THE FARMER'S MONTHLY VISITOR. 



151 



city embracing the three most considerable 

 towns in the interior upon the Kennebeck — witli 

 their city as well as their country aspect ; and 

 not more magnificent did these towns api>ear 

 than the noblo stream upon which had been float- 

 ed to them the means of wealth. But what to 

 me was most interesting of all was the soil capa- 

 ble of producing the meansof sustenance for man 

 and beast to every desirable extent — the soil bear- 

 ing upon its surface in all seasons of vegetation 

 evidences of a depth of richness beneath, which 

 encourages those who cultivate it to dive deeper 

 and deeper into its bosom. The county of Ken- 

 nebeck, already richer than many older counties 

 of the older New England States, possesses ad- 

 vantages that few interior counties possess : her 

 soil, deep, rich and retentive, gathers capacity lor 

 increased production the more it is cultivated : it 

 is a soil which can never wear out so long as it 

 shall be fed and nourished — it is a soil which 

 will become more surely productive, under an 

 improving cultivation, the more crops shall be 

 taken from it. Within a few years we have 

 heard of the discovery of extended marl beds on 

 the Atlantic seaboard, especially in the State of 

 New Jersey where it has already been extensive- 

 ly and advantageously used as a manure. By 

 means of this material, underlaying large dis- 

 tricts of country where a natur.illy light sterile 

 soil had been rendered more sterile by a system 

 of farming which takes every tiling away and 

 carries nothing back, fruitful fields have been 

 multiplied, the face of the ground has itself 

 changed, and the means of subsistence have 

 been greatly increased. The richness of the 

 coimtry which siu-rounds this capital and its sis- 

 ter villages results from that same quality of marl 

 in which the better soil of almost every agricul- 

 tural district abounds. Pas.«ing over your excel- 

 lent roads we have the evidence of a better qual- 

 ity of soil in its deeper excavations ; and if the 

 upper saface of such a soil shall become exhaust- 

 ed, the new labor which overturns that and 

 brings to the surface what has laid hidden below 

 for bundi-eds of ages will be repaid many fold in 

 its increased capacity. 



The inherent sources of wealth and happiness 

 exist perhaps to a greater extent in the State of 

 Maine than they do in any other State of the 

 Union : but it is here, as it is in every other State, 

 that we should look to Agriculture as that most 

 ennobling pursuit which will give vigor and 

 health to every other calling, whether it shall be 

 mechanical, mercantile or professional. And 

 what rule of life can be better and mole safely 

 established than to make that calling the most 

 honorable which contributes most to our com- 

 forts ? Let it be our feeble purpose in the best 

 efforts that remrfiu to life to extend that calling 

 and make it no less honorable than it is useful. 

 In themselves the occupation and the operations 

 of the successful farmer present attractions that 

 are scarcely equalled by the best results of the 

 highest mental efforts. There is a charm in the 

 rich vegetation that grows out of the efforts of the 

 skilful agriculturist vvhich the ingenuity of tlie 

 best inventions in morals or science can scarcely 

 reach. 



The value of agricultural associations and of 

 agricultural exhibitions is found in the knowl- 

 edge which they collect and diffuse, and in the in- 

 ducements which are offered for the trial of new 

 improvements by the developed results of suc- 

 cessfid experiments. Man does not live for him- 

 self alone,nur for the generation oftbe present day. 

 Miserable would he be in the pursuit of any busi- 

 ness if all his knowledge must be confined in his 

 own personal practice. Each generation is or 

 should be wiser than the generation which pre- 

 ceded it, because every new generation combines 

 all the new advantages of a longer experience. 

 The whole world had continued to be shrouded 

 in barbarism, had not the means in the progress 

 of succeeding ages been discovered of transmit- 

 ting the experience of the father to the son ; and 

 not the individual experience of a single family, 

 but the collected wisdom of a previous age, is 

 brought down as man " who is but of a few days" 

 enters and passes over the stage of life. 



