102 QUARTERLY JOURNAL. 



mers, who are not ready to frame a theory from one isolated fact, 

 are the persons to whom we must look to find out the cause. It 

 has been said that the disease was imported from Europe to this 

 country. If so, perhaps it was brought over for us to detect the 

 cause, and cure it and send it back. 



The only remedy we have seen recommended as proving effect- 

 ual, is a small quantity of lime thrown into the hill. 



Wampanuxet, Dec. 19, 1844. • 



FARMER'S CLUBS. 



During the long evenings of winter, the farmer may find much 

 time for mental improvement. We have often thought how much 

 time is wasted that might be used in profitable cultivation of the 

 mind. If every evening were employed in examining and learn- 

 ing one new idea only, it would amount in one year to three hun- 

 dred and sixty-five — and that is more new ideas than will often be 

 found in a whole book ; or in the active years of a man's life, from 

 five years old to fifty-five, he could number no less than 18,250 

 new ideas ; and this supposing he learns only one a day. But 

 when it is remembered that one thought is the father of a multi- 

 tude, and the more the mind knows the more its capacity is in- 

 creased, we may take it as settled, that in the ordinary days of a 

 man's life, an amount of knowledge beyond computation may be 

 acquired if only our leisure time is profitably occupied alone. But 

 by interchanging our ideas with each other, we are furnished with 

 another aid in acquiring knowledge. 



There is probably no one way in which so much has been done 

 "for the improvement of farming, as by farmer's clubs. Wherever 

 they have been established in this country, they have given a new 

 life and interest to the business. But in Great Britain they are 

 laying the foundation of a total revolution in the condition of the 

 tillers of the soil. An idea is generally prevalent, that in that 

 island the large landlords are the persons who take the lead in 

 these meetings. To a degree this is true. Yet, if any one will read 

 the foreign Agricultural Journals, he will see that the tenantry are 



