THE FARMER'S MONTHLY VISITOR. 



133 



migrated to tlie State of New York, and aro farm- 

 era in easy circumstances, residing westerly of 

 Lake Chaniplain, to wliicli country they were pi- 

 oneers. 



Ksq. Boardman and liis son Iiave this season tlie 

 sowing of five bushels of wheat, which was reap- 

 ing the day ho left home, and is very fine ; it h?3 

 neither blight nor weavil. He says the crop of 

 wheat will furnish abundance of bread for the two 

 families, should all other crops of grain fail. A 

 porticm of this wheat is raised on pasture ground, 

 broken up the previous fall without a particle of 

 manure, other than the droppings of the cattle, hav- 

 ing been applied for years. On the same gronnd 

 e.vcellent potatoes arc raised : he informs us that 

 the potatoes there have not been at all aflectcd 

 with rnst and blight as they have been on all the 

 lower grounds in this vicinity. The experience 

 of the three last years has demonstrated that on the 

 high grounds of this State, wheal is a more sure 

 crop than any other ground. A fact, which much 

 raises the value of the most elevated lands of New 

 Hampshire, was mentioned by Mr. B : he says the 

 frost does not strike the crops so soon by a month 

 on his farm, as they do frequently on the low 

 grounds upon the river. 



Whether we take into the account long life, 

 health and muscular strength, the productiveness of 

 the soil, the social ties of relationsliip and neinrh- 

 borhood, the means of ministering to every want, 

 the ample provision made for the education of 

 youth, as well as for moral and religious instruc- 

 tion — the pleasures of the winter fire-side, or the 

 holiday enjoyments of a milder spring, summer and 

 autumn, — there is no region of the world more in- 

 viting than the thoueand hills of New Hampshire, 

 extending to an elevation from one hundred to two 

 thousand feet above the beds of the two great riv- 

 ers which meander in its whole extent of nearly 

 two hundred miles north and south. The octoge- 

 narians and centenarians of the revolution who 

 live to enjoy that bounty of the nation, of which 

 they were deprived at the time of service by the 

 general poverty, and which was never realized by 

 thousands who died before the Legislature made 

 tlie provision ; these men and women are livirnr 

 witnesses to the value of New England soil, the 

 charms of New England society, and the bles- 

 sings of New England habits. 



A profitable and safe investment of sur- 

 plus money. 



The Hon. Daniel Abbot has sent us the report 

 of the first operations of the first Rail Kmid in 

 A'cio Humpshirc, being the Rail Road, ex- 

 tending fifteen miles from Lowell Ms. up 

 the valley of the Merrimack in a direction 

 nearly central in tlie State. The original estimate 

 of the cost of this road was !i(id80,000 ; its actual 

 cost was $360,000. It is reniarkable that in al- 

 most every instance the cost of rail roads has ex- 

 ceeded the estimate. The directors of the Nashua 

 and Lowell road present a good excuse for their 

 excess in the facts, that the road was elevated 

 three feet above the first calculation, requiring 

 more excavation and embanUment ; that they were 

 obliged to expend a large sum in an extra bank 

 wall on the river at Tyngsborough ; that the land 

 damages present an enormous excess of $:>0,000 ; 

 that the weight and expense of the imported iron 

 rails were above the estimate and order ; and that 

 they have purchased an additional locomotive, and 

 cars, and constructed more extensive depots 

 While the cost of the Liverpool and Manchester 

 rail road, was $150,000; the Boston and Lowell 

 $(30,000 ; the Boston and Salem 40,000 ; the Bos- 

 ton and Worcester 37,000 ; the Boston and Provi- 

 dence 43,000 ; the road west from Worcester 34,- 

 000; the Directors of the Nashua road say their 

 whole expense, including locomotives, cars and de- 

 pots, has been only 2.5,0u0 dollars a mile. 



The number of passengers on this road has far 

 exceeded the original estimate — the quantity of 

 freight transported has been less. The daily re- 

 ceipts on the road for the first three months, from 

 Oct. 1838, to Jan. 1839, averaged $83,75 : the dai- 

 ly receipts from the 1st to the 8th August, 183!>, 

 had risen to an average of $138,62. From the 

 opening of the road on the 8th of October, ten 

 months, the engines have run over 30,000 miles, 

 carrying more than 58,000 passengers, and 8000 

 tons of merchandize, and making over 1000 regu- 

 lar trips. "iN'ot a trip has been lost, (says the Re- 

 port) from any cause, nor has the slightest acci- 

 dent happened to any passenger or passemrer car." 

 The receipts of tlie road for the ten months were 

 $24,080 13; the expenses for the same period 

 were $14,500— leaving as profits $9,.580 13. The 

 Directors made a first dividend of 3 per cent, $7,- 

 500, and retain a balance in the treasury of $3,220 



49, as a fund to meet "contingencies and general 

 depreciation." 



