NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



2» 1 



to protect the lead from the effects of the atmos- 

 phere : -while turpentine forms a good varnish with 

 resins and gums, its combination Avith oil is alto- 

 gether different, forming a soap ; hence, those who 

 know not this fact, and use too much turpentine 

 with their paints for outside work, may expect to 

 see it disappear before it is very old. The best way 

 to put on white lead for outside work, is to com- 

 mence with a very thin coat, and let it dry perfectly. 

 It is better to put on four thin coats, one after 

 another, than two thick ones. The labor, to be sure, 

 is more expensive, but those who buy their own 

 paint, and use it in the country, will fuid out that 

 it will be a saving in the end. — Scientijic American. 



OUR COUNTRY VILLAGES. 



"Without any boasting, it may safely be said, that 

 the natural features of our common country (as the 

 speakers in Congress call her) are as agreeable and 

 prepossessing as those of any other land, whether 

 merry England, la bulk France, or the German father- 

 land. AVc have greater lakes, larger rivers, broader 

 and more fertile prames than the old world can 

 show ; and if the Alleghanies are rather dwarfish 

 when compared to the Alps, there are peaks, and 

 summits, " castle hills," and volcanoes, in our great 

 back-bone range of the Pacific, — the Rocky Moun- 

 tains — which may safely hold up their heads along 

 with Mont Blanc and the Jungfrau. 



Providence, then, has blessed the country — our 

 country — with "natural born" featiircs, Avhich we 

 may look upon and be glad. But how have w'e 

 sought to deform the fair landscape here and there, 

 by little, miserable, shabby-looking towns and vil- 

 lages ; not miserable and shabby-looking from the 

 poverty and wretchedness of the inhabitants, for in 

 no land is there more peace and plenty ; but miser- 

 able and shabby-looking from the absence of taste, 

 symmetry, order, space, proportion, all that consti- 

 tutes beauty. Ah, well and truly did Cowper say, 



" God made the country, but man made the town ; " 



for in the one we every where see utility and beauty 

 harmoniously combined, while the other presents us 

 but too often the reverse ; that is to say, the marriage 

 of utUity and deformity. 



Some of our readers may remind us that we have 

 already preached a sermon from this text. No mat- 

 ter ; we should be glad to preach fifty ; yes, or even 

 establish a sect, as that seems the only way of 

 making proselytes now, whose duty it should be to 

 convert people living in the country towns to the 

 true faith ; we mean the true rural faith, viz., that 

 it is immoral and uncivilized to Live in mean and un- 

 couth villages, where there is no poverty or want of 

 intelligence in the inhabitants ; that there is nothing 

 laudable in having a piano-forte and mahogany 

 chairs in the parlor, where the streets outside are 

 barren, and destitute of shade trees, destitute of side- 

 walks, and populous with pigs and geese. 



AVe are bound to admit (with a little shame and 

 humiliation, being a native of New York, the " Em- 

 pire iState") that there is one part of the Union 

 where the millennium of country towns, and good 

 government, and rural taste has not only commenced, 

 but is in full domination. Wc mean, of course, 

 Massachusetts. The traveller may go from one end 

 of that state to the otlier, and find flourishing vil- 

 lages, with broad streets, lined with maples and elnis, 

 behind which arc goodly rows of neat and substan- 

 tial dwellings, full of evidences of order, comfort, 

 and taste. Throughout the whole state, no animals 

 aie allowed to run at large in the streets of towns 

 and villages. Hence so much more cleanliness than 



elsewhere ; so much more order and neatness ; so 

 many more pretty rural lanes ; so many inviting 

 flower gardens and orchards, only sc])arated from the 

 passer-by by a low railing or hedge, instead of a for- 

 midable board fence. Now, if you cross the state 

 line into New York, — ^ a state of far greater wealth 

 than Massachusetts, as long settled, and nearly as 

 populous, — you feel directly that you arc in the land 

 of " pigs and poultry," in the least agreeable sense 

 of the word. In passing through villages and towns, 

 the truth is still more striking as you go to the south 

 and west ; and you feel little or nothing of that 

 sense of " how pleasant it must be to live here," 

 which the traveller through Berkshire, or the Con- 

 necticut valley, or the pretty villages about Boston, 

 feels moving his heart within him. You are rather 

 inclined to wish there were two new commandments, 

 namely : Thou shalt plant trees, to hide the naked- 

 ness of the streets ; and. Thou shalt not keep pigs — 

 except in the back yard. 



Our more reflective and inquiring readers will nat- 

 urally ask. Why is this better condition of things, a 

 condition that denotes better citizens, better laws, and 

 higher civilization, confined almost wholly to Mas- 

 sachusetts ? To save them an indefinite deal of 

 painstaking, research, and investigation, we will 

 tell them in a few words : That stale is better educated 

 than the rest. She sees the advantage, morally and 

 socially, of orderly, neat, tasteful villages in produc- 

 ing better citizens, in causing the laws to be re- 

 spected, in making homes dearer and more sacred, 

 in making domestic life and the enjoyment of prop- 

 erty to be more truly and rightly estimated. 



And these are the legitimate and natural results 

 of this kind of improvement we so ardently desire 

 in the outward life and appearance of rural towns. 

 If our readers suppose us anxious for the building of 

 good houses, and the planting of street avenues, 

 solely that the country may look more beautiful to 

 the eye, and that the taste shall be gratified, they do 

 us an injustice. This is only the external sign by 

 which we would have the country's health and 

 beauty known, as we look for the health and beauty 

 of its fair daughters in the presence of the rose on 

 their cheeks. But as the latter only blooms lastingly 

 there, when a good constitution is joined with 

 healtliful habits of mind and body, so the tasteful 

 ajipcarance which we long for in our country towns, 

 we seek as the outward mark of education, moral 

 sentiment, love of home, and refined cultivation, 

 which makes the difference between Massachusetts 

 and Madagascar. 



We have, in a former number, said something as to 

 the practical manner in which " graceless villages " 

 may be improved. We have urged the force of ex- 

 ample in those who set about improving their own 

 property, and shown the influence of even two or 

 three persons, in giving an air of civilization and re- 

 finement to the streets and suburbs of country towns. 

 There is not a village in America, however badly 

 planned at first, or ill-built afterwards, that may not 

 be redeemed, in a great measure, by the aid of shade 

 trees in the streets, and a little shrubbery in the front 

 yards ; and it is never too late or too early to project 

 improvements of this kind. Every spring and every 

 autumn sliould visit a revival of associated ettbrts on 

 the part of selectmen, trustees of corporations, and 

 persons of means and influence, to adorn and embel- 

 lish the external condition of tlieir towns. Those 

 least alive to the results, as regards beauty, may be 

 roused as to the eflects of increased value given to 

 property thus improved, and villages thus rendered 

 attractive and desirable as places of residence. 



But let us now go a step farther than this. In no 

 country, perhaps, are there so many mw villages and 

 towns laid out every year as in the I'nited States. 

 Indeed, so large is the number, that the builders and 



