628 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Nov. 



charge of the matter, and since that, the product 

 has been magnified in such an immense proportion, 

 that the minister of agriculture is now enabled to 

 distribute large quantities over the empire, with 

 instructions from the government farm as to the 

 best mode of cultivation. 



It is suggested that the immense productiveness 

 of this wheat is owing to the long rest of the seed. 

 We imagine that it would be hard to find sufficient 

 cause in any other direction. It opens a very fine 

 field for speculation and inquiry, and if any of our 

 readers have facts bearing upon the subject, we 

 should like to get hold of them. — Springheld Re- 

 publican. 



Pot the New England Farmer. 



RECOLLECTIONS OF OLD THINGS. 



Mr. Editor : — I commence this letter without 

 making any preliminary remarks, except saying 

 vhat I have week after week seen some article that 

 X have wished to respond to. Sometimes I want to 

 ask questions about some favorite bird, and tell 

 what I know of its songs and habits, for some of 

 your contributors write about the birds, which 

 gives me much pleasure to read. Others write about 

 the old spinning-wheel, which brings a sweet re- 

 membrance of early childhood and youth, of my old 

 grandmother and her loom, and how I used to help 

 her get in her webs, and wind her quills ; and all 

 these rise up in my memory as vivid as though it was 

 yesterday. I should like to write about my grand- 

 mother, of her industry, her habits and energy, and 

 even her dress, and contrast them with grandmoth- 

 ers of the present age. And then there is that dear 

 lady who writes the "Sunday Readings," which 

 have at times imparted sympathy to my lonely 

 spirit, when disease and suffering were my daily at- 

 tendants. The one of August 19, 1854, was partic- 

 ularly interesting to me at that time, and many 

 thanks I owe her for her sweet Christian sympathy 

 for the afflicted. Often a little word will fall like sun- 

 shine on a drooping plant. It is a little thing to 

 speak a phrase of common comfort, which by daily 

 use has almost lost its sense, yet on the ear of him 

 who thought to die unmourned, it will fall like 

 choicest music. Old age is the time for reflection. 

 (I have within a few days past entered my seventieth 

 year.) I often contrast my labors, advantages and 

 amusements of early years, with those of children 

 and youth of the present day. Being the eldest of a 

 family of daughters, I was often called early in life 

 to help my father, and I can well recollect his em- 

 ployment each month from January to December. 

 When a "field hand," I rode the horse to plow, 

 dro[)t the corn, pulled the flax, drove the sheep to 

 wash, (where now is Mansfield depot,) raked hay, 

 husked corn, kept the blackbirds off with my grand- 

 father's sling, and had often to go to mill on horse- 

 back with three bags of corn. It would be thought 

 now very cruel in a parent to send a child with bare 

 feet, into a field newly plowed, eai-ly on a spring 

 morn. But it was no task to me then. I loved na 

 ture from the first dawn of childhood. There I had 

 sweet communion with birds and fiowers, learned 

 their names and songs, also the common names of 

 plants and flowers and their qualities, though I 

 knew not the meaning of the word botany. You 

 are striving ::ard, Mr. Editor, to bring the commu 

 nity into a state of love for agriculture in all its de- 

 partments, but how can it be done, unless the rising 



generation are taught that they are made for use. 

 Not that I wish them to be put to manual labors 

 beyond their strength, but in some way to be use- 

 ful. It appears now, that children are made to 

 think that faf^hion is the one thing needful. Their 

 hours of school are crowded with studies that they 

 have no taste, nor love for, before their physical 

 system is half-developed. 



But I digress ; I wish to say a few words about 

 my old spinning-wheels, *wheel-pin, reel, &c. I 

 have them still, they look to me like dear old 

 friends, to them I owe many sweet associations. I 

 arose early at my task, and "sweet was the breath 

 of morn, her rising sweet, with charms of earliest 

 birds;" from year to year I was the spinner; my 

 labors ceased only for a short time, only for my 

 education at school, from Webster's spelling book 

 and third part, I think now, that I was as happy 

 with my new wheel that my father bought me when 

 a child, as any young lady now, with a new piano. 

 But old things and old people are passing away, all 

 things are becoming new. There is something riot 

 a little appalling to aged people, in this breaking 

 up of the old order of things. It seems as if every 

 thing venerable was to be swept away. Does na- 

 ture partake of the change ? I have thought if the 

 same kinds of birds are here now that used to be, 

 they have a new song. I have not heard the sweet 

 notes of the bobolink the summer past. How it 

 thrilled my childish heart on my way to school to 

 see him perched on a muUen stalk, warbling away 

 his "labyrinth of song." And no dialect that I ever 

 read of his song, ever came so near to his expres- 

 sion as I learned when a child from some intimate 

 playmates, who learned the song from their father. 

 Another question I would ask before I close, do 

 the blue-birds migrate ? I have a box on a tree 

 opposite my window that they have occupied for 

 five or six years till last spring. There was a great 

 battle between the blue birds and a little bird with 

 a head like a martin, which succeeded in getting 

 the box. Some years there were three broods. I 

 watched the process of weaning and learning them 

 to fly. They would come in flocks about the middle 

 of October, in company with a flock of small dark 

 birds, as if in consultation what course to pursue. 



I am aware that many would think me imbecile, 

 in writing such simple reminiscences, and that 1 

 might be better employed in my declining years. I 

 am daily warned by disease and suffering, and the 

 lengthening shadows of life, that the twilight is gath- 

 ering, and that what I do, ought to be well done, 

 and done quickly. E. s, B. 



Foxboro', Sept., 1857. 



Annual Meeting. — The annual meeting of the 

 Middlesex ^Agricultural Society was holden at Con- 

 cord, on Tuesday, Sept, 29th. The President read 

 the resignation of Mr. Simon Brown, as Secretary, 

 after having held the office six years. After other 

 preliminary business, the Society proceeded to the 

 election of its officers for the ensuing year, and the 

 Hon, John S. Keyes was re-elected President, 

 Dr. Joseph Reynolds, Secretary, George Hey- 

 wooD, Treasurer, and Simon Brown, Delegate to 

 the State Board of Agriculture. "We understand 

 that a vote was passed admitting ladies to member- 

 ship. A good idea. 



