38 



Farmers^ Cabinet, &(■€. 



Vol. III. 



that of personal independence is easy, and 

 scarcely perceivable. They don't feel like 

 enmncipated slaves. They are not intoxica- 

 ted vi'ith liberty, but enjoy it soberly ; still 

 looking back, with mixed emotions of respect 

 and love, to the salutary discipline they have 

 been under, and still accustoming themselves 

 to consult their parents and to receive their 

 advice with deference. 



Nothing, indeed, is more clear, than that 

 the simplest government is best for children ; 

 and yet, this plain matter of fact is often over- 

 looked, and that too, by some of excellent 

 minds and hearts. Many parents, of good 

 sense, and great moral worth, fearful of fail- 

 ing in their duty, by not governing enough, 

 •sua into the opposite extreme. They main- 

 tain a reservedness, a distance, a stateliness 

 toward their children, who hardly dare to 

 ^cak in their presence, and much less to 

 manifest before them any symptoms of the 

 gaiety of youthful hearts. They encumber 

 them with a multitude of regulations; they 

 tire them with long lessons of stern monition ; 

 t-hey disgust and alienate them with a super- 

 abundance of sharp reproof; they treat their 

 little levities as if they were heinous crimes. 

 Instead of drawing them with "the cords of 

 love," they bind them fast with cords that are 

 galling and painful. 



This mistaken, though virell-intentioned, 

 manner of family government, is very apt to 

 draw after it several unhappy consequences. 

 Children so brought up, how much soever 

 they fear their parents, do rarely love them 

 very much. However much they respect 

 t-heir virtues, they seldom yield them the 

 warm affections of their hearts. Of some, it 

 breaks the spirits, and renders them unenter- 

 prising, tame, and servile, in all the succeed- 

 ing periods of their lives. Others, who have 

 more native energy of mind, and stiffness of 

 heart, it makes exceedingly restless: and 

 whenever these can get aside from parental 

 inspection, they are particularly rude and ex- 

 travagant in their conduct. With longing 

 eyes they look forward to the day of emanci- 

 pation from parental authority as a jubilee : 

 and when the wished-tbr time has come, they 

 are like calves let loose from their stalls. The 

 transition is so great and so sudden, that it 

 bewilders them ; and it often happens that 

 their ruin is involved in the first use they 

 make of their freedom. 



They are wide of the true mark in family 

 government, who make a mighty bustle about 

 it. In their laudable attempts to e.\cel in 

 that way, they spoil all by overdoing. 



For the Fai-mefs' Cabinet. 

 Farmers' Cabinet— Transmutation ot 

 Plants— ObserveJC* No. 14— ttuestion 

 answered^ 



I have lately become a subscriber to your 

 valuable publication, the " Farmers' Cabinet." 

 I have received and read four numbers of the 

 work, with great pleasure, and I hope some 

 profit. In the course of my agricultural op- 

 erations for the last sixteen years some cir- 

 cumstances had come under my observation 

 which had led me to embrace a belief in the 

 transmutation of plants, or however, to think 

 that wheat did sometimes turn into cheat. — 

 But I am free to acknowledge that since read- 

 ing an essay upon that subject in the April 

 number of the Cabinet by your able corres- 

 pondent W. D., I no longer entertain that 

 opinion. I think I recognise in the author of 

 that article a friend of my youth, one to whom 

 I am indebted for the ntre of a much more 

 I serious malady than this mental delusion, at 

 an early stage of my life; and to which I ot- 

 iten recur wfth the mo^t grateful feelings. 



Since writing the alnwe I have received ano- 

 ther number v^hicli I have read with no less 

 pleasure than the preceeding ones ; I hope you 

 will persevere in the good work. I think 

 your paper is calculated to do much good. — 

 At present the " Cultivator" is pretty gener- 

 ally taken in this immediate neighborhood, 

 and, although ably conducted, your paper i.s 

 evidently better calculated for this latitnde, 

 and will, I hope, at no distant day receive a 

 full share of the patronage of the farmers of 

 this section of country. I shall endeavor to 

 make my neighbors acquainted with its mer- 

 its. If it would not be presumption in an il- 

 literate old farmer, I would ofler a solution to a 

 question asked by your able correspondent "( )b- 

 server" in his 14th number. He says, among 

 other things, that poke weed is known to spring 

 up abundantly where brush heaps have been 

 burned, and then asks how shall we account 

 tor this fact? 1 will just answer this question 

 and trouble you no further at present with 

 my remarks. There are several kinds of birds 

 that feed upon the berry of the poke, partic- 

 ularly the robin, thrush, and cat-bird, which 

 are all in the habit of rubing and dusting 

 themselves in the ashes and fine earth remain- 

 ing after burning a brush heap ; when en- 

 i^aged in this operation they no doubt deposit 

 tiie seed. If the farmer will spread the ashes 

 and plough up the ground im med lately after the 

 fire is extinguished he will find no poke grow- 

 ing on the spot or its Ticmity. 



A Natitk Penkstltaniar. 



Montgomery Co., Maryland, July, 183H. 



One individual who is methodical in his 

 bushiess can, with ease, perform the work of 

 four men who set order and regularity at de- 

 fiance. 



The way to wealth depends on two things, 

 industry and frugality ; that is, waste nei- 

 ther time nor money ; but make the beet use 

 of both. 



