DEVOTED TO AGRICULTURE AND ITS KINDKED ARTS AND SCIENCES. 



VOL. XL 



BOSTON, APRIL, 1859. 



NO. 4. 



JOEL NOURSE, Proprietor. 

 Office. ..34 Merchants Row. 



SIMON BROWN, EDITOR. 



FRED'K HOLBROOK, > Associate 

 HENRY F. FRENCH, \ Editors, 



CALENDAR FOR APRIL. 



'Tis the glorious Spring, as she passes along, 



With her eye of light and her lip of song, 



While she steals in peace o'er the green earth's breast; 



While the streams spring out from their icy rest, 



The buds bend low to the breezes' sigh. 



And their breath goes forth to the scented sky ; 



Where the fields look fresh in their sweet repose, 



And the young dews sleep on the new-born rose. 



RIL ushers in the 

 round of Months 

 in which the farmer 

 finds the duties of 

 'his occupation the 

 most pressing. — 

 The ice and snow 

 has mainly disap- 

 peared, cold winds 

 are tempered by 

 blowing in to us 

 from milder regions, and 

 the earth, warmed and sof- 

 tened by longer visits from 

 the sun, unlocks itself and 

 grows light, and porous and ge- 

 nial, inviting the husbandman to 

 scatter his seed in generous hope, 

 and wait in the same spirit for 

 the fruition of the Harvest, — cultivating 

 in the meantime with diligent and assid- 

 uous care. 

 In sunny and sheltered places, the earth as- 

 sumes her wonted green, and fresh flowers un- 

 fold themselves, look out into the peaceful glen 

 where they were born, bathe in the warm rays 

 of the sun, and shed their rich fragrance all 

 around the place of their nativity. And though 

 all alone, they bud and bloom, and exhale their 

 sweet odors, and perform all their duty, just as 

 precisely as though cultivated and tended with 

 unremitting care, in a well designed and expen- 

 sive garden. 



As the sun takes a broader sweep over the 

 earth, its rays penetrate the soil, impart unusual 



warmth and cause free evaporation ; the cold sur- 

 face water is thus taken up and scattered abroad, 

 returning in gentle rains filled with the elements 

 of fertility which they have sifted from the at- 

 mosphere, and which now find their way down 

 the light and porous soil to supply the roots of 

 plants which are about ready to commence their 

 new work for the year. Vegetable life is re- 

 animated, and shows returning signs of vigor 

 and activity everywhere. The buds are swollen, 

 and the tree tops thickened up long before leaves 

 or blossoms have shown themselves. 



And so it is in the animal kingdom. The birds, 

 our last summer friends, begin to return ; the 

 Warbling Sparrow began his cheerful songs in 

 March, singing all through the middle of the 

 day in the piles of brush, and gathering its in- 

 sect food from the rough bark of the wood. The 

 Blue Jay screams from the tall elm, while the 

 Crow, poised on the topmost shoot of a hundred 

 foot pine, calls to his fellows in the distant wood, 

 to come and partake with him of a breakfast 

 which he has just discovered. The Bluebird, 

 every morning, looks into the boxes in the gar- 

 den, and seems to take into grave consideration 

 the expediency of domiciliating herself another 

 summer in the old quarters, — while the Robin 

 flits from tree to tree, lifting a straw from this 

 old nest and a twig from that, and then pouncing 

 upon some hapless worm that shows its head 

 above the surface for a moment's sun. 



Mr. Beecher has been a close observer of the 

 varying seasons, and makes a capital application 

 of what he has seen. He says : — 



"April ! The singing month. Many voices 

 of many birds call for resurrection over the graves 

 of flowers, and they come forth. Go, see what 

 they have lost. What have ice and snow, and 

 storm done unto them ? How did they fall into 

 the earth, stripped and bare ? How do they come 

 forth opening and glorified ? Is it, then, so fear- 

 ful a thing to be in the grave ? 



"In its wild career, shaking and scourged of 



