102 Wisco>TsiN State Horticultukal Society. 



tread-mill existence ; that he went back and forth, back and forth, 

 from his bouse tohisoflfice, from his office to his house, with never 

 a day's recreation, much less a vacation journey. To his wife's oft- 

 repeated invitation to accompany her, his reply was that home 

 was the best place for him ; that he was miserable away from his 

 business. So after tea, he looked over the daily papers, then fell 

 to planning for the morrow, till ten o'clock came, and then to bed. 

 To sleep ? " Ay, there's the rub ! " Could he have slept, all might 

 have gone well with him. But, instead of taking note of this 

 first <varning, he sought an opiate, and the end was not far off. 

 Are we mistaken in saying that if this man had given an hour or 

 two of every day to light and agreeable work in his garden, bad 

 learned to take an interest and a pride in it, that his health 

 might have remained firm, acd his life been prolonged ? Look 

 about you, and see if the successful men, those who possess a 

 competence, together with a sound mind and a sound body, have 

 not some diversion, something which takes them out of the dull 

 round of life's activities, and opens to them a new avenue to hap- 

 piness and health. In a circular, recently issued by the State 

 Board of Charities and Eeform, we read : " The number of the 

 insane in this state is increasing faster than the population." This 

 alarming increase has given rise to special legislation during the 

 past winter, in regard to the building and furnishing of county 

 insane asylums, and it demands the attention of all who are 

 studying and laboring to elevate and improve their fellow-men. 

 Nowhere is this increase more noticeable than in the rural dis- 

 tricts, and especially among the wives of farmers. The farmer's 

 life is accounted one of the healthiest, and so, undoubtedly, it is, 

 " as loBg as it is pursued in accordance with the laws governing 

 life. Dr. Kerapster says : " Bight hours of hard muscular labor 

 is as much as can be borne pi'operly out of the twenty-four, without 

 damaging health." It is also asserted, on high authority, that two 

 hours of work indoors is more exhausting than four hours out of 

 doors. What shall we say then of the farmer's wife, who per- 

 forms hard, muscular labor from morning until night during the 

 heat of summer ? Is it strange that we so often find her broken 

 in health, when we expected to see her strong and vigorous? 



