THE AMERICAN FARMER. 37 



the first meal, I thought the folks had made a breakfast party 

 on purpose for me, and were very grand folks, and very extrava- 

 gant too, for they had hot tea and hot coffee, and hot cakes, and a 

 plenty of good butter, and plenty of meat, which I scarcely 

 ever saw at home ; and I Avas afraid to sit up to the meal. But 

 they told me to take hold, and I just did so, and I ate and ate 

 till I was all full inside, and could hold no more ; and I have 

 never seen the time from then till now, that I have not fared as 

 well ; and the man that fails in America — God bless her — to 

 get a living, whether he be native or foreign, is just a fool, or 

 too lazy to live.' 



" Such were the actual words to me of a once Scotch laborer 

 from near Paisley, who is now worth one hundred thousand 

 dollars, — of which, forty thousand is money at interest. He 

 lives in a western county of Massachusetts. You may call this a 

 strong and rare case ; suppose it be, it shows what can be done 

 under the influence of institutions such as ours."* 



I might compare the condition of the American farmer with 

 that of the millions of serfs, the cultivators of the soil in Rus- 

 sia, or with that of the poor oppressed nations of the East, the 

 millions of cultivators of the soil who are mere tenants at suf- 

 ferance, and may be driven from their homes while their crops 

 are standing ; and who, if by chance they scrape together some- 

 thing more than the bread they eat, literally bury it in the 

 earth, knowing that the bare suspicion of their good fortune 

 would bring ruin upon them and their families. But time will 

 not permit. I have conversed with the men of whom I speak, 

 both in Europe and in the East. I have seen what they call 

 their homes, which you would deem it cruel to call a shelter for 

 your cattle. On some of the fairest portions of this beautiful 

 earth, the only homes of the farming population are of mud 

 and stone ; where, in one apartment, men, women, children, 

 mules, asses, swine and poultry, lie down together, and when 

 the fierce storms or the cold night compelled me to take shelter 

 in these abodes of misery, I found, from what I there heard, 

 saw, and smelt, the whole truth of this sad story. Even in 

 lovely Italy, the most beautiful and fertile country in the world, 



* Address delivered at Lawrence, September 30, 1852, before the Essex 

 Agricultural Society, by Henry K. Oliver, pp. 17, 18. 



