HAMPDEN SOCIETY. 225 



HAMPDEN COUNTY AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



The accompanying reports of this society will show an in- 

 crease of interest on the part of its members, over former years. 

 We trnst a disposition has been awakened, to bring the farmers' 

 true interests more directly before them, so that they may be 

 assured that their interests do not simply consist in rearing 

 stock and gathering harvests, but also in part, in free and friend- 

 ly intercourse with their neighbors, and in learning from the 

 different towns of their county, and the different counties of 

 the State, what is doing to advance agriculture. We some- 

 times hear the young farmer complain that his work is drudge- 

 ry, and often unpleasant, while that of the clerk in a store is 

 one of ease and pleasure. But a few days' experience behind 

 the counter, may satisfy him that there is no independence like 

 that of the farmer ; that there is no occupation that will allow 

 a man to control his time, as will the occupation of tilling the 

 soil. There is no pursuit in which man may see so much of 

 nature, and learn so much of nature's God, as he may see and 

 learn from roaming the fields, gathering the golden corn, plucking 

 the delicious fruits, or witnessing the wonderful effect upon the 

 products of the earth, of the sun and rain, day and night, cold 

 and heat, the Creator's agents for good to man. Every blade 

 of corn that springs from the earth, is a renewal of the promise, 

 that " seed time and harvest shall not fail." And while the 

 farmer's business may lead him to depend upon many other 

 trades and professions, still there is no man independent of the 

 producer ; next to the great Creator, he is the sustainer of life, 

 and may, if he will, exert a controlling power over the world. 

 The subject of agriculture, which is attracting so much at- 

 tention in every part of our country, is worthy the attention , 

 not only of the tiller of the soil, but of the statesman and phi- 

 lanthropist, and it must ere long receive that consideration from 

 our national government, which its importance demands. We 

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