NEW ENG1ANB HAMMER. 



PUBLISHED BY GEO. C. BARRETT, NO. 52, NORTH MARKET STREET, (at the Agricultural Warehouse.)— T. G. FESSENDEN, EDITOR. 



VOL. XII. 



BOSTON, WEDNESDAY EVENING, APRIL 30, 1834. 



NO. 42. 



AN ADDRESS TO THE ESSEX COUNTY AGRI- 

 CULTURAL SOCIETY, 



At New Rowley, September 26th, 1S33, at their 



ANNUAL CATTLE SHOW. 



BY JEREMIAH SPOFFORD. 



(Concluded from pnge 323.) 



The cold seasons of 1812 and 1816, and the in- 

 termediate years, produced a disposition in many 

 to abandon their native land, as though nature had 

 changed, and the divine promise of seed time and 

 harvest had failed ; but the profusion with which 

 the fruits of the earth have been showered around 

 us for the last fifteen years should teach every far- 

 mer to value his soil, to he content with his cli- 

 mate, and never to distrust the faithfulness of Him 

 who governs the seasons. 



Alternate showers and sunshine have covered 

 the earth with a luxuriance of fruit which has lit- 

 erally compelled many of you " to pull dowu your 

 barns and build greater." 



'Tis true your lands are not annually enriched 

 by the alluvion of rivers three thousand miles 

 long : nor are your fences and cattle and buildings 

 swept away by the overflow of such rivers. Yet 

 no part of the country is more finely diversified 

 with rivers and streams of water than Massachu- 

 setts — than our own county of Essex. Almost 

 every farm is supplied by its running broofc — mill 

 streams and rivers of manageable magnitude are 

 found in almost every town ; and the imjestie 

 Hudson rolls not a more beautiful sheet of viater, 

 nor presents banks more luxuriantly fringed with 

 shrubbery, or exhibits finer river scenery than 

 your own Merrimack. With strict truth we may 

 here apply the lines of the poet of the Connecticut : 



" No watery gleams through happier villas shine, 

 " Nor drinks the sea a lovelier wave than thine " 



From what has been said, and from many other 

 considerations, I conclude that the sons of New 

 England should value their birth right, and wherever 

 their enterprise may lead them in pursuit of wealth 

 or honor, that they have cause to prize the land 

 of their nativity — the land of constant industry and 

 steady habits — the land of " bibles and sabbaths" 

 — the laud of red schoolhouses and white church- 

 es — the land where slavery is unknown. 

 " My own green land forever. 

 " O ! never may a son of thine, 

 '• VVh&re e'er his wandering steps incline, 

 " Forget the sky which bent above 

 "His childhood like a dream of love." 



Although the sceptre of political power may 

 have departed from the " cradle of liberty," and 

 even the seat of empire be already loosening from 

 its foundations for its removal from the Atlantic 

 States ; yet the time honored history of the past — 

 the happy institutions and habits of the present 

 day — and the enterprise which is inherent in the 

 sons of the pilgrims — will ever secure NewEngland 

 an honorable place in her country's annals, and ;.s 

 the Jews from every nation under heaven, lock 

 towards Jerusalem as the land of hope and prom- 

 ise — so the distant wanderer o'er sea and land, 

 shall in visions or reality return to wander ovir 

 the happy haunts of his childhood, and lay his 

 ashes on his native soil. 



True these opinions would be of more weight if 

 they came from abroad, or from one who had trav- 



elled extensively ; hut these estimates of other 

 parts of our country are founded on the observa- 

 tions of many competent witnesses ; and as it is 

 an honor to a child to highly esteem his father's 

 house, so I consider it an honor, a duty and a 

 privilege to do justice to my native soil. 



Let us now attend to some of the means essen- 

 tial for the improvement and enjoyment of these 

 advantages. 



And one of the first requisites for the improve- 

 ment of our advantages is — untiring industry. 



It is often literally true that the hand of "the 

 diligent maketh rich ;" but where from any cause 

 it fails to enable a person to gather heaps of shi- 

 ning dust, it always in this land enables the dili- 

 gent to possess constantly and plentifully the ne- 

 cessaries and comforts of life, which to every rea- 

 sonable mind is true riches. 



See England by her active industry extending 

 the arm of her power over every sea, and draw- 

 ing her supplies from the remotest corners of the 

 earth. 



Water and steam and muscular force, are in per- 

 petual action. The very elements are forced to 

 labor, and the island is one vast workshop. Her 

 ships and seamen brave the tempests of every sea, 

 and bring back the riches of every clime. The 

 merchandize of both the Indies congregrates in 

 her warehouses, and her merchants are literally 

 princes, and a hundred millions of the indolent 

 Asiatics own their authority, and lay their unvvil- 

 .ing tribute at their feet.* 



The advantages of industry on a large scale, 

 are also strikingly illustrated by the comfort and 

 prosperity of New England compared with our 

 southern States. 



