VOU. \VI. NO. 20. 



AND GARDENER'S JOURNAL. 



155 



[For tho New England Farmer.] 

 " Home, sweet home : — 

 Tliere's no place like home." 



Hosv many respond to this tender and patriotic 

 sentiirient! Jt iti lieatd, not only iVo?n the parlor, 

 in the soft soprano of tiie fashionable belle ; from 

 the street at niidnifjht, in the lover's harmonious 

 serenade to Ids miistrcss ; upon the stage, and at 

 the public, halls, where niu.sie holds her devotees 

 in rapt cMchaiitmpnl ; but the merry cow boy and 

 the ruddy milk-uiaid have caught the witching 

 note ; the market man, in his journey jog to the city, 

 hums it along at morning twilight ; and the busy 

 husbanrlman, as he turns tlie rich, yielding mould, 

 whistles it to the slow moveuient of his three-rattle 

 team. But there is a strange inconsistency after 

 all, and practice is too much opposed to principle. 

 The excellent sentiment of this song so thought- 

 lessly, it would seem, chanted by old and young, 

 seems to meet with but little approval and corres- 

 pondence in our conduct. Our ever restlessness, 

 our peri)etual longing for change, turning hither 

 and tliither, like u sick man, laboring under sonic 

 |)ainftd malady, will show if our iriusic is anything 

 more than " tinkling brass and empty sound." 

 This love of home must be affected all. We 

 sing of the pleasures and delights, we tell of the 

 conveniences, the comforts, the advantages, and 

 the numberless benefits enjoyed at the old domi- 

 cil of our fathers, and the scenes of our youthful 

 joys; where the old oaks still wave over the pas- 

 ture lands, and where the famed high-top sweeting, 

 of pilgrim memory, once the queen of the orch- 

 ard, cheers us with the remembrance of the rich 

 regales it afforded in days of yore. Still discon- 

 tent and a restless spirit haunt ua at every turn ; 

 ' awiiy^ away !" is the contiumjd echo in our ears, 

 ^nd an inciM'able desire to migrate and leave this 

 "happy home " is perpetually tho attendant of 

 )ur bosoms. 



Look at the young farmer, who might, if he 

 would be happy. His prospects are fair ; plenty 

 iurrounds him, and, if he only made due improve- 

 ment of his opportunities, his condition would be 

 ;nviablp. Knt, alas ! liow reluctantly lie moves 

 ner the liomestead, where his father and grand- 

 atlicr were wont, for years and years, to cultivate 

 he fields, and to receive in return the bountiful 

 ■ewards of their toil! He lags in the furrow of 

 he old cornfield, he feels heavy at heart, he stops 

 lis team, and, seating himself upon his plough, 

 leain, ruminates upon the joys and fancieil deliglits 

 if the far-west husbandman. He says to himself, 

 'no ploughing, no manuring, no hoeing, no dig- 

 ;ing is there ; but, in order to grow rich, you have 

 ■nly to will it, and it is Tnine ! Honors too there 

 irown the wish of every aspirant !'' This thought 

 It once electrifies him ! He starts up in the midst 

 if his revery, and resolves no longer to delve and 

 9 tug like a fill-horse upon the old, thread bare 

 lomain of his ancestors. So he hastens to his 

 iither, and calls for the " portion of goods that 

 allelh to hini," that he may depart and seek n 

 ifferent home, and different fortune, declaring 

 imself to be tired of perpetually laboring, while 

 thers grow rich with little exertion. No parent- 

 I tears, no expostulations can avail against his in- 

 lination ; but go he must, and go he does. Thus 

 •sweet home " with its three hundred acres,whicli 

 light suffice for three good farms, is contemptu- 

 usly deserted by this foolish and inconsiderate 

 onng man. Westward he turns his course, but, 

 nfortunalely, when too late, discovers that even 



where the land is said to " flow with milk and 

 honey," and wealth to crown every exertion, the 

 wheat-fields will not yield their increase, without 

 cultivation; none can prosper without industry 

 and steady application to busines.'» ; and that, be 

 where we may, bodily employinent is necessary to 

 health and peace of mind. 



There are sundry causes for the above besetting 

 evil, and they arc signally prevalent at the present 

 day. One is an eagerness to become rich at 

 once, without the usual, wholesome and jiroper 

 means. Another is a contempt of manual labor. 

 The latter discovers itself more or less among all 

 classes of jieople, but afl'ects most injuriously the 

 farmer. The honest and industrions husbandman 

 who has, by means of economy and attention to 

 his own afl^air.s, arrived to that independence, so 

 characteristic generally of New England yeoman- 

 ry ; viz., a plenty to live on, and sometliing laid 

 lip for casualty and misfortune, has a half dozen 

 of stout, lusty sons. He brings them up '• in the 

 way they should go," giving them such education,, 

 as the common town school affords, wliich i.s 

 competent for all the purposes and business of 

 common life, short of professional concerns. But, 

 as soon as they arrive to the age of usefulness, 

 and are cajiable of judging and taking some lead 

 in the management of the farm, by some luckless 

 incident or other, (it may be a visit from a city 

 cousin from behind the counter of a soila-shop, or 

 the return of a tourist from the Rocky iMouiitains,) 

