324 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTUEE. 



frank speaking, and the Avorship in God's own bine-vaulted temple "inspirit 

 and in truth." 



To refresh your recollection of these facts you have but to turn to any of the 

 standard authors in poetry or romance. Go Isack to Spensex", or to Chaucer (if 

 yoii want to spend a little time in learning his old English), and then trace 

 down through age after age to our own Bryant and Whittier the universal 

 love and use of rural scenery and rural life. If tliis is too great a task, turn to 

 Milton's L' Allegro, or to a host of places in Paradise Lost; to Isaac Walton's 

 Complete Angler, where he goes a fishing, not only for the fish of which he was 

 fond, but for the "breezy main" and "cooling shade." and country wit and 

 wisdom of which he was fonder. Read again Gray's Elegy in a Country Church- 

 yard ; glance over Thompson's Seasons ; take Goldsmith, or Cowper, or 

 Burns^ or Wordsworth, or Scott, or Tennyson, or Mrs. Hemans, — all household 

 names, — and with this question in your thought, feel for their interest in your 

 home life. Even that well-rememljered lullaby of Isaac Watt's might answer 

 our purpose as an illustration. 



Often these references expand into beautiful pictures Avhich we take, jDerhaps, 

 for the mere adornments of rhetoric : but any reader has missed the cream of 

 poetry who has failed to find the lieart in it, and this lieart is what trains and 

 moulds our feelings till they are developed into action. 



The growtli of landscape gardening in England out of the merest formality 

 into an imitation of nature is supposed by excellent authority to have been due 

 to the iniluence of Milton, Addison, and Pope, exercised entirely through liter- 

 ature. May it not be found upon careful scrutiny that the longing of this cen- 

 tury for a stronger hold of the soi] we cultivate, a better knowledge of our 

 powers over it, and a fuller enjoyment of our God-given blessing in it, is due to 

 the wider reach of the same and kindred influences through a more general 

 acquaintance with such works in books? 



But that the poets have been in earnest in their regard for country living is 

 proved by numerous instances of life spent amid rural pursuits. Some of these, 

 as rural poets, I have already named ; others more noted can be added. Shakes- 

 peare retired from the stage to his farm. Samuel Daniel, laureate poet of the 

 same age, spent his last days on his own farm. Edmund Waller, famous fifty 

 years later, was possessed of great wealth by inheritance ; and this he invested 

 in a country place which became the fame of all the land for its beauty, 

 variety, and fertility, — all through the taste of its owner. Alexander Pope 

 spent all his spare change in beautifying his country seat, and in cultivating fine 

 fruits and vegetables. AVm. Cowper spent nearly his whole life in the country, 

 and found his chief satisfaction in his gardening, of which his poetry every- 

 where reflects the flavor. Robert Burns failed in his farming, not from want 

 of knowledge or appreciation, but from Avant of application, inspired, as is too 

 often the case, by the too frequent use of the social glass. Sir Walter Scott 

 delighted in the care of his estate, and was well skilled in forestry and tillage, 

 but was extravagant in its adornment aiid in his mode of living. Wordsworth 

 passed most of his life in the country, as one of his critics says, "under the 

 ■habitual sway' of nature." Southey and Coleridge, too, dwelt side by side for 

 a time, and seemed to love their country home the best. Tennyson dwells in a 

 -suburban, " careless ordered garden " that he loves, and 



'• The fields between 

 Are dewy fresh, browsed by deep uddered kine. 

 And all about the large lime feathers low, 

 'J'he lime a summer home of numerous wings."' 