The amount of stock subscribed and paid up to 

 May 29, 1839, was 2500 shares or $250,000. $50,- 

 000 was loaned to the company by the Len-islaturc 

 of Massachusetts on a stock of five per cent, for re- 

 embursng which other $50,000 \n railroad sto.:k was 

 created and pledged, wliieh pledge the report says 

 will undoubtedly pay tiie loan and probably com- 

 mand a premium. An additional stock "of 500 

 shares or $50,000 was voted to meet the additional 

 cost of the road, which was at once taken up, and 

 applications made for even a larger amount. Ths 

 fact demonstrates the abundant success of the en- 

 terprise. 



The Nashua and Lowell rail road is almost ex- 

 clusively tlio fruit of the enterprise of citizens of 

 New Hampshire : it was at first treated with jeal- 

 ousy by the rich owners of the Lowell rail road be- 

 low. A large portion of the stock was originally 

 taken and carried through in small sums by farmers 

 and others in Old Hillsborough. We heard of o^e 

 gentleman in Lyndeborough, who made an invest- 

 ment of .$2500 in spare cash on this road, who has 

 sold out his stock and received a handsome premi- 

 um beyond the principal, and six per cent, interest 

 on the investment. 



There can be no doubt that a rail road, through 

 the whole extent of central New Hampshire up the 

 Merrimack river, will succeed. The farmers who 

 may invest their 10(1 to 1000 and even 5000 dollars, 

 will be more sure of a permanently valuable stock, 

 than to invest in banks, or almost any thint"- else. 

 The complete success of the Nashua road, being 

 the first fifteen miles from Lowell on the way" 

 pl-oves the position. This route, unlike almost ev- 

 ery other route, must forever remain without com- 

 petition, either to the right or left : it is destined to 

 pour through its avenue in a constantly increasing 

 volume, the constantly increasing products of a 

 soil and population, to whose multiplication there 

 are at present no defined bounds. 



The rail road above Nashua to Concord, about 

 twice the distance from Lowell to Nashua, may be 

 constructed, and the apparatus furnished at an ex- 

 pense certainly not exceeding twenty thousand 

 dollars a mile. There is abundant wealth in the 

 ownersof the land twenty miles on either hand 

 from the beginning to the termination of this dis- 

 tance, whose real estate will be raised in value at 

 once more than double the cost of the road ; there 

 is abundant ability in its immediate neighborhood, 

 if all who are able will take hold as one man, to con- 

 struct this road without feeling the inconvenience. 



Now let us look around us, and inquire into this 

 ability. Forty years ago nineteen in every twen- 

 ty of our farmers were in debt : at this time in 

 many towns there is hardly one farmer in twenty 

 who is not only out of debt, but has cash capital to 

 spare. Forty years ago turnpike roads were com- 

 menced and carried on in almost every direction in 

 New Hampshire : these were generally made on 

 the principle of shortening distances solely, and 

 passed over hills to get by villages, or the doors of 

 largel andholders.As travelled roads profitable ttrthe 

 proprietors they have not succeeded ; although the 

 experiment has been of great benefit in spurring 

 the public to competition, and thereby improving 

 the free roads. The turnpike roads in New Hamp- 

 shire built thirty and forty years airo, cost 

 their proprietors on an average at least two thou- 

 sand dollars a mile, jis much enterprise at this 

 time would enable the people of JYew liampsliire to 

 construct an equal ilistance of rail roads at an aver- 

 age expense uf twenhj thousand dollars the mile. 

 The surplus capital, and of consequence the a- 

 bility of the owners of the soil in this State, is at 

 least ten times as great as it was forty years ago. 



There is no reason in the world why the shrewd 

 calculating men of central New Hampshire should 

 hesitate to embark in the business of extending 

 the rail road from Nashua up the Merrimack river 

 valley. Carried to any depot upon this road, every 

 production of their farms will at once possess an 

 advantage equal to that of the garden farms from 

 six to ten miles out of Boston or Salem. In the 

 freight cars their pigs, calves and lambs, their cat- 

 tle,sheep,hogs, and poultry, either alive or slaugh- 

 tered — their butter, cheese and eggs, their grain 

 and garden vegetables, fresh as when taken from 

 the cellar or dairy room, or field or granary — 

 may in six hours time be upon the market stalls of 

 our cities. So in return we can obtain fish and the 

 various products of the sea, or early rarities from 

 the South, as fresh as they are obtaiiied in the sea- 

 board markets. *^ 



The Directors of the Nashua rail road say the 

 usual price of transport (water) from that place to 

 Boston was $3 per ton in summer, and $6 by land 

 in winter : tlie present rail roid price is $2,50 in 



Slimmer, and $3 in winter, making a difference of 

 f.J per ton in the one case, and fifty cent.i in the 

 other. The passenger fare to Boston by this rail 

 road has been reduced 50 cents. The saving thus 

 cifected in the pockets of the people on 10,000 tons 

 of freight in summer, and 5000 tons in winter and 

 70,000 passengers, will he not less than $30,000 an- 

 nually. 



