"Whence came agriculture? Certainly no dragon ever ploughed a field - nor even tended a herd. How then was this, most vital of all skills first begun?
Here we must thank the most base and shunned of the habits of man for this though naught else. Indeed it is the consumption of narcotics - from ruinweed for smoking to the sowing of hops for the brewing of beer that agriculture first came. Men had long known the value of such things - ruinweed gathered and smoked was common in early religions while tree hollows are used for natural fermentation even today in the wild jungle isles.
As man grew more numerous under the dragons' gaze, however, foraging could not support these habits beyond the worthy few, so man took to planting such crops and building places to store them when harvested. This in turn became common for all fruits of the land that were eaten even as hunters took to herding the more amenable of their intended prey.
And from these early beginnings came agriculture, without the study of which only a tenth of men could be fed from what would naturally be produced by the land. Not that this will provide any student with any sympathy should they be found with a ‘secret garden’ of such things while attending this academy!
Professor Ambleby, valedictory lecture."