BOSTON, February 23, 1883.

To the Honorable the House of Representatives:

I have the honor to transmit herewith the twentieth annual report of the trustees of the Massachusetts Agricultural College, and in so doing I take leave to more than make a formal transmission of that document to the House.

I especially call attention to its contents, and submit that in if the opinion of the Executive it would be for the benefit of the people of the commonwealth, that a very considerable number of copies of it should be printed and widely distributed.

I am convinced, both from the state of my own knowledge heretofore, of the Agricultural College, and from conversation with several gentlemen of intelligence, that that institution is entirely misunderstood as to its purposes, its methods of instruction and the scope of its educational power. A too commonly received opinion seems to be that at that college only some information is imparted to the pupil concerning soils, the methods of treating them, and the practical work of the farm, and therefore that only sons of farmers, or those who are intending to devote their lives to farming, should seek to obtain an education therein. While it is true that these things are taught and well taught therein, they are by no means the limit of the educational course. For practical instruction, to every branch of professional life except perhaps theology, the curriculum, and the methods of imparting knowledge to the pupil, are as beneficial as those of any other institution of learning In addition, the elements of military science, so far as the “ school of the soldier,” and the officer of the battalion are concerned, are imparted to the pupil, and he is fitted, if attentive and apt, to take a commission in any regiment, practically quite as well in so far as if from West Point.

 The instruction in the order of business, in neatness and care of the person, in habits of cleanliness in the care of apartments wherein men live, which are the embodied results of the experience of all armies, are as useful to the civilian who shall have the care of others, especially if dependents, as they are to the officer in the care of his men. From experimental knowledge I testify to the value of this branch of instruction.

 From the economy which can well be practiced by the student at the Agricultural College, because of the cheapness of living, the absence of those inducements to extraordinary expenses by the pupil which render a college course so burdensome to men of moderate means, the sons of such men will be enabled either by their own exertions, or the support of their parents, to obtain at a cost within their reach a good practical education, as good in my judgment as anywhere else to fit them for the business of life.

 I commend, therefore, this institution, founded both by endowment by the United States and the State, to the attention of the legislature, and ask for it such appropriations as may meet its very economical needs.

BENJ. F. BUTLER.
 
 
 
 
 
 

AMHERST, Jan. 30, 1883.

To His Excellency BENJAMIN F. BUTLER:

SIR,—I have the honor herewith to present to your Excellency and the Honorable Council the Twentieth Annual Report of the Trustees of the Massachusetts Agricultural College.

I am, sir, very respectfully,
Your obedient servant,
P. A. CHADBOURNE,
 

To His Excellency the Governor and the Honorable Council:

  Since the last report was made, important changes have occurred among the officers of government and instruction in the college. Edward C. Choate of Southborough has been elected trustee in place of William Wheeler, resigned. Both of these gentlemen are graduates of the college. The resignation of the Hon. Levi Stockbridge, as president, has removed from the college one who has been identified with it from the beginning, and who, by his long and successful labors here, has won for himself a high position among the agriculturists and educators of the country. His place was filled- by the election of P. A. Chadbourne, late
president of Williams College and formerly president of this institution. Mr. A. B. Bassett has been elected to the chair of mathematics and physics, and is performing his work with marked skill and success. The chair of agriculture, left vacant by the resignation of President Stockbridge, has been temporarily filled in a very acceptable manner by Mr. John W. Clark. Dr. Manly Miles, formerly of the Michigan Agricultural college, has been elected to this chair and commences his instruction the present term. Mr. Clark will continue as associate instructor in agriculture, having care of the class work in the field. Robert W. Lyman, Esq., of Belchertown, a graduate of the college, has given instruction in rural law, and Dr. Edward Hitchcock, Jr., in elocution. The president has given instruction in general zoology, entomology, and mental philosophy. In the present year he is also to give instruction in geology. He also conducts religious worship on the Sabbath in the college chapel. The other departments of instruction remain as they were at the time of the last report.
 
 The course of study has been so far modified as to introduce more instruction in the structure of the English language, rhetoric and history. The study of French and German heretofore required has been made optional, and the time of recitations 80 arranged that each student can study both languages if he so elects.

