208 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



JANUARY S, 1634. 



MISCELLANY. 



From the Genesee Farmer. 

 TO COMING EVENINGS. 



In summer days I til! the ground. 

 And tug, and toil and get my bread ; 



I\o interval can then be found 

 Between my labor and my bed ; 



Ily wife declines to knit by night, 

 And 1 to reail by candle-light. 



But when the souih receives the sun, 



Beyond the equinoctial line — 

 When all my summer work is done, 



Substantial pleasures then are mine j 

 Then Jane begins to knit at nighty 



And I to read by candle-light. 



I am content and never sigh, 



Nor fly from home some bliss to find ; 



And Jane is pleased as well as I, 

 It so completely feasts her mind, 



To sit her down to knit by night, 

 And hear me read by candle-light. 



For when I read, she always hears, 

 And what she hears she tries to scan ; 



When aught obscure to her appears, 

 Then I explain it if I can. 



how she loves to knit by night. 

 And hear me read by candle-light. 



But when she drops a stitch and gapes, 

 Soon gapes again and nods her head, 



1 close my book, and say '' perhaps 

 'Tis time, my dear, to go to bed — 



So knit again to-morrow night, 

 And hear me read by candle-light." 



From the London Quarter!:/ Review. 

 FIXED STARS. 



We are as yet, and doubtless ever shall lie, 

 without the means of numbering those -tenants of 

 the firma'ment. Every new improvement of the 

 telescope brings within the range of vision count- 

 less multitudes which human eye has never seen 

 before. Some stars are double, and even triple ; 

 that is to say, they appear to us within a barely 

 distinguishable distance of each other. Upwards 

 of three thousand double stars have been discover- 

 ed; and it is justly supposed that even this num- 

 ber by no means exhausts the fertility of the 

 Heavens in these twin productions, some of which 

 have been actually observed to move round each 

 other in orbits requiring for their entire comple- 

 tion twelve hundred of our years. Such systems 

 as these give the mind a faint glimmer of eternity. 



Astronomers conjecture, not without reason, 

 from the analogies of our own system, that these 

 suns do not revolve round each other, shedding 

 their light in vain, but that each is accompanied 

 by its circle of planets, which being opaque bo- 

 dies, would of course be forever shrouded from 

 our view by the splendor of their respective orbs 

 of day. This idea leads us to conclude that the 

 stars which are separated from each other by dis- 

 tances at least as great as that of Uranus from out- 

 sun — that is to say, some eighteen hundred mil- 

 lions of miles — have also their respective planets, 

 their Mercuries, their Earths, their Jupiters, and 

 Saturns, and are the centres or peculiar systems 

 throughout the whole firmament. If these plan- 

 ets be peopled by intelligent beings, as Earth is, 

 and the other planets of the Solar System are 

 supposed to be, the eontemplation in thought of 

 such myriads of globes with their inhabitants, 

 overwhelms the mind. 



We have no mode of ascertaining the distance 



of any one of the stars from the earth. We have 

 measured the circumference which we describe in 

 our annual journny round the sun ; we take the 

 diameter of that circle, and with it form the base 

 of a triangle whose vcfetex should be at the near- 

 est of those luminous bodies. The angle thus 

 formed, however; at the star, would be unappre- 

 eiutde with the most perfect instrument of human 

 invention. Now an angle of one second of a de- 

 gree is appreciable ; consequently the distance of 

 the nearest fixed star must exceed the radius of a 

 circle, one second of whose circumference meas- 

 ures one hundred and ninety millions of miles ; 

 that is, it must exceed two hundred thousand 

 limes the diameter of the earth's orbit. If the 

 dove that returned no more to Noah, had been 

 commissioned to bear with her utmost speed, an 

 olive branch to the least remote of the spheres, 

 she would therefore still be on her journey: after 

 towering for forty centuries through the heights 

 of space, she would not at this moment have 

 reached the middle of her destined way. 