Compared with much of the civilized world 

 this country, and even our own New England 

 the elder part of this country, is recent and t 

 We have in this land of freedom evidence of the 

 greater advance and advantage that belongs to 

 aciencB — to a knowledge of t!i« better experience 



hich comes down to us and has remained with 

 us since the first settlement of the country. We 

 have seen this new people keeping pace with all 

 the best improvements of civilization — we have 

 seen them advance at once fiirther than any other 

 nation to a knowledge oftbe true principles of self- 

 government — we have seen them managing sys- 

 tems and plans lor the regulation of society, for 

 conservation and safety of the public and in- 

 dividual rights which are a step and I might say 

 I many steps beyond the best rules of the best 

 foreign state or nation or municipality on earth. 

 lU 1 will not detain you with an essay upon 

 the great improvements that are taking place in 

 the world. I will at once bring you to the sub- 

 ject which has called us together on this occasion 



to the matter upon which depends every other 

 matter connected with the prosperity and welfare 

 oftbe State; for without attention to the Agricul- 

 ture oftbe country — without the improvement of 

 our soil, without perseverence in a course which 

 shall make our lands more productive, we must 

 degenerate as a people — we must, in the absence 

 of means for our best enjoyments, either become 

 miserable from want, or resort to new countries 

 for those enjoyments which only can be appreci- 

 ated by those who earn them by their own efforts. 



I take at once the position that the trade and 

 occupation of the farmer — I mean the man who 

 labors with his hands, and who pursues that labor 

 as his most constant occupation — is that pursuit 

 hich secures equal if not greater enjoyment 

 than that which may appear upon the surtiice the 

 most desirable business upon earth. If we look 

 in any direction where do we find the man with 

 so many means of happiness, with so great power 



guard himself against the adverse accidents 

 and vicissitudes of life, as the independent farm- 

 Other men, even men of wealth and great 

 influence, depend still for the principal means of 

 living upon the labors of others ; and with his 

 coffers filled with silver and gold, with power to 

 direct and command those around him, the rich 

 man and the mighty man may not have the means 

 of subsistence from day to day. As every thing 

 springs from the earth, so upon the cultivators of 

 the earth is every living and moving thing in the 

 shape of humanity dependent. 



Men accustomed to the toil and .sweat of the 

 face retire from the world and its business for 

 the purpose of enjoyment. Did you ever see a 

 man thus retiring before he had arrived at the 

 "sere and yellow leal" of life who advanced at 

 all in enjoyment ? It is one of the glorious dis- 

 pensations of Providence incident to our natures, 

 that man enjoys more happiness in labor than in 

 indolence and inactivity. The road of public 

 preferment is open to every man in this free 

 country : it is the privilege of the farmer to be- 

 come distinguished as the careful local officer of 

 our towns, in the halls of legislation, in the field 

 either as tiie subordinate or head of our armies, 

 and even upon the bench oftbe magistrate. No 

 men are generally blotter qualified or more dis- 

 creet and safe agents for executing the various 

 purposes of civil government, than the intelligent 

 farmers of our country towns. For the last thir- 

 ty years I have been conversant with much pub- 

 lic business of a State and of the nation: I have 

 known men of no occupation more trustwortiiy 

 or more able so far as related to all the practical 

 uses of government, than farmers who have left 

 the plough for one or more weeks or months in a 

 year to take seats in the Legislature, or manage 

 the prudential concerns of a town, or administer 

 upon estates, or even sit as judges in causes 

 for trial. Rarely will it be found that the well 

 informed man who has spent a portion of his 

 time in public life — who has gone his round as t 

 State legislator or even left his farm and his fam- 

 ily to occupy a seat in Congress, who does not 

 return to the labor of his farm, if he have been 

 successful in that pursuit, with an appetite in- 

 creased for a more zealous devotion to his occu- 

 pation. I have myselfbeen more or less in pub- 

 lic life for twenty years — I have spent the time of 

 several successive sessions by the side of some 

 oftbe most talented and conspicuous men oftbe 

 country in that desirable position the Senate of 

 the United States, and I have in succeeding years 

 sat at the head of the councils of the State; but 

 better and more satisfactory would have been the 

 employment, had my constitution and education 

 admitted the exercise, to have labored on land 

 which I knew to belonjs; to me, and on which I 



had the satisfaction of witnessing a growing an- 

 nual production profitably increased by my per- 

 sonal efforts. I have in fact gladly retreated from 

 a public position when my services might be dis- 

 pensed with to do such work in the garden or 

 field as 1 know how to perform. 



