216 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



ants, "Flowers are curses, young gals will stick 'em into the 

 ground, and afore they are big enough to make butter or weed 

 onions, the paltry yellow and red, and speckled blossoms will be 

 peppered like Canada thistles, all over the garden patch, and whole 

 home lot." But Hodge, with all his hostility to flowers, does not 

 receive larger profits than his neighbor, whose grapery and tomato- 

 bed, and fowl-yard, and hive-house, increase his cash as much as 

 they add to the beauty of his premises, although their mutual ar- 

 rangement amid roses and dahlias have the appearance of a mere 

 pleasure garden. Hodge will have to look for his children, bye and 

 bye in some city, while the latter family mentioned will only have 

 remained, like the people of the apiary, to occupy and adorn con- 

 tiguous homes, and give to the whole neighborhood the aspect and 

 fragrance which enchanted their young years. "When we look at 

 the utter want of regard to the id-ea of rendering agriculture at- 

 tractive in our common school arrangements, we must cease to 

 wonder that there is so much migration from our favored State. 

 We call it the spirit of adventure. Is it not, in part at least, the 

 spirit of disgust? How, then, shall a change be brought about? 



After fifty years the same question confronts us, and its 

 solution, which Mr. Stone sought in proper education of 

 the young, is, if anything, even more imperative now 7 than 

 it was then. 



Hod«;e has lono- been seeking: in the cities for his chil- 

 dren, but lo, they are not. Our vital statistics are much 

 complicated by foreign immigration ; but it is probably 

 safe to say that among our strictly New England popula- 

 tion there are more deaths than births. We often hear 

 France alluded to in this connection, but official statistics 

 for New Hampshire, 1892, show that to every 1,000 in- 

 habitants there are 19.1 births and 20.1 deaths. In France 

 the ratio is 22.1 births to 22.6 deaths. As a whole the 

 New England States stand third lowest anions; the nations 

 of the earth. The birth rate is 24.9 per 1,000 population. 

 France has a birth rate per 1,000 of 22.1; Ireland, 22.4; 

 Germany, 35.7; Hungary, 40.3. Despite her lower death 

 rate, New England also stands third lowest in increase of 

 population from this vital source. From strong families 

 of from six to twelve children we have dropped in a single 

 generation to families of one, two or none ; so that writers 