No Machinery has yet been invented, indeed it 

 seems at present impossible that we should ever 

 devise any means, by which we might estimate 

 the magnitude of even the least of the stars, since 

 we never behold their distances. We become sen- 

 sible of their existence by rays of light, which 

 must have taken, in some instances, probably a 

 thousand years to reach our globe, although light 

 is known to travel at the rate of one hundred and 

 ninety-two thousand miles in u second. Sirius, 

 the brightest, because perhaps the nearest to us of 

 those luminaries, is conjectured by Dr. Wollaston 

 to give'as much light as fourteen suns, each as 

 large as ours. An individual gazing through an 

 instrument from a planet of Sirius to our sun, 

 might suppose that he could cover our entire sys- 

 tem with a spider's thread. He would set down 

 the sun in his map as a fixed star, but to his eye 

 it would present no variation, as the largest of our 

 planets would not intercept much more than a 

 hundredth part of the sun's surface, and could not 

 therefore produce any loss of light of which he 

 could take any estimate. For him this globe of 

 ours, immense as to our finite faculties it seems to 

 be, would have no existence. It would find not 

 even a point's place on his chart, and if it were 

 blotted out of space tomorrow, it would never be 

 missed by any of the probably fifty worlds that 

 are bathed in the floods of light that Sirius pours 

 forth. Whose eye is it that watches over our 

 sphere ? Whose is the ever-extended arm that 

 maintains it ? 



CASTOR OIL FOR LAMPS. 



In the thirteenth volume of the American Far- 

 mer, page 207, we mentioned a discovery by Mr. 

 Isaac Smith, of Eastville, Northampton Co. (Va.) 

 wliieii enabled him to render castor oil equal to 

 the best sperm for burning in lamps. We men- 

 tioned, also, that it was Mr. Smith's intention to 

 take out a patent for this valuable improvement. 

 This, however, he has not done ; and his son, Mr. 

 Francis 11. Smith of this city, called at our office 

 a day or two ago, and gave us permission to make 

 known, for the benefit of the public, his father's 

 method of preparing the oil, which is merely mix- 

 ing with it spirits of turpentine, with which it 

 readily combines, in the proportion of one of the 

 latter to four of the oil. The simplicity of this 

 manner of preparing it, enhances the value of the 

 commodity very considerably. 



As to the excellence of the composition, for the 

 purpose of lighting rooms, there can be hut one 

 Opinion by all who have tried it. 



It is at least equal to tin; best sperm we ever 

 saw in its quality for combustion, and in its ap- 

 pearance decidedly superior. We are now writ- 

 ing by a lamp filled with it, and a finer light we 

 never saw. The lamp has been burning three 

 hours, and there is not the slightest appearance of 

 crust ; on the wick and on extinguishing the flame, 

 there is no fire remaining in the wick a? is gene- 

 rally the case with sperm oil, except of the veiv 

 best quality — indeed, in the extinguishment and 

 in the relighting of a iamp of this oil, there is a 

 strong similarity to that of a gas light. Mr. F. II. 

 Smith, has used this mixture in bis house these 

 five years, and prefers it decidedly to the best 

 sperm. It emits, be says, a clearer and more 

 powerful light, and burns somewhat longer than 

 sperm, and ?ietier congeals in the coldest weather. 

 The present relative prices of castor and sperm 

 oil, otter no inducement to those on the sea-board 

 to substitute the former for the latter; hut to our 

 brethren of the West, the subject promises to be 

 of much importance, as rendering them still fur- 

 ther independent of foreign supplies for the neces- 

 saries and comforts of life. The compound is 

 likewise much cheaper to them, inasmuch as a. 

 double freight is saved — that on sperm oil from 

 the sea-board and on castor oil, the abundant pro- 

 duct of tbejr fields, to a distant market. — Jim. Far. 



AMERICAN HEARTH RUGS. 



JUST received at 414 Washington street, a fresli supply of 

 Hearth Rugs, from the Tariffville Factory, manufactured ex- 

 presslv for the subscriber — they are superior in beauty and fab- 

 ric to any imported. E. S BREWER. 



N. B. E.S. B. will receive orders to manufacture Rugs to 

 match any carpet. iseoplJl nov 23 



CASH STORE. 



THE subscriber ofi'ers for sale a large stock of English and 

 American Goods at reduced prices, among which are 

 Bales Black Bomliazetle of good quality, at 12£ els. per yard. 

 " Green " " " " " n " 



" Bltfe and Brown Camblets of good quality, at 12^ cents. 

 " Scotch Plaids, " " " 



■' English, Sup. ifc fine 6-4 Merino from 3s. to 8s. per yard. 



" French " ' #1 to $t " ' " 



In addition to the above, the subscriber offers a more exten- 

 sive stock of Woollen, Linen and Cotton Goods, than can bo 

 had at any other Store in the City, at prices proportionally 

 low to those above named. 



E. S. BREWER, 414 Washington Street. 



THE NEW ENGLAND FARMER 



Is published every Wednesday Evening, at $3 per annum, 

 payable at the end of the year — but those who pay within 

 sixty days from the lime oi subscribing, are entitled to a deduc- 

 tion of fifty cents. 



0= No paper will be sent to a distance without payment 

 being made in advance. 



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