  The work of the college has been most efficiently done. The improvement of the students in their studies and in that good order and gentlemanly deportment so desirable in college, has been highly satisfactory.

  While we could use to great advantage much larger means than we have, and should have the assistance of specialists in different departments of science, which our limited means do not warrant us now in securing, we should be false to the best interests of the college, as well as ungrateful towards the nation and Commonwealth, if we did not fairly recognize what they have already done in making this college an efficient agency in the work of practical, liberal education. In seeking for more which is needful, we have perhaps too much lost sight of, or kept from the public view, what we now have.

  It is plainly evident that the people of the State, as a whole, have not understood the provisions here made for the education of the young men of Massachusetts. When committees from the legislature and others have, visited the institution and become acquainted with its organization, its means of instruction, and its actual work, the college has proved its own best advocate. To make the college and its work better known to all the people of the State, we ask a careful consideration of the course of study and of the reports of various departments. We also feel justified in once more calling the attention of the legislature and the people of the State to the founding and organization of this institution as well as to its present condition.

  The grant of land and land-scrip for founding agricultural colleges was made by the general government in 1862. The civil war had brought out with great clearness the elements of national strength,—varied production in agriculture and the mechanic arts, and a citizen soldiery well trained in the art of war. To secure all these in their greatest perfection, was the aim of the bill for establishing  “Industrial Colleges “ in the various loyal States. Whatever mistakes may have been made in the organization and management of these institutions, no fault can be charged home to the original bill. It was eminently a wise measure, and suggested an outline of organization and management that has not as yet been improved upon. Its significant words are as follows: “ The endowment, support and maintenance of at least one college where the leading object shall be, without excluding scientific and classical studies, and including military tactics, to teach such branches of learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanic arts, in such manner as the legislatures of the States may respectively prescribe, in order to promote the liberal and practical education of the industrial classes in the several pursuits and professions of life.” No branch of learning peculiar to the old colleges was to be necessarily excluded; but the new colleges were to push on to the practical application of the sciences they taught, and they were to train all their students as defenders of their country against domestic rebellion or foreign invasion. In a word, they were to educate their students as men and as American citizens. The rank of the education given is “ liberal,” the term applied to the education given by the highest institutions then known. It was to be so broad as to fit men for the “ several pursuits and professions of life.” The object of these colleges was to obliterate the supposed superiority of the so-called “ learned professions,” by securing a “ liberal,” that is, the highest education, for those who chose industrial pursuits, thus lifting agriculture and the mechanic arts from the plane of mere routine labor to the dignity of learned professions, founded upon scientific knowledge and allied to, or connected with, those branches of learning essential for a broad and generous culture of the whole man. Many who have attempted the management of these colleges, as well as many who have criticized them, have apparently overlooked the broad and generous plan upon which they were founded.) It is doubtful if they will ever accomplish the great work for which they were intended, until their original purpose is so fully and constantly recognized and carried out by judicious, painstaking work, that the currents of education shall be once fairly turned toward these new channels. When once fairly turned, that they will continue to flow can no more be doubted than we can doubt the success of any natural process when not artificially obstructed. An education that ‘gives boys what they need to daily use when they become men,” commends itself as rational and practical. All true education should aim at this. And this certainly is the idea that is embodied in the bill founding the industrial colleges of the several States. The provisions of this bill were accepted by Massachusetts. One-third of the funds received from the United States was given to the Institute of Technology in Boston for the promotion of the mechanic arts, and two-thirds were devoted to founding a college at Amherst for the special work of agriculture. By the gift to the Institute of Technology, the Agricultural college has been freed from much labor in building up a mechanical department,—a fact that has been lost sight of by some,—and is left free to carry out the idea of a college making agriculture the leading idea, while it secures rigid training in military tactics and provides such a range of studies in science, literature and philosophy, as shad, in the words of the bill, promote “ liberal education.”