 their heads are, all on a sudden, turned ; their 

 minds hitherto peaceful and happy, are filled with 

 a thousand vagaries ; a strange and inconsistent 

 notion possesses them ; viz., that it is dishonora- 

 ble to be seen at work, laboring with the hands, 

 especially the labor necessary to Agriculture or 

 Horticulture; and this, forsooth, because of the 

 dirt. For the hands to be soiled with dirt, or to 

 be toughened by the use of fiirndng implements is 

 disgraceful, low and unbecoming any one but hire- 

 lings and drudges. Thus, this new doctrine is 

 received and foolishly credited. The consequence 

 is disappointment and distress to the parent, and 

 ruin to his once bright, industrious and happy 

 offspring. In their search for a living without 

 bodily labor they find it too truo that "all is not 

 gold that glistens;'" they lose their early and valu- 

 able habits, and contract others which are alike 

 detrimental to their morals and their hi;alth. Tlie 

 firm, which uinler proper management, might 

 have supported them all has been necessarily neg- 

 lected, and run down; thistles, thorns and bram- 

 bles encompass it, and its income is now scarcely 

 siiflicient for the support of its aged occupants, 

 the disheartened and solitary father and mother. 

 Such is the effect of fiilse pride, and the silly no- 

 tion that manual labor is disgraceful. 



An eager desire to gain a fortune suddenly, by 

 one single swoop, is another source of evil. Suc- 

 cess may sometimes attend such speculators, liut 

 generally the riches, so gained, are iijit to " take 

 wings and fly away," as hastily as they were ob- 

 taiiu'.'!. When this passion seizes a young farmer, 

 and a thousand xgnes Jatut aredancingaround him, 

 too often he is deaf to every warning voice, and 

 nothing save fatal experience will bring him to 

 reason. Suppose that he has settled down upon 

 a rich alluvion in the western country, and by 

 reason of his industry i-< in a thriving condition, 

 abounding with plenty, &c. ; how might it have 

 been, had he resisted this love of change, and tar- 

 ried upon the paternal lot.' it is well understood 



now that the good management of a few acres, 

 even a garden spot, is better than the poor hus- 

 banilry of a large farm. '1 he love of being thought 

 a great landholder without improvement is alto- 

 gether idle. Flas an) thing been gained by remo- 

 val } Unquestionably not. He is worth no more, 

 enjoys no more, and is no more respected, than 

 he might have been at his former home. 



There is nn Ojiinion too prevalent among our 

 agriculturalists, thai the land in thejEastern Atlan- 

 tic States is worn out, and incapable of producing 

 to any profitable amount, manage it as you will ; 

 and this is another inducement to emigration. But 

 it is ipiite nn incorrect and ill-founded notion. Let 

 such turn their attention to old England, our old 

 home, whose fertility and productiveness are pro- 

 verbial, and they will see, that by proper attention 

 to all the requisites in the art ofagrlculture, such as 

 a regular and suitable rotation or.change of crops, 

 the mixture of soils, the compounding and applica- 

 tion of maiinres.snmmer fallowing, and various oth- 

 er melliods for re|i!eiiishing, sustaining and invigo- 

 rating the soil, the priiicijile of nutrition, lifa and 

 activity is kept up, and there will be no such thing 

 as " wearing a farm out "■ 



A professed farmer should liave something more 

 than a mere superficial knowledge of the princi- 

 ples of his art. He should endeavor to investi- 

 gate cause and effect in all his operations, and not 

 be contented to depetid on his more industrious, 

 more stulious and ambitious neighbor for infor- 

 mation in things peculiarly belonging to the busi- 

 ness of his calling, and which are easily attained 

 by devoting a little portion of that time, which 

 every one has enough of to study and reflection. 

 The chemical properties of various kinds of soil 

 and substances is a very suitable study for the 

 leisure hours of a young fiirmer or gardener. Let 

 him attend to these, and watch every operation|and 

 every change in the growth of vegetation ; let him 

 practise such exfierinients, as may not be attended 

 with very great ex[iense ; let him be ambitious to 

 know something more than liis patient and sub- 

 missive ox, that moves only by compulsion, and 

 whose penetration extends not beyond the shallow 

 furrow in which he treads. He must be alive to 

 new plans, new inventions and improi ements, and 

 not be too much a bigot to the superficial practice 

 of his ancestors, believing that he must/bllow e.x- 

 actly their ways and manner of doing. Thus he 

 may learn that the age of his farm need never he 

 a cause for abandoning it; that its proper cultiva- 

 tion will richly repa}' for the labor spent upon it ; 

 that to labor with the hands brings no dishonor ; 

 that the home of the farmer is ever sweetened by 

 the sweat of the brow ; and that his station is thg 

 one truly honorable and independent. B. B. 



A Hint to the Working Classes. — If a man 

 of 22 years of age, begin to save ai dollar a week, 

 and put it to interest every year, he would have, 

 at 31 yeais of age, six hundred smd fifty dollars; 

 at 41, one thoiis.ind six hundred and eighty ; at 

 51, three thousand six hundred and eighty ; at 61, 

 six thousand one hundred and fifty; and at 71, 

 eleven thousand five hundred dollars. When we 

 look at these sums, and when we think how much 

 temptaion and evil might be avoided in the very 

 act of saving them, and how niiicli good a man in 

 humble circumstances might do for his family by 

 these sums, we cannot help wondering that there 

 are not iiiore savers of §1 a week. 



