THE FARMER'S MONTHLY VISITOR. 



166 



For tlie Farmuv's Monthly Visitor. 



The Husbandman's Harvest Hymn. 



Father of Light ! entlu'on'd above, 

 Thv bounteous hand is open still j 

 Tliy kindness and paternal love 

 With harvest Truit our garners fill. 



No blight nor drought hath chill'd the heart, 

 Or ftll'd our bosoms with despair; 

 Hut thou in kindness didst impart 

 Thy blessing to reward our care. 



Ani 710IW, '.vith glowing hearts we haste 

 To bow in suppliance to Thee ; — 

 To thank thee for thy mercies past, 

 And lowly bend the willing knee. 



O ! may thy goodness warm the heart 

 With pure devotion's sacred fire ; — 

 Bid every anxious fear depart, 

 And witl) new zeal our souls inspire. 



' Our Father!' — what a gracious name 

 By whicli tliou deignest to be known — 

 How the heart kindles to a fiame 

 For all thy loving kindness eliown. 



Upon onr heads thy mercies rest 

 Like sunsliine on tl]e ' sobbing seaj' 

 While we with sin's dark stains oppress'd, 

 Turn with repentant heart to Thee. 



O Father ! help us so to live 

 That we thy iavonr may secure : 

 Our wanderings from thy ways forgive. 

 And bid us /jo and sin no more. S. C. 



Dorchester, Nov. 12, 13-tO. 



Picarooning. 



If there is any difleicnce of grade in thieving, 

 the most meun and despicable kind is that of roh- 

 liiiig gardens and orchards. And yet it is practised 

 by ninny who consider themselves respectable 

 and would resent being called a thief as the high- 

 e.st of insults. They are a sort of land pirate — 

 Picaroons — harpies who would snatch from oth- 

 ers what they were too lazy to grow for them- 

 selves. 



The fruit or articles purloined may not be par- 

 ticularly needed by the light fingered gentry who 

 purloin them, and yet the loss of them be severely 

 iclt by the real owners. A farmer takes pains lo 

 raise a tree — to send to a distance and obtain a 

 choice variety of fruit : he nurses and watches it 

 day after day and protects it summer and winter, 

 and at length it puts forth blossoms and a few 

 specimens of the fruit begin to grow. He looks 

 forward with ple.nsine to the consunnnation of 

 his labors, and the rewai-d of his care and atten- 

 tention ; at any rate he thinks he will soon be able 

 to test the accuracy and result of his choice and 

 know lor certainty what ho has been rearing with 

 so much solicitude. 



Now the fruit itself — no matter what it be — 

 whether aj'ples — jilums — pears or any thing else, 

 may not be worth in the market three cents, aud 

 yet to the owner it has a value not to be measured 

 by dollars and cents. Very well, they are nearly 

 ripe, when along come some of these locifing 

 7iuisances and (brthwilh strip the tree. 



Remonstrate with them and they will laugh in 

 your face — talk of prosecuting and they are actu- 

 ally astonished tliiit you should " tnahe such a fuss" 

 for two or tlirec apples. HhaVs two orlhrte apples! 

 and that's all the consolation you get. We had 

 rather a man would take us by the throat and rob 

 us of our watch, ])ocket book or coat, than creep 

 round oiu- preniises like a skunk in a hen coop, 

 picking off this or that little thing — apple, melon, 

 or berry, and then be so confoimdcdly astounded 

 if you .-'ay any thing against it. In the former case 

 there is courage and decision aboiU it which may 

 give it the semblance of no small deed, but in the 

 latter, there is not a single redeeming circum- 

 stance — nothing to give it the shadow of a shade 

 of respectability or decency. It is sinking down 

 on a level with the crawling reptile — nay, below 

 even that, for the reptile may plead of reason and 

 himger for excuse, but the Picaroon has neither 

 of these to plead in extenuation of his nasty, 

 sneaking, contemptible acts. — Maine Farmer. 



inent |)ublislied in the newspapers of upwards of 

 two millions, as compared with the official report ; 

 the newspaper report making the amount of im- 

 ports from other places than India and China $21,- 

 350,6(i9 ; and the official report making the same 

 item $18,685,295. 