  The college now has 383+ acres of land for farm, gardens, nurseries, etc. It has college buildings, laboratory, botanic museum, plant-houses, gardens and nurseries, so that provision is made for teaching all the sciences that relate to the cultivation of the soil, and these sciences are practically applied lo all the work of the farm, garden, vineyard and orchard. The Durfee plant-house and propagating houses afford practical instruction the year round.

  The course of study aims to do what the original bill declared should be done,—give a practical knowledge of agriculture and horticulture, and at the same time so educate the man, that the students from the Agricultural College shall not be mere artisans, having learned a trade or business and nothing more, but be liberally educated, so that, as farmers, they shall rank in intellectual training with those who chose what have heretofore been called the is learned professions.” It is plain that farming will never take its true place, nor farmers have that influence in the government of our land which they ought to have, until they take their place with those in other professions, not only as men of power and practical ability, but as men of learning and culture. Those who claim that the farmer's life forbids this result, have never yet fully appreciated the farm as a place for study and thought, as well as n place for labor.
 
The course of study in the Massachusetts Agricultural College, at the present time, embraces the following topics:—

  1. Lectures on Health and Habits of study, and general plan of the college work. These lectures are now given by the president. The student, as he begins his college work, is instructed as to the best means of preserving health, the best methods of study and of recitation to secure knowledge, and the best mental training at the same time. He has laid before him the studies of the whole course, so far as he then is able to understand them, that he may in the beginning have some just idea of the value of the different studies,
may understand why they come in the order they do, and how they make a complete educational whole to secure the purpose for which the college exists.
 
  2. Botany—structural and systematic—special application to cultivated plants—Microscopy.
 
  3. Zoology—systematic, with special studies in Entomology.

  4. Agriculture—extending through the entire course of four years—study of soils—methods of working—fertilizers—draining—farm implements—special crops, etc. Stock and Dairy Farming, with lectures on Veterinary Science. Work on the Farm under direction of the Professor of Agriculture, six hours a week, when such work can be supplied.  5. Horticulture. Market Gardening—Arboriculture, Care of Nurseries—Landscape Gardening. Work in nurseries, propagating houses and vineyard done under direction of Professor of Horticulture.

   6. Chemistry. Theoretical and practical. Work in Laboratory, Junior and Senior years, under direction of the Professor of Chemistry.

  7. Geology and Mineralogy, with special reference to Agriculture. The origin of soils, location of Artesian wells, etc.

   8. Military Science and Military Droll continued through the whole course Older direction of officers of the Regular Army, detailed by the United States Government for this special service. This includes weekly inspection of all halls and rooms in college buildings, thus securing neatness and proper sanitary conditions. The students of the college when graduated are competent, in their military knowledge, to receive commissions in the Regular Army.

   9. Mathematics—Algebra, Geometry, Trigonometry and its application, Mechanics, Physics and Astronomy.

   10. English Literature, History, Constitution of the United States, Elocution, assay Writing and Debates, bookkeeping, Drawing.
 
  11. Rural Law, Outlines of Mental and Moral Science.
 
  12. French and overman Languages. This is a brief outline of studies, without any attempt at systematic arrangement, as they are given in the curriculum of terms. Other subjects are introduced as circumstances favor. To some of the subjects here named, but little time can be given, and this varies with different classes; but to those studies, like Botany, Chemistry, Agriculture and Horticulture, which are the practical studies of the course, \ the time and strength of the student are specially given. $ The course of study is so arranged that students may be absent from the college during the spring and summer, and yet go on with their classes. The studies of the first and second  terms of each year make a connected course, or one which the student can complete by a moderate amount of study  while absent in the summer., Students who complete this  partial course receive certificates, but not the regular degree of Bachelor of Science.
 
  In addition to the college proper, the work of which henceforth will be mainly that of instruction, the State has now established an experiment station which will give to the student a constant acquaintance with the methods and results of agricultural experimenting under the direction of the most competent men the board of control can employ. The college can use to advantage larger funds than it has. in many directions, increased funds are absolutely essential for carrying out the true idea of the college.

  The apparent income, as shown by the treasurer's report, is quite delusive. Several of the items generally given there represent the amount of business done by the farm and department of horticulture, rather than income for support of the institution. The net income is very small, while the work of instruction in practical science is very great, much greater than in an ordinary classical college that has no special scientific department. Small classes require the same amount of instruction as large ones.

