Project Gutenberg's The Stewardship of the Soil, by John Henry Worst

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Title: The Stewardship of the Soil
Baccalaureate Address

Author: John Henry Worst

Release Date: December 31, 2007 [EBook #24080]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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STEWARDSHIP OF THE SOIL

WORST

_The_
STEWARDSHIP
OF THE SOIL

[Illustration]

_Address by_

JOHN HENRY WORST

_President of_ NORTH DAKOTA
AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE

_The Stewardship
of the Soil_

BACCALAUREATE ADDRESS BY
JOHN HENRY WORST
PRESIDENT NORTH DAKOTA
AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE

[Illustration]

_Delivered at the Twenty First Annual Commencement of the
North Dakota Agricultural College
Fargo, North Dakota, June Sixth, Nineteen Hundred Fifteen_

[Illustration: JOHN HENRY WORST]

_The Stewardship of the Soil_

_By_ J. H. WORST

Our ambitious young commonwealth, in conjunction with other states
comprising the great Northwest, occupies a commanding position in the
industrial and economic affairs of this nation.

Mines of gold and silver or forests primeval North Dakota does not have;
but from the millions of fertile acres comprising our vast agricultural
empire, we may reap a golden harvest every year that will exceed in
wealth the output of all the golden placers in the western mountains.

The harvest of minerals, however, can be gathered but once. Time will
not restore the precious nuggets.

The forests once harvested can, at great expense, be renewed in the
course of a century; but our harvest of domestic plants and animals
recurs with every passing season to recompense the farmer for his toil
and to enrich the farmer's friends.

What a precious theme is harvest! The hopes, the well-being, the life of
the world is fast bound up in the magic of this single word.

The soil upon which the harvest depends, moreover, is God's benediction
to human