While New England retains habits of industry 

 she will prosper under any system of policy which 

 the general government can constitutionally pur- 

 sue. And though a vacillating policy, and fre- 

 quent and sudden changes, may embarrass and 

 perplex our commerce and manufactures, yet even 

 that can only diminish the profits of the people, 

 but reaches not the deep laid foundation of New 

 England prosperity. 



While on the other hand our southern brethren 

 may threaten or nullify — change the tariff or per- 

 petrate a revolution — they will still find they have 

 not reached the cause of their depression. The 

 absence of voluntary vigorous industry is the real 

 cause of the evils of which they complain. A 

 white population ashamed to be "seen with im- 

 plements of labor in their hands," and a black 

 population doing as little labor as possible, is 

 enough to " nullify" the prosperity of any country. 

 Perhaps some may imagine that it were easy to 

 grow rich where men possess slaves who labor 

 without wages. But let such remember that these 

 slaves are also men, who must eat or they cannot 

 work — that they must be maintained, the old and 

 the young — the sick, the lame and the lazy, with 

 the taskmasters necessary to make them labor at 



* Yet notwithstanding the political power and grasping poli- 

 cy of England, the nation is so convinced of the iniquity, im- 

 policy and uselessness ot personal Slavery, that it is not 

 permitted on her soil, and is about (at a great expense) to be 

 extirpated from her colonies ! an example worthy to be follow- 

 ed by our nation, when boasting of its liberty, and proclaim- 

 ing "that " all men are born free and equal." 



all, before any surplus can arise to support the 

 luxury of the landlord. Now put a hundred of 

 these laborers, as they would rise from infancy to 

 age, under the care of some hireling taskmaster, 

 while the owner of the whole concern is absent at 

 a horse race, or a barbacue, and what is his chance 

 of a clear profit, for the support of a princely ret- 

 inue ? 



Take even a hundred poor people of New Eng- 

 land : let the maintenance of them and their chil- 

 dren be made sure, thus removing all the stimu- 

 lus of liberty and property on the one hand, and 

 all fear Of poverty and wanton the other, and who 

 of you would become bound for their mainten- 

 ance for all the surplus of their labor ? You would 

 much sooner hire the laborers, pay them their 

 wages, and dismiss them to their own cares, 

 when the labor was done. 



You will therefore see that slavery lays the axe 

 at the root of the tree of industry, and that indo- 

 lence saps the foundation of public or private pros- 

 perity. Whatever removes the stimulus to indus- 

 try, whether political, moral, or physical, it is 

 equally ruinous to nations, states, private families, 

 or individuals. 



To no class of men does this necessity of con- 

 stant industry apply more forcibly than the far- 

 mer. He turns his own wheel of fortune, more 

 emphatically than almost any other class; those 

 great and sudden turns of fortune which some- 

 times raise or depress others lay quite out of his 

 track. With firm foothold he climbs the ascent 

 to wealth ; or with loosened energies he slides 

 down the gradual descent to poverty. 



The eyes of the master or owner must pervade 

 the whole establishment ; his mind and his hands 

 must he equally ready to do their appropriate 

 work ; his example must be such that no idler can 

 feel easy for an hour on his premises. 



Another requisite to prosperity is the system- 

 atic plan. Men who have no enterprise to plan, 

 will have still less if possible to execute. Few 

 men do more than they intend to do, and there 

 are or ought to be U;\v who have not ambition 

 enough to rouse all their energies to accomplish 

 what they have once deliberately planned to do. 



I would by no means encourage or excite inor- 

 dinate ambition, but still a desire for property, and 

 accommodation (rail it by what name you please) 

 is the life spring of all that is laudable and valua- 

 ble in society. 



The man who is the mere child of circumstance 

 acting only as he is acted upon by his necessities, 

 may enjoy a kind of Indian tranquility, but with 

 such men only, the march of improvement must 

 stop in its course, arid society fall back into bar- 

 barism. 



That man who aims at nothing, will certainly 

 accomplish nothing; he that is content with a 

 cabin will never possess a palace; but he that fig- 

 ures to himself the Conveniences and elegancies of 

 life, will make exertion to obtain them, and will 

 enjoy at least as much in a well directed pursuit, 

 as in the, full possession. 



The farmer who is content with a shabby house, 

 wooden fences, and ten bushels of corn or five 

 hundred of hay to the acre, will seldom find him- 

 self in a better situation, while he who plans to 