  The farm and department of horticulture are both subjected to large expense in the care of roads, grounds, plant-houses, etc., all of which must be kept in order for the credit of the institution, and as a means of instruction in practical work. This special care and ornamentation of grounds is provided for in most institutions by special funds. Here this expense, which is very large, is charged to the departments. They are thus made accountable for expense that does not properly belong to them. This gives their products an apparent cost which misrepresents the real state of the case. An attempt will be made to separate these items of expense, so that the real working of the farm and horticultural department shall be more clearly seen.
 
  We feel the need of larger funds for every department of college work. We must look to private individuals as well as to the State for the aid the college must have to sustain and increase its efficiency, and make it second to none in the facilities it offers. While money is given so freely to educate men away from productive pursuits, it is certainly strange that in Massachusetts not a dollar has yet been given, by private benevolence for the endowment of a chair of instruction in the Massachusetts Agricultural College, an institution founded to fit men to become intelligent producers in time of peace, and efficient defenders of the State and Union in time of war. When all the legislators and citizens understand the true state of the case, we believe that the Massachusetts Agricultural College will never lack for students or the funds needful for carrying on this institution founded by the joint action of the United States and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

EDUCATIONAL PLAN OF THE COLLEGE .

  For the outline of studies and the special work in each department, we refer to the course of study, and the tabulated report of work in each department in the second part of this report.

  It is the aim of the trustees to keep the requirements for entrance such that every boy in the State can Bind facilities for fitting himself for the college, without leaving his home, or incurring any expense for schooling which the well-ordered schools of the various towns cannot afford. If boys from fifteen to twenty years of age come with a good common-school education and give themselves heartily to the
work here presented for them, they will, in four years’ time, be well educated to begin any practical business of life.

  The expense of education for four years is a serious matter for most farmers’ sons. The other colleges have large funds for aiding indigent students, and a large proportion of those thus aided are as well able to pay their bills as the average farmer's son. It should be the aim of this college, then, to reduce as much as possible the college expenses, and to foster habits of economy among the students themselves. It now furnishes free scholarships, but it has no funds except a single scholarship to make good the loss of tuition. So that while the college diminishes the expense of the student, it diminishes its own power to do for him what ought to be done. Professors can do double work for a time, but there is a limit to their time and strength, and to their ability to properly teach so many subjects as are now required of them.

  From necessity the college makes provision for the board of students, and it secures this at reduced- cost by giving Rent free the boarding-house and its furniture. The necessity for this provision arises from the fact that the college is far removed from the thickly settled portion of the town that boarding places are difficult to be obtained within reasonable distance from the college grounds.

REPAIRS .

 The legislature of 1882 granted to the college $4,000 for repairs. This money has been expended and the bills deposited with the treasurer of the State. The farm buildings have been repaired and painted; the laboratory repaired and painted, and provided with cases for proper protection of apparatus and specimens. The botanic museum has been painted outside and in. The lecture-room repaired and provided with eases for protection of specimens and instruments. The Durfee plant-house and propagating houses have been thoroughly repaired and painted. The heat and moisture in those houses had caused more serious damage
than at first appeared. The farm-house now occupied lay the market gardener has been shingled and otherwise repaired. The barns connected with this house have been remodeled and repaired for the use of the horticultural department, and the professor's house, to be occupied by Prof. Miles, has been repaired, painted and papered. All of these buildings from long neglect of repairs from want of means had become in many places unsightly and hardly fit for occupation. They are now essentially in good order, though much more Might have been done to most of them with great profit, had the appropriation allowed. As is generally the case, the work proved more formidable than it appeared before it was begun. The carpenter in charge gave entire satisfaction, and we believe every dollar of the money has been judiciously expended. It would require at least $1,000 to complete the repairs upon the buildings, including the painting of the roofs which would be economy in the end.

  It was supposed by the trustees that the Cowles buildings would be taken and repaired by the board of control of the experiment station. No estimate was therefore made for their repairs. If these buildings are not taken by the experiment station, they can be made of great service to the college for the assistant professor of agriculture. It will require $2,000 to put them in proper order for college use.
 
