78 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Feb. 



foul air being completely cradieatod, so that the | provide for our households, is a duty we owe to 

 well could bo worked in perfect safety. Whether] ourselves and to our Creator, which may nut be 

 this remedy has ever been tried l)y any one else I; neglected with impunity. Let us then begin the 

 do not know. If such remedy would have the i year with the determination, that, althougii " he 

 desired effiK-t in all cases when tried, it certainly} who delves and digs the earth from morning until 

 would bo valuable information to those digging! night, has little time and less inclination for 



or cleaning wells. — Rural New-Yorker. 



For the JVew Ensland Farmer. 



IIOKTHLY FARMER FOR JANUARY. 



In reading the extracts of agricultural address- 

 es, on page 51 of this number, I noticed particu- 

 larly the following sentence from jNlr. Fay's Es- 

 sex County address : — " He who delves and digs 

 ihe earth from morning until night, has little time 

 and less inclination for thought.^ ' This is very dif 



thought," yet that little shall be faithfully and 

 carefully improved. Reading matter is now 

 cheap, and that which is appropriate to our busi- 

 ness is rapidly improving in character and value. 

 The monthly F«n/ifr,with its forty-eight broad 

 pages, enters upon the new year with a variety of 

 contents that must stir up thought in the mind of 

 every careful reader. We offer a few of our own 

 thoughts on some of its articles. 



" The Concord Grape.'' — The remarks of Mr. 

 Wilcox express a feeling that I find prevails to a 

 great extent among farmers in the country, and 



ferent from the usual style of such addresses. The _ 



advantages which the farmer enjoys for study and jam therefore glad to see them treated so respect- 

 reflection, and his opportunities for profiting by ifi^Hy ii^ the i-'awttr, ))uth by the editor and by 

 the changes of the seasons and the successive j the proprietor of the grape. Whether the re- 

 beauties which the rolling year presents for his|i»arks of Mr. AY. are just, or illilM:ral, in this 

 admiration and improvement, are generally dwelt! case, is of little importance in comparison with 

 upon by agricultural orators in poetic ecstacies, the infiuence of the impression, that "the Press 

 tliat are but poorly realized by him who sits down which tolerates such speculations, does no good 

 in a warm room to study, after a day spent in the service to the community." For my own part, I 

 woods with tlie thermometer pointing at zero, or | see no objection to a man's selling grape vines for 

 by him who attempts to admire the glories of five dollars a-piece so long as there are plenty of 

 sunrise, after mowing long enough to be thinking' 1-»»yers at that price. After the fever is over, and 

 of breakfast, or of his feet and legs that are "sop- 1 the five-dollar purchasers are all supplied, the 

 ping wet " with the chill dews of a summer's j pi'ice will probably come down; and tlien, if the 

 morning. But if it is a fact, which I think few good qualities of this grape don't come down too,_ 

 who have tried it with their own hands will denv,'ii'ieucl Wilcox and I may perhaps have a vine of 

 that farming affords " little time and less inclina-|Ourown to sit under. But in the mean time, it 

 tion for thought " and intellectual cultivation I may turn out a " multicaulis," or a " rohan," or 

 generally, what is the natural inference? Be-' it may prove a " Baldwin," or a "Bartlett,"— 

 cause Ave have but a single opportunity, shall that! the five-dollar men will decide this at their ex- 

 be buried in the earth ? Because we have little\ pense, but for our benefit. Why sliould lue 

 time for thought, shall we give up thinking en- igi'umble. 



tirely and rely on our priest, our doctor, and our; ''Buminating Animals.''— ^ome popular notions 

 lawyer to do it all for us? By no means. The j about chewing the cud denied, 

 very fact that we have small means implies the I ''Witch Grass.''— Owl^ article informs how to 

 need of great efforts. When we are most alarmed i destroy this pest by cultivation, but with little 

 by appreliensions of a scarcity of hay in the fall,|lioeing ; and another article recommends summer- 

 fipring often finds us with enough and to spare. I fallowing. 

 Vfc saw that we had but little, and looking the! Articles on "Sheep and Wool," on "Canker 



k Two- Acre Farm," " Gale's 



"A Journey" to New Jersey, 



And if hard labor! Pennsylvania, &c., " London Vegetable Markets," 



toil-worn machines!" Agriculture in North Carolina," " Changes of 



Food," " Prepare for Winter," arel)ut specimens 



of those on which wc have no comments to offer. 



French Garden Implements,'''' &c. — In France, 



fact boldly in the face, by our care and economy, j^^ orms," on 



that little became an abundance! To know our, Straw Cutter, 



disease, then, is half its cure 



does tend to make us mere 



Lit last," the sooner we realize the danger, the 



more immediately shall we seek to improve the 



little time and inclination for thouo-ht that we do 



enjoy. But how improve? There might be i it seems that farm labor is poorly paid, yet such 

 much said on this question, but I Avill say but are the habits of the people, that a man and his 

 little here. As a first thought, however, we! wife, boarded and lodged by their employer, laid 

 would advise to read some agricultural periodical I by $100 of the $180, which were paid for the la- 

 regularly. I »dj periodical, because books do not!bor of both for a year. If our expenses increase 

 soem to meet the case. A book may be laid aside 'faster than our income does, it will take a long 



and forgotten ; but a periodical that comes to us 

 monthly or weekly, makes a fresh claim upon our 

 attention, just so often at least. No farmer has 

 a right to do less than this for his mind, if he 

 would not become a drudge, a toil-worn machine. 



time to get rich, and large wages do little good. 



''Talk about Guano." — And a very interesting 

 chat it is. Tlie remark which was ascribed to the 

 editor, but which it appears he never made, that 

 guano in ]Massaehusetts had done more hurt than 



and finally in old age, a dotard, whose intellectual I good, is one which I really believe would express 

 imbecility and weakness shall be more jiitiable the result, so far as I have personally observed its 

 than the ravings of insanity, or the struggles of, effects, in my own neighborhood. If merely a 

 icath itself. If he who puts an end to his phys-| few preliminary experiments, which leave th#i 

 ioal existence is guilty of murder, can the mental! editor of the Farmer with " no means of judg- 

 i^uicide be regarded as innocent? A habit of | ing " Avhether the losses or the benefits are the 

 reading and thinking, as well as the obligation to! greater, cost our country ten millions of dollars. 



