wives are commiserated with as doomed to the labors of the kitchen, just as though the world was not full of kitchens and as though all womanhood probably I should say girlhood did not sigh and pine to become mistress of a kitchen

I do not come to you with hands bony from toil I have no hayseeds in my hair and probably I think none of the odors of the barn yard on my boots, but I come to you as one that has a common interest with you in all that pertains to the soil and to agriculture I claim to be one of you, But I will not and I know you will not ask for honor that you would not with the exact same measure mete out to other callings of usefulness, none are entitled to crowns that do not themselves win them. Honorable and Important as is our calling furnish as we do the staff of "life to the rest of the world but yet we must not forget that man cannot live by bread alone. They that tan leather and make shoes, that weave cloth and make garments that dig ore and fashion iron an[d] so through the whole catalog of usefulness industries form a vast brotherhood that it is our duty and interest to recognize And they that heal our bodys that furnish food for our minds that instruct us in morals are surely our equals in usefulness to those that supply food and garment[?] merit We want to crown our calling with the largest unselfishness We should not build walls of separations between those that in any way by hand head or heart contribute to the general stock of usefulness let all these be brethren We should have no lines between us to separate but those that are drawn between indolence and industry between drones and workers

let toil be honorable and idleness a shame let not profession but excellence in our calling be the measure of honor So honor industry that idleness shall from shame be abandoned What it is the interest of every man that expects to make an honest living is to establish [?] truth to that it is just as honorable to make shoes dig coal and raise wheat as it is to write books or go to congress That a superior boot black[?] is entitled to more respect than a dull dirty farmer or than a brainless briefless Lawyer. The true measure of mans nobility is that he excels in the work he is called to do. But whilst we must not over rate we must not underate our position I think farmers are often unjust to themselves at this point, we are prone to envy the condition of others because we see only what is brightest the darkness is hidden from us the skeletons are kept in closets I admit if the chief end of man was to have soft hands wear good clothes and attain Sudden wealth I would not advise the pursuit of agriculture But when we look at the difference between raising a family amid the quiet surroundings of the Country or the pernicious[?] tendencies of town that the one tends to industry and virtue the other to idleness and vice In the country where brothers and sisters are dependent on each other for social enjoyment they become acquainted with each form tender life attachments that cannot be said of town [?] children

When we see the numerous failures in business as compared with its successes the consuming anxiousness of financial struggles with the quiet contentment of those that seek only content with small gains. That the one is a tennant of nature the other is a prisoner to close brick walls the one looks out upon the beauty fields robed[?] in green or covered with waving gold. The other on dusty streets and narrow allys the one breathes air laden with the fragrance of flowers the other that poluted with the affluences of dense population Just as the works of God are above the works of man so is the farmers exaltation home above that of his fellow in the city for God made the country man the town

I admit that we cannot afford to over look the many profits of our calling At this point we should be liberal in our appliances for in farming as in morals there is a with holding that tends to poverty and a scattering about that maketh rich a little extra expense in the begining is often great gain in the outcome. The seed of the best varieties of what is usually raised on the farm pays though it costs more and so with breeds of cattle sheep hogs horses and even chickens. It is surely so in planting fruit trees we cannot be to careful in selecting varieties and quality of trees and it is always a mistake to patronize strangers when we can be as well served at home, and be sure that we are getting the variety we desire and pay for, the labor and expense of planting fruit trees is comparatively inexpensive small but in a few years add very greatly to enjoyment, we can hardly estimate the money value of luciuis[luscious] fruit supplying us almost through the entire year An expenditure of one hundred dollars in fruit and shade trees will in a short time add thousands of dollars to the selling value of the farm It is our right and duty to look well to what is our money interest make where we can and save what we can, we do to much fencing, we ought to demand a law that would impel cattle owners to fence their cattle in not their neighbors cattle out The cost of farm fencing in Penna is estimated at one hundred and eighty millions of dollars. The interest on this is over ten millions of dollars the annual repairs about 10,000 thus making an annual burden of 120 000 000, dollars. I am not a granger and of course have no right to dictate to men but it seems to me that in no other way could that organization make itself more useful than in developing its efforts to a change of the fence law of Penn^a We thought our state tax high when real estate paid about two million dollars per annum that includes City town and rural, and yet here is twenty millions of dollars on farm property alone. Why it is [?] quite enough[?] to cripple the agricultural interests of the state

When I spoke of liberal expenditure I should have spoke of the profit of understanding. I have some land that the increased crop paid for the drains the first year and I have had sixteen years profit. I would advise farmers to make a beg[inn]ing at this in such places were water does most harm and I feel sure they will rappidly increase their work in this direction The money cost of fencing in this state is more than the horses cattle pigs and sheep of the state would sell for. The great bulk of farmers Keep up their cattle certainly not more than one in a dozen lets his stock run at large to pester his neighbors So that on an average a dozen farmers must fence at an enormous expense because one man in the neighborhood chooses to send his cattle out to forage on other people, this is not only a breech of good neighborhood feeling, but it is a positive injustice Farmers too can save money by having sense and independence of feeling enough to cheerfully deny themselves of much of the fripery and folly of the age. Good substantial clothing is really in better taste for farm life than much of costly brand[?] cloths or silks and satins and laces a plain carriage is more comfortable and useful than one so costly and handsome as to be brought out only in great occasions when roads and weather are good Costly furnished parlors and bed chambers hermetically sealed only now and then when a stranger comes are not only an extravagance but such an actual burden to the house wife that farmers should endeavor to keep clear of There are many follies and always expenses [?] that have neither comfort or usefulness in them that do not cultivate taste bring pleasure or gratify life, all these we should forego. The farmer should surround himself with what all that is necessary to comfort of body to the formation of rational taste to the instruction of the mind and to bring out domestic pleasure, then he should stop. We should seek gain but only seek it that that the gain only that [?] it may contribute not to the artificial but to the real pleasures of life After all that is the best calling that tends most to the formation of the best type of manhood and womanhood. I know that farmers gains are so small that there is probably more danger to to[o] great in saving severely than too large in spending liberally. This severity we must avoid if we would not drive our children from home and into other callings. It can be but little satisfaction to the old father and mother broken with years to look out upon a half dozen farms around them the result of their sever [?] life savings, but their children all gone into the towns and cities with impatience waiting for the period when these possessions that have left upon them no pleasant memories may be sold to strangers and then proceeds enter into prison[?] ventures.