Silks from India and China, piece goods, 



$1,738,509 

 do do do sewings 50,650 



do sewings from other places 



thair India, &c. 818,284 



do raw silk 39,258 



do from other places than India, 

 &c., laee, veils, shawls, 

 shades, &c. 354,490 



do other manufactures from oth- 

 er places than India, &c. 18,685,295 

 Manufactures of silk and worsted, 82,- 

 319,883, (allowing one-half the va- 

 lue thereof to be silk,) 1,159,943 



,Sa2,&38,628 

 Compared with other articles imported, that of 

 silk is one-fourth more than the amoimt of any 

 other. The amotint of manufactures of cotton 

 imported was .$14,692,397; of iron, .$12,051,668; 

 of cloths and cassimeres, .$7,078,906 ; worsted 

 stnfTs, $7,025,898 ; other manufactures of wool, 

 .$3,.567,16l ; one half the value of silk and worsted 

 stuffs, $1,167,942; total woolen goods, $18,831,900. 

 The importations of sugar amounted to .$9,924,- 

 632 ; linen, $6,931,278. So that the importation 

 of silk is nearly equal to that of woollen and linen 

 together, and is equal to half of all other fabrics 

 combined. Need we say a word as to the import- 

 ance of .caving this immense expenditure to the 

 nation, now tliat it is established I cyond all ques- 

 tion that we are more capable of producing the 

 article of silk om-selves than any other country ? 

 — Journal of the Am. Silk Society. 



It IS tndy jiainfid to reflect that the importation 

 of silk comes directly in competition with the 

 manufiictiu'o of cotton in this country. Will it 

 not be both just and expedient, as well for the fur- 

 therance of all laudable efforts to produce silk in 

 this country as to protect other manufactures, that 

 in a future adjustment of the Tariff the tax on im- 

 ported silks should be at le.ist equal to the ta.x on 

 imported cottons and woollens.' — Ed. M. Visitor. 



Importation of Silk. 



The importation of silk during the year ending 

 30ih of Seplf-mher, 1839, amounted to nearly 

 twenty-three millionsof dollars, as will he seen by 

 the following items copied from the report of the 

 fiecretary of the Treasni-y of the commerce and 

 navigation of the United States for that year, 

 which has been politely sent ub by the secretary 

 of the Treasnrv, There is an error in the stnte- 



The Insane Hospital at Worcester, Ittass. 



A SEW VIEW OF INSAMTY. 



There can be conceived no object of more no- 

 ble charity than tlie institiuions for the meliora- 

 tion I f the condition of the insane. Indeed in the 

 institution of governiTient, one of the first objects 

 for which the mass of the coinniunity shotdd he 

 boiuul to contribute would be for the comfort 

 and support of that i)ortion of humauity which, 

 from any cause, is bereft of reason. Insanity oi^en 

 assiunes the appearance of vice ; and from this 

 cause the world has imputed as a sin in the iiuli- 

 vidual what was his misfortune and not his crime. 

 A hereditary predisposition for insanity has some- 

 times given a family in its successive generations 

 the character of one or more prevailing vices ; and 

 it is possiUe that a diffisrent degree of insanity 

 may liave tinged or led to a cast of character the 

 veiy reverse of vice. The disease of insanity is 

 perhaps less understood than almost any other 

 disease to which the hiunan system is liable — it is 

 a disease with both moral and physical affinities. 

 It appears in so many shapes — there are so many 

 diflereut degrees of the same species of insanity, 

 leading to such a diversity of action and propen- 

 sitv, that the study and experience of the life of 

 any single individual will enable him to contri- 

 bute the addition of a mite towards developing 

 the causes of the disease and the remedies for its 

 cm-e. 



We have reason to believe that no man in this 

 country has done more towards perfecting the 

 best system for treating the insane than Doct. S. B. 

 WooDW.iRD, the principal and superintendent of 

 the State Hospital at Worcester, Massachusetts. 

 The world, we think, is growing wiser in relation 

 to both education and government. The severer 

 discipline is giving place to a njilder regime. It 

 is found that we may better lead our children un- 

 der the influence of moral suasioti than drive 

 them into virtue and the practice of honesty by 

 the force of frequent flagellation. The rod may 

 not be spared in extreme cases, but never should 

 I he jtsed when milder remedies mav be made to 



efl'ect the same object. So it will be found that 

 the best objects of civil government are answered 

 by the certainty rather than the seventy of inflic- 

 tion for breach of the laws, and that the commu- 

 nity in which the mildest remedies for crime are 

 applied has the less occasion for their use. 



