TPIE FARMER. 89 



new-born and fervid, awaken and i-einforce the intellect, raise 

 up character, enlarge the whole man. 



In the summer of last year, when the recruiting for the volun- 

 teer regiments was in progress, spending some weeks in one of 

 our interior counties, I had occasion to attend meetings — town 

 meetings, mass meetings — in several small farming towns — 

 meetings called for promoting enlistments. The fires of pat- 

 riotic ardor had reached them, and were all ablaze. The people, 

 nearly all farmers, had risen up into sympathy with the gran- 

 deur of the time. And there was no faltering or halting in the 

 determination to meet the cri.sis like men. The cowardly and 

 half-hearted, the disloyal, the fault-finding, the abettors of 

 treason, the advocate of base surrender, and of that peace-at- 

 ahy-price, which is but the inauguration of eternal strife — 

 men more anxious to save a party than to save their country — 

 and so could make a mock of that country's perils and dis- 

 tresses, — such men, if such there are in such communities, and 

 I think there are fewer of them there than almost any where 

 else, were not present at those meetings, or, if present, they 

 slunk away, into corners, sullen and silent, unheeded and alone. 

 But the sacred demands of the time found abundant voice. 



Men all unused to public speech, more accustomed to address 

 their flocks and herds, than assemblies of men, had their tongues 

 loosed, as by the forked flames of a new Pentecost, and spoke 

 with a sublime and touching eloquence, although they knew it 

 not for eloquence, because of its simplicity. Hands, hard and 

 stiff from the plough and scythe, and looking little fit for such 

 an office, were stretched out in effective appeal. They told the 

 story of the fathers, what they did and suffered in the Revolu- 

 tion. They spoke of the immeasurable value of the Union, 

 the Government, and the Constitution, how it was worth all 

 the blood or treasure we could pay for it. They voted their 

 money — little enough they had, and hard-earned — voted it 

 freely as water. They called on their young men to take up 

 arms. Old men cheered their sons, as they walked up to sign 

 the roll. In more than a single instance I saw an old farmer 

 bent with years and toil, with weeping and trembling speech, 

 bid his only son God-speed, though it was his all, his only stay 

 and staff, needful enough to him in tiie hard winter of his age 

 and his poverty. 



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