" Let the soldier ciult in the pomp of war, 



The king in his serf-tiironed hall ; 

 The free-born farmer is happier far 



Than kinea, and lords, and all. 

 His are no fields with carnage red, 



And drenched with blood of the slain, 

 But hills and vales, o'er which is spread 

 A harvest of waving grain." 

 The gentleman farmer, he who puts not his 

 hand to labor but oidy overlooks and instructs 

 others, is comtnendable as doing a duty some- 

 times sufficiendy onerous: frequently the exten- 

 sive cares of a farm may require an oversight 

 that will forbid the manual labor of its owiVer. 

 But the man, who owns and occupies a farm ei- 

 ther small or large and who will manage and la- 

 bor both at the same time, must have the gratify- 

 ing anticipation of more sure success ; and pos- 

 sessing that, his |iositlon is the more desirable. 

 Thanks to the good sense of an educated coin- 

 niunily, the time has arrived when it is not con- 

 sidered disreputable for any New England man 

 to strip for work upon his own farm — the " strip- 

 ed frock" in a New England field is an insignia 

 " more honorable than the star and garter or any 

 other order that can be conferred by king, prince 

 or potentate." It derogates from the merit of no 

 man — it unfits him for no seat in the carpeted 

 halls of the legislator or the magistrate, or even 

 for the parlor oftbe voluptuary. 



I am happy to perceive that the spirit of the 

 new agricultural journals established within the 

 last few years has had the effect to animate no 

 inconsiderable portion of the agricultural com- 

 munity. The number of agricultural associa- 

 tions in the several States is probably four times 

 as great as it was four years ago. In some States 

 these as.sociations are patronized by the govern 

 ments of the States in proportion to the amount 

 offered by voluntary contribution : in other States 

 associations depend entirely on private subscrip- 

 tions. These associations are not more impor- 

 tant to the members who compose them than to 

 the whole agricultural community. If there is a 

 farmer who cannot find time or money to expend 

 in agricultural exhibitions or to read and pay for 

 newspapers devoted exclusively to agriculture 

 and domestic economy, the successful experi- 

 ments and improvements elicited by the one and 

 spread abroad through the other will reach him 

 through the spirit that the information has infus- 

 ed into the ambition of his neighbor. He will 

 find that neighbor at first trying some new meth- 

 od of cultivation different from that pursued ever 

 since the forest was cleared : perhaps he will 

 laugh at the taste which differs from the ortho- 

 doxy of the former practice : the experimenter 

 may dig too deep or plough too deep — he may 

 ruin his prospect of a crop by beating down the 

 lightened soil with a heavy roller — he may grow 

 his Indian corn in a field flattened like his 

 mowing ground, and tiius leave it without a prop 

 against the winds — he may cover his manure out 

 of sight a foot deep below the surface, and lose 

 the whole by leaching — he may change his wet 

 ground into dry by filling the bottom with rucks 

 leaving a cover of earth only deep enough to go 

 below the reach of the plough, and thus in the 

 opinion of the wondering man who mows a small 

 remnant of sour hay on the same ground where ' 

 his great-grandfather mowed it a hundred years 

 ago, forever spoil his meadow by the change — he 

 may ditch his meadows or cover them with grav- 

 el or sand with the apparent prospect that they 

 will forever be as unproductive as the interior of 

 the bed from which the new material is taken — all 

 this may be the subject of scorn and derision to 

 the man who looks with suspicion upon the im- 

 provements suggested by an agricultural news- 

 paper or recommended through the report ofthe 

 committee of an agricultuial society. But afier 

 the courageous farmer who has ventured out of 

 the track long steadily pursued from father to 

 son to the third and fourth generation has suc- 

 ceeded in some capital crop once, twice, thrice 

 beyond his sneering neighbor — when he repeats 

 the crop improving it each yetir on land original- 

 ly of poorer quality — when he raises large crops 

 of hay for successive years over the turned sward 

 that was never moved to bo rotte<l on the sur- 



