28 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



inquiries as can never fail to give vividness even to clear per- 

 ceptions, and will often lead to the conviction that what we 

 seem fully to know, we have only half learned. Now this is 

 precisely the spirit in which nature invites us into her school 

 and bids us ponder wisely her secrets ; things often placed out 

 of the reach of children, only that they may be fully within 

 the control of adults. 



Yoii can scarcely go a step without encountering something 

 which thus needs looking into. You had a larger yield upon a 

 wet field, for this rainy year, than you have generally secured 

 in a dry season ; and yet the land has always been accounted 

 too moist for successful culture. Surely, interest, as well as 

 science, will render you curious enough to ask, why. 



Last week, you had a severe frost on your low land. But the 

 thermometer stood at 55° when you looked at it before retiring, 

 and at 45° in the early morning, just when the damage was 

 done ; and yet you know that water docs not freeze with a 

 temperature greater than 32°. Lideed, why was it, that the 

 frost ■ followed its usual law, and avoided the hills and the 

 neighborhood of all your stone walls ? Beside, some of your 

 plants were destroyed, and others were unharmed ; and they 

 were all of the same kind. Will you be content to say, " that's 

 singular;" or, shall you ask why, and discover the true cause? 

 Moreover, in a thermometer held over the frozen plants, the 

 mercury would have stood several degrees higher than over those 

 untouched. That is decidedly more singular, and the reason 

 is worth finding out for its own sake ; and knowing it, you may, 

 perhaps, better guard against the antics of Jack Frost, whose 

 picture painting on the window pane is queer enough, but 

 whose manoeuvres in the gardens " beat the Dutch." And 

 yet, they are luiiformly all " according to the statutes, in such 

 cases made and provided." 



Closely connected with the early frosts of autumn and the 

 late frosts of spring, is a most interesting inquiry concerning 

 deio, the foundation of such frosts. Dew, as it is well known, 

 supplies to vegetation much needed moisture in dry weather. 

 Around this will gather at once a host of questions. Why is 

 dew a general indicator of dry weather ? And what is its 

 connection with these destructive frosts of New England ? 

 Aud, more beautiful and interesting than all, by what unvary- 