In every view in which a central road through the 

 Oranitc .State can be presented, the inducement is 

 to go forward. There can be no mistake about 

 it : the farmers are the class fii people most interes- 

 ted in this enterprise— the farmers possess abun- 

 dant ability, wthoutthe trammelling of State pro 

 tection or State loans, to move— the fanners outrht 

 to control and direct these, and al] other great fra- 

 provements, which rai-se the value of every inch 

 of their ground; and the farmers will ere long 

 perceive, as with one eye and one mind, the bene- 

 fits that may result froni the concentration of their 

 well directed efforts. 



The intelligent proprietors of the Nashua road 

 will at a glance peiceive that they have no less in- 

 terest in stretching their road northward up the 

 valley, than the shrewd projector of the Andover 

 branch rail road had in extending that branch from 

 Andover to Haverhill, Ms., and subsequently to 

 Exeter and Dover. Principalhj by the farmers on 

 the irinj li.is tlie road been neirri ,j completed the first 

 fifteen milcsfroyn Haccrhill to Exeter ; and the next 

 season will do as much at least between Exeter 

 and Dover ; so that in one ye.ar from next spring, 

 the rail road from Dover and Boston will be in op- 

 eration. The people below on the Merrimack do 

 not calculate how much travel and business will 

 be turned from them by the earlier completion of 

 the rail road up to Dover : should the contempla- 

 ted road up the Merrimack valley be delayed five 

 years, one half the not profits of the Nashua road 

 for that time will be diverted from them. 



High prices of Cattle. 



While writing at our desk soon after sunrise, 

 we are called to the butcher's cart : the pork bar- 

 rel still remains, which, with baked beans on Sun- 

 day, and fine dun codfish on Saturday, is the most 

 healthful and the most palatable resort: but our 

 working men must have fresh meat twice if not 

 thrice a week. Ten cents a pound for a roasting 

 piece (at least one third bone) from the surloin of 

 a two-year old heifer is a higher price than any 

 man who does not raise heifers to sell can afford 

 to give; yet oh this ninth day of September, the 

 season when beef is more plenty and cheap than 

 any other time of year, ten cents a pound is the 

 cash price for tlie better piece of beef from a young 

 hoifer ; — this price is equivalent to at least fourteen 

 cents the pound of a first rate fat ox. 



The butcher tells us he pays six dollars a hun- 

 dred for the most ordinary young cattle fit for the 

 knife. A yoke of five year old working cattle sold 

 in this town the other day, for one hundred and 

 forty dollars ! Last fall w^e purchased six ordinary 

 calves of the preyiou.-i spring, for which we paid 

 nine dollars each — this was then a matter of won- 

 der to some of our astute and experienced neigh- 

 bors v>'ho had none to sell, but who thought five 

 or six dollars an enormous price : at any rate we 

 had the comfort of daily feeding them through the 

 winter, and seeing them grow upon ruta^baga, 

 with such a personal attachment as induced them 

 to follow and surround us whenever we visited the 

 yard. These six calves cost but little for their 

 keeping beyond the pleasures of attending them, 

 for besides the ruti baga they lived almosrexclu- 

 sively on the waste hay and corn stalks left by the 

 larger cattle ; and since the first of May they have 

 been pastured on Kearsarge at the price of one dol- 

 lar the head for the entire season. Now these 

 calves will be worth when they return, at least 

 sixteen dollars each ; and there are of the number 

 a finely mated yoke of steers and a heifer, for 

 whicli, if they have done as well during the sum- 

 mer, as they did in the winter, we would refuse 

 twenty dollars each. We have ingreat plenty just 

 the kind of keeping for this and our other stock of 

 young cattle during the winter. ]f the value of 

 these creatures shall be kept up until they are four 

 years old, we shall have two fine yokes of o.ven, 

 the one worth one hundred and ten or twenty dol- 

 lars the yokej find- two cows with their calves at 

 the value of from forty to fitly dollars each. The 

 priceqf the purchase and the cost of keepino- will 

 not exceed half the sum. Now although the°read- 

 er may smile at our imaginary happiness, as the 

 practical illustration of the fable of the maid with 

 her jiail of milk upon her head, he will confess that 

 there is something of reality in the anticipated 

 profits which the fanner enjoys in the growth of his 

 stock of cattle.j 