  The unsightly gravel-pit near the road has been filled at large expense, and other important improvements have been made as indicated in the farm and horticultural reports. Mr. Danforth K. Bangs has given to the college three-fourths of an acre of land at the intersection of the two roads that cross the college grounds from the south. This piece of land, rough, neglected and unsightly, WAS a great injury to the appearance of the college property. By this generous gift of Mr. Bangs, we have been able to transform this piece of land to a small ornamental park, so that the entrance to our grounds is now marked by the appearance of ornamentation and culture, instead of roughness and neglect.
 
  The plan henceforth will be to concentrate the farm-work near the roads and farm buildings, and spend less money upon the pastures and swamps, till we hare more to expend. Much of such labor gives very slow returns, and much of this kind of labor is still to be done on this farm. With so much land to be cared for by the work of students and by hired help, it is a very difficult problem to gain profit while trying to use the farm as a means of education. Much labor upon it has thus far been like labor in the laboratory, without any direct pecuniary profit. Now that the experiment station is to take the burden of experimenting, the farm-work should be narrowed to that limit that it can be done with profit. The position of the college, away from markets, renders the work more difficult for both the farm and garden than it
would be were the institution near some large city affording a ready market for the most profitable crops.

  Notwithstanding the improvements made, involving large expense, and the loss on nearly all crops in consequence of the unprecedented drought, the expenses of the college as a whole have been kept within its income. If we add to the reported balance $1,309,12, paid on debts of 1881, and $2,045.19, income delayed on account of change in securities, we should show a balance of $4,098.07, as the real condition of the college, January, 1883, as compared with January, 1882. It is estimated that the bills due the college
ill pay its present outstanding debts.

WANTS OF THE COLLEGE.

 While we have set forth the capabilities of the college, we have not lost sight of what it urgently needs to increase its sufficiency. Its library is not adequate for our purpose,—for the wants of the students. We have no proper library-room. There is no proper place for the cabinet, which is a valuable one for the purposes of instruction. It is the "State Collection,“ enlarged and enriched by private donations. During the past year it has received valuable additions of several thousand specimens of minerals, fossils, shells, insects and bird's eggs and nests, the entire private collection if Mr. Winfred A. Stearns, who presented it to the college, and personally superintended its classification and arrangement. Both this and the library are in dormitory buildings, A with all their inconvenience for such purposes, and exposure to fire. We have no room suitable for public college exercises. The hall we now use for chapel is too small for any commencement exercise, and this room is needed to enlarge the chemical department.

  One of our pressing needs, therefore, is a public building  containing hall for public exercises, for the library and cabinet. We trust some public-spirited man will soon give funds for such a building. The names of the Hills, of Knowlton, and Durfee remind us of what has already been generously given to the college for specific purposes, and we feel that when the work and needs of the college are known, other names will be added to the list of our benefactors.

  Our second need, perhaps first in importance, is a fund for payment of instructors. We should have more men, and they should be better paid. We must have men, the equals at least of those in other colleges, and they have more work to do than is ordinarily required of professors in classical colleges.
  It was found to be impracticable to erect such a building as the college should have for the military department, for  $5,000. The plans were cut down, but still no bid warranted the trustees in making a contract. They concluded to build by the day. The work has progressed far enough to show that a large saving has been made over the lowest contract price. Still, the grant will not complete the building. It will be covered so that it can be used for drilling, but it will require from $1,000 to $1,500, to complete it for its whole work as drill-hall, armory, gymnasium and lecture room combined. The grant for repairs has been exhausted, and $1,500 is needed to complete those repairs, and put the old drill hall in proper condition for a museum of agriculture.

  It is hoped that the Cowles buildings may be found adapted to the wants of the experiment station, in which case those buildings will be repaired from the experiment station fund.

  NOTE.—The present condition of the several departments is set forth in the special reports hereto annexed, and the plan and work of the college, as an educational institution, are given in the second part of this report, in the curriculum of studies and the schedules of work in the several full departments of instruction.