This principle ims been carried out to a great 

 extent by Doct. AVoodward in the management of 

 the Insane Hospital at Worcester. We have wit- 

 nessed with great pleasure the progress of that 

 Institution din'ing the last few years. The most 

 miserable condition of humanity is that where the 

 subject is bereft of reason. If one person, situated 

 3t the mercy of the winds and waves, without 

 compass or chart to direct that immortal faculty 

 ivhich distinguishes man from the brute, produces 

 so great trouble as not only to destroy the peace 

 of families and neighborhoods, making him the 

 object of concern and terror to others, as he is of 

 discomfort and even agony to himself; what must 

 we think of tens and hundreds of maniacs col- 

 lected in one spot, and breught into frequent con- 

 tact with each other? 



THE INSANE MADE RATIONAL AND CAPABLE OF 

 TAKING CARE OF EACH OTHER. 



On the fourteenth of October we last visited 

 (he Insane Hospital at Worcester. More than 

 three hundred persons at that time were in that 

 asyhun laboring under different degrees of insan- 

 ity, fiom the homicide to the most inoffensive of 

 the human species. It was the remark of a visi- 

 tor present who had spent some days there, that 

 it would be difficult to find any community of an 

 equal number associating with each other where 

 more rational enjoyment wouhl be realized than 

 at this asylum. The fact struck us then as it had 

 struck us before, that instead of one insane person 

 being an annoyance to another, the different de- 

 grees of the disorder were calculated to give em- 

 ployment to the insane on one point in looking 

 after and preventing iujin-ies of some one insane 

 on a different point, so that the insanity of the 

 first was changed for the time or lost in the pre- 

 ponderance of the rational faculties. Within the 

 last three or four years, public social worship has 

 been introduced as an exercise of the insane pa- 

 tients at Worcester ; and with the exception of 

 some half a dozen maniacs whom for the time it 

 was necessary to restrain three hundred and more 

 of these attend at the chapel constructed for the 

 ])urpose, and either unite in the devotions or listen 

 as spectators, with scarcely less decorum than so 

 many of the rational part of mankind in a com- 

 mon church. Of the religious exercises, sacred 

 music has a peculiarly soothing effect upon the 

 attendants. 



The value of the course of treatment at the 

 Worcester asyhun is found in the speedy cures of 

 a very large portion of the cases of insanity of re- 

 cent origin, and the incomparably greater com- 

 fort of those who from the long continuance of 

 the disease are in most cases incurable. Here 

 the incurable ))aticnt, who is miserable else- 

 where, who is either confined in a cage or by 

 chains in some solitary apartment, enjoys compa- 

 rative contentment and comfort under the system 

 of management which leaves them to their own 

 volition where that is not of obvious injurious 



tendency. 

 AGRICULTURF. AT THE WORCESTER HOSPITAL. 



Our object in introducing the Insane Hospital 

 here was with the view of bringing to the public 

 attention the excellent management of the lands 

 belonging to the Asyhun for purjioses of agricul- 

 ture and horticidture. The institution, by purchase 

 at different periods, has at this time sixty acres of 

 land. Seventeen acres of this land is a garden 

 or field fronting and near the principal buildings. 

 These seventeen acres produce as much probably 

 as any other seventeen acres in the county of 

 Worcester. The land is naturally very ii-ee and 

 fertile, of a kind that will produce the largest crop 

 when well cultivated, and retaining all the strength 

 of manure put it upon it after it becomes incor- 

 |)orated with the soil. Upon thirly-fwo square 

 rods of this land were, this year, produced 125 

 bushels of onions. On these seventeen acres 

 from two to three thousand busliels of roots, such 

 as ruta bnga and English turnips, carrots, beets, 

 &c. are annually raised. A part of the same 

 ground is planted annually with potatoes. 



Three years ago there was purchased a side 

 hill lot more than a half mile distant of gome 

 twentv-five ncres. as forbidding in appearance as 



