THE GEITESEE FARMER. 



375 



New Advertisements tliis Month. 



[ e New York Observer— Sidney E. Morse & Co., New York. 

 I e Saturday Evening Post— Deacon & Peterson, Philadelphia. 

 J e Little Pilgrim— Leander K. Lippencott, Philadelphia. 



over & Baker's Family Sewing Machines. 



Home in the Sunny South — A. Van Doren, Falmouth, Va. 



Close of the Volume. 



IE present number terminates our engagements with 



' 'ly twenty thousand subscribers of the Genesee Farmer: 



have endeavored to make good all our promises. We 



labored to conduct the Genesee Faiiner in accordance 

 I its time-honored motto, " The Practical and Scien- 



Farmers' (hon Paper." We have, aided by our nu- 

 ous correspondents, aimed each month to furnish in- 

 sting, reliable; and valuable information. We have 

 lestly desired to exclude everything calculated to mis- 

 Articles may have been published which conflict 

 the experience of some of our readers. To this, 

 'ever, they cannot reasonably object. Our columns 

 epen to free, courteous discussion on all matters per- 

 ing to the farmer's vocation. If any of our readers 

 Ttain opinions differing from those published, they are 

 only at liberty to state them in our columns, but are 

 lestly invited to do so. 



he Genesee Farmer should be regarded as a " Monthly 

 mers' Club," at which delegates from every State and 

 ritory, as well as from the Canadas, favor the meeting 

 1 their experience, observations, and suggestions. 



e fiirmers and fruit-growers compare notes, and study 

 h others opinions and practices. The discussions du- 



the present year have been conducted with marked 

 rtesy and mature deliberation. The next meeting of 



Club will be held on the first of January. Any person 



become a member on the paj^ment of fifty cents, and 

 3 entitles him to all the privileges of the association 

 1 a volume of the Transactions for the year 1859 ! 

 'hose of our friends who have been pleased with the 

 nesee Farmer during the present year will, we trust, 

 )scribe without delay for the next volume. We do not 

 ih to lose a single reader. Thanks to the disinterested 

 3rts of our friends who have acted as agents in procur- 

 ; subscribers, and in communicating their experience 

 ■ough its pages, the Genesee Farmer is in a most pros- 

 rous condition. Encouraged by our greatly increased 

 d increasing circulation, we are determined to spare no 

 brts to make the next volume of the Farmer still more 

 )rtliy of their patronage. 



Will not our friends give us a practical evidence of their 

 od will, by showing a number of the paper to their 

 ighbors, and asking them to join the " Farmers' Club ?" 

 e want fifty thousand subscribers next year,— and we 

 all have them if our friends will make a little timely 

 brt in our behalf. There are 25,.565 postoflSces in the 

 nited States, and there are comparatively few where a 



club of from eight to twenty subscribers might not be 

 formed, if some earnest friend of agriculture or horticul- 

 ture would use his influence in procuring subscriptions. 

 There is no reason why the " Farmers' Own Paper" might 

 not have a hundred thousand regular readers. It has now 

 a larger circulation than any other similar journal in the 

 world, and its cheapness, if nothing else, commends it to 

 still greffter patronage. 



And now, thanking our agents for their disinterested 

 eSbrts in our behalf, our numerous cerrespondents for 

 their valuable communications, and our readers generally 

 for their encouragement and support, we bidUhem adieu, 

 —trusting that if our intercourse the present year has 

 been half as agreeable to them as it has to us, we shall see 

 one and all, and thousands more, at the next regular 

 i' Monthly Meeting of the Farmers' Club," which will take 

 place on the 1st of January, at the warm fire-sides of the 

 intelligent yeomanry of our extended and happy country. 



Local Agricultural Papers. 



"An agricultural paper must be a local paper, or it 

 can not be adapted to your soil, your climate, and your 

 exposure." — Indiana FaiTner. 



According to this rule, every county must have its 

 agricultural paper,— nay, every town, and almost every 

 farm. There are a great variety of soils in every county, 

 in every town, and not unfrequently on the farm itself. — 

 Must we have agricultural papers designed for the occu- 

 pants of clay farms, sandy lands, calcareous, sandy and 

 clayey loams ; for a dairy farm, a wheat, or corn, or stock 

 farm? Must we have an agricultural paper for the far- 

 mer on a southern, a northern, an eastern and a western 

 exposure? One for the uplands and another for the val- 

 leys? 



If farmers were entirely ignorant of the details of their 

 vocation,— if they had to turn to an agricultural paper be- 

 fore they could tell when to perform the multifarious op- 

 erations of the field, the garden, and the barn-yard, there 

 would be some truth in the assertion that " an agricul- 

 tural paper must be a local paper." But this is not the 

 case. An intelligent farmer does not read the paper for 

 the purpose of learning the details of his business, but 

 rather to inform himself of those general principles on 

 which a rational system of agriculture and horticulture is 

 based. These principles are the same in Indiana as in 

 Western New York — in America as in Europe. Climat-e 

 and soil modify their application ; but once understood, 

 any intelligent farmer can vary his practices according to 

 his circumstances. 



If an ao-ricultural paper is what it should be — if it is 

 desio-ned for men, not children ; if it furnishes food for 



thou<^ht strong meat, and not milk-and-water — it can be 



read with profit by the farmers of the East and the West, 

 the North and the South. 



The principal defect of the agricultural and horticultu- 

 ral literature of America— of the age— is that it is too 

 dilute. There is too much of it. No one can doubt that 

 if the talent now employed on half a dozen agricultural 

 papers was concentrated upon one, it would be better for 

 publishers and patrons— better for writers and the read- 

 ing public. 



Instead of multiplying agricultural papers, therefore,— 

 instead of making them " local," it would be wiser to de- 



