552 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Dec. 



•when this Lombardy Poplar's history shall be 

 forgotten. Then, should it be felled, to serve do- 

 mestic purposes, woe to the carpenter's axe and 

 saw ! They will have hard work when they shall 

 have penetrated into the interior of the tree. 



From this brief account, the admirer of trees 

 may learn that it may be in his power to do won- 

 ders with them in their hour of accident, provid- 

 ed that he goes the right way to work, and lets 

 Dame Nature have her own wise course. A lof- 

 ty and majestic tree is a jewel of inestimable 

 beauty on a villa's lawn, and is worthy of the 

 owner's utmost care. — Charles Waterton, Walton 

 Hall, in Horticulturist. 



INFLUENCE OF BUBAL LIFE. 



The following just and eloquent remarks we 

 quote from the Address of Henry F. Durant, 

 Esq., of Boston, delivered before the Norfolk 

 County Agricultural Society, Sept. 29, 1859. 

 Mr. D. said : 



He did not come here to attempt any instruc- 

 tion in agriculture. But there was a common 

 ground where we could all meet and learn some- 

 thing from each other. Other lessons might be 

 learned in the green fields, than the best mode 

 of raising crops. Education in the widest sense 

 was the great end and mystery of life. We were 

 here to unfold and educate ourselves — to find the 

 development of heart as well as of brain, of the 

 affections and the moral nature. In the country 

 might such an education be the most usefully 

 obtained. 



He first spoke of the democratic aspect of ru- 

 ral life, of the happiness, the necessity, the dig- 

 nity of labor, and its tendency to elevate the 

 mind as well as to secure competence. Labor 

 was the law of our being. Its results were fixed 

 in the Almighty decrees. Sunrise and sunset, 

 winter and summer, were not more sure than the 

 results which waited upon the footsteps of strong 

 endeavor. The law of "no work, no wages," 

 should be to us a source of deepest gratitude. 

 The New England farmer should be peculiarly 

 grateful for the hard soil which he finds in this 

 section of the land — calling forth those eff"orts 

 which, under the guidance of Christianity, have 

 elevated him high up in the lists of true manhood. 



Rural life had its lessons for the heart and the 

 affections. In the city, men hardly knew the 

 names of their next door neighbors ; in the coun- 

 try, though half a mile apart, men were neigh- 

 bors. Country life taught men the value of sym- 

 pathy and of society. It gave woman her true 

 sphere, too, as no city homes ever gave. 



The country refined and elevated. It taught 

 us on every hand lessons of infinite good. Scenes 

 of grace and beauty spread themselves abroad on 

 every hand. In Rome stands a great obelisk, 

 brought long centuries ago from Egypt — from 

 the centre of mysterious ruins — and men travel 

 thither from every land, and seek to read the 

 story of the ancient days, and gather wisdom 

 from the strange hieroglyphics inscribed upon 

 the column. Yet all around us, we had greater 

 my&teries than those of ancient hieroglyphics or 

 Egyptian obelisks. Every blade of grass which 

 raised itself in the breeze was a tower, built story 



on story, with its foundations deep in the earth, 

 mocking with its elastic strength and beauty the 

 poor imitations of man. It had its origin long 

 before towers and obelisks sprang into being at 

 the touch of man, and came down to us perpetu- 

 ated, from year to year, fraught with wondrous 

 memories and suggestions. 



This was but one form of that strange mystery 

 which enveloped us on every hand, which, for 

 want of a better name, were called beauty. Its 

 influence on man was boundless, and the son of 

 labor, "Gerard Massey," in one of his songs, 

 called "The People," sang of it in fitting strains. 

 This wonderful book Avhich we called nature, ru- 

 ral life, was a pleasant story which had no end, 

 and on every page we found the word "Excelsi- 

 or." Taught by the flowers which raised their 

 beauties up from the cold ground, taught by the 

 trees which lifted their arms heavenward, taught 

 by the mountains whose lofty peaks seemed to 

 unite earth with heaven, taught by the constella- 

 tions which never ceased their progress through 

 the grand and boundless realms of space, we 

 should seek to make our lives like the star which 

 waited never, but hastened on its appointed way 

 to the zenith of eternity. 



For tlie New England Farmer. 

 CHARITY FOR THE ROBIK. 



Friend Brown : — In your issue of Sept. 3d, 

 "Charity" has attempted to furnish facts gathered 

 from the investigations of Prof. Jenks. He says 

 that nine-tenths of the food of the robin found 

 until the first of May, consisted of the larva^ of 

 the Bibio allissennis, an insect, in the opinion of 

 entomologists, capable of producing one million 

 from each parent, each season. 



Prof. Jenks demonstrates that th^ robin, dur- 

 ing the months of March and April, sixty-one 

 days, consumed from one hundred to two hun- 

 dred of those terrible scourges to the tillers of 

 the soil, daily, each bird destroying some six or 

 eight thousands yearly. During those months, 

 robins are very scarce, not many having returned 

 from their southern quarters, averaging two, or, 

 at the most, three pairs to a farm. 



(), what incalculable benefit to the poor soil- 

 tilier are four or six birds destroying some five 

 or six hundred worms daily out of millions of 

 millions ! How soon they must all be destroyed, 

 and then, cock robin must starve. 



If the Professor's theory is correct, to annihi- 

 late the Bibio, robins must abound pltritifully 

 enough to out-number all olher birds in exis- 

 tence. Why, sir, the number must be so vast, 

 that ten months starvation must follow, for all 

 the crops used by the human family would not 

 suffice to sustain the robins needed for such a 

 glorious worm-slaughter. 



"Charity" would have us protect the highway- 

 man, the banditti, the poacher, becarse they may 

 have some redeeming qualities ; generosity, even 

 charity may be dispensed by them, when it comes 

 cheap — stolen charity. 



I wish to say a few words about the bird law. 

 Common law gives a citizen self-protection in 

 person and property from poachers. Massachu- 

 setts statute law says he shall be mulcted for 

 every robin killed, or found dead on his premi- 



