AGRICULTURE FOR
BEGINNERS
BY
CHARLES WILLIAM BURKETT
Editor of the American Agriculturist
formerly Director of Agricultural Experiment Station
Kansas State Agricultural College
FRANK LINCOLN STEVENS
Professor of Plant Pathology, University of Illinois
formerly Teacher of Science in High School
Columbus, Ohio
AND
DANIEL HARVEY HILL
Formerly President of the North Carolina College of
Agriculture and Mechanic Arts
REVISED EDITION
GINN AND COMPANY
BOSTON · NEW YORK · CHICAGO · LONDON
ATLANTA · DALLAS · COLUMBUS · SAN FRANCISCO
COPYRIGHT, 1903, 1904, 1914, BY
CHARLES WILLIAM BURKETT, FRANK LINCOLN STEVENS
AND DANIEL HARVEY HILL
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
329.7
The Athenæum Press
GINN AND COMPANY · PROPRIETORS · BOSTON · U.S.A.
GETTING READY FOR WINTER
PREFACE
Since its first publication "Agriculture for Beginners" has found awelcome in thousands of schools and homes. Naturally many suggestions asto changes, additions, and other improvements have reached its authors.Naturally, too, the authors have busied themselves in devising methodsto add to the effectiveness of the book. Some additions have been madealmost every year since the book was published. To embody all thesechanges and helpful suggestions into a strictly unified volume; to addsome further topics and sections; to bring all farm practices up to theideals of to-day; to include the most recent teaching of scientificinvestigators—these were the objects sought in the thorough revisionwhich has just been given the book. The authors hope and think that theremaking of the book has added to its usefulness and attractiveness.
They believe now, as they believed before, that there is no line ofseparation between the science of agriculture and the practical art ofagriculture. They are assured by the success of this book thatagriculture is eminently a teachable subject. They see no differencebetween teaching the child the fundamental principles of farming andteaching the same child the fundamental truths of arithmetic, geography,or grammar. They hold that a youth should be trained for the farm justas carefully as he is trained for any other occupation, and that it isunreasonable to expect him to succeed without training.
If they are right in these views, the training must begin in the publicschools. This is true for two reasons:
1. It is universally admitted that aptitudes are developed, tastesacquired, and life habits formed during the years that a child is in thepublic school. Hence, during these important years every child intendedfor the farm should be taught to know and love nature, should be led toform habits of observation, and should be required to begin a study ofthose great laws upon which agriculture is based. A training like thisgoes far toward making his life-work profitable and delightful.
2. Most boys and girls reared on a farm get no educational trainingexcept that given in the public schools. If, then, the truths thatunlock the doors of nature are not taught in the public schools, natureand nature's laws will always be hid in night to a majority of ourbread-winners. They must still in ignorance and hopeless drudgery teartheir bread from a reluctant soil.
The authors return hearty thanks to Professor Thomas F. Hunt, Universityof California