46 



GENESEE FARMER. 



Feb. 



The Farmer's Interests and Rights. 



Mr. Editor : — It is not often that I take the 

 liberty of troubling the conductor of a public 

 press. This you will probably discover from the 

 style of this communication. Yours is a paper 

 through which farmers ought to be allowed to ex- 

 press their sentiments on subjects which affect 

 their own interest ; and, as they are the founda- 

 tion of all prosperity, I may add the inter- 

 ests of all classes of community. Oppress the 

 tiller of the soil, and you sap the foundation of 

 our national prosperity, and shorten the duration 

 of our free institutions. Let the laboring man 

 occupy the place in community which he de- 

 serves, and we are in a measure safe in the en- 

 joyment of our privileges. I have often won- 

 dered why it was, that in the estimation of soci- 

 ety, the primitive calling of man, had come to 

 be the lowest calling. Why it was that a call- 

 ing, which first received the sanction of Infinite 

 Wisdom, as one fit to engage the time and at- 

 tention of man, should become menial to so ma- 

 ny other artificial employments brought into ex- 

 istence by vice, folly and inhumanity. The or- 

 der of nature seems to have been reversed, and 

 the great Jirst has become the insignigcant last. 

 By this, I only mean that the lawyer, the doctor, 

 the merchant and the man who struts about with 

 ♦' bullet buttons" on his coat, and " curled wire 

 on his shoulder," look upon the farmer very 

 much as the farmer looks upon his manure, a 

 thing inseparable from his prosperity yet all the 

 better for being trodden under foot. Is not this 

 so in relation to these professional gentlemen } 



One answers, no. I grant that there may be 

 some honorable exceptions, yet they are by far 

 too few. Where we find one professional man, 

 ©r one in pursuit of a profession, who when he 

 meets a farmer in the street, greets him as a be- 

 ing not his inferior in all that constitutes the 

 noblest work of God, we see an hundred who 

 •with '* soap-locks," delicate fingers, averted eye, 

 and a gentleman's gait, pass by the n|^n of the 

 sun-burned brow, and hard hand as a being un- 

 worthy of their notice. And only when sordid 

 interest dictates will they deign to open their 

 delicate lips in conference with him. Perhaps 

 they ought not to be blamed, for it is certainly 

 owing to a weakness in the " upper regions," 

 nor do I hold the farmer entirely blameless. It 

 is certainly folly on his part to allow such a state 

 of things to exist. Why do they allow them- 

 selves to be trodden upon one moment and flat- 

 tered into friendship the next ? Why allow pro 

 fessional men to do the work which belongs 

 to themselves ? I apprehend it is the want of 

 confidence, a diffidence in assuming responsibil- 

 ities which require a little mental application, 

 and an unwarrantable modesty in accepting sta- 

 tions that would bring them prominently before 

 the people. These situations are generally 



courted by those who live by the tongue and the 

 quill, but who never add one iota to the wealth 

 of the people. And we, " good easy souls," 

 are willing to lift them from their obscurity, and 

 carry them on our backs to a pinnacle where we 

 can but see them every time we lift our eyes 

 from the work that employs our hands. And 

 they, with no just sense of the responsibility that 

 rests upon them, act with an eye single to their 

 own aggrandizement. 



Now I hold this to be wrong ; men ought to 

 be more jealous of their rights, and have more 

 respect for themselves. Men who are the most 

 independent of any on the globe, whose powers 

 and privileges are unequalled by any set of men 

 in any country, who are continually conversant 

 witli the works of God, in forms beautiful and 

 sublime, ought to know their duty better, and 

 knowing, ought to do it. I think there is a want 

 of associate feeling among farmers, altogether 

 incompatible with their true interests. A man 

 living isolated and alone, can never know the 

 feelings and wishes of his neighbor. Men in 

 every other occupation in life associate togeth- 

 er, and by mutual council and information, ad- 

 vance immeasurably their own interests. Now, 

 if farmers would associate together more, im- 

 part to each other advice and information, with 

 more freedom, store their minds with knowl- 

 edge appropriate to their occupation, have con- 

 fidence in and support each other, they might 

 take a position far in advance of what they now 

 occupy. 



I am far from thinking that the information of 

 the farmer should b-> confined strictly to a knowl- 

 edge of farm operations. No, it should extend 

 to every thing that interests an American citi- 

 zen, and ever be ready to scrutinize the acts of 

 his Legislative servants with an enlightened 

 mind, a mind stored by reflection and reading, 

 with practical wisdom, and common sense. |f 

 farmers would oitener see themselves represent- 

 ed in our halls of legislation, I have no doubt 

 that their interests would be an hundred fold bet- 

 ter attended to than they are at present, and the 

 burdens they are now compelled to bear, mate- 

 rially lessened. 



In conclusion, I wish to say, that every farm- 

 er will find himself the gainer by subscribing for 

 an agricultural paper, and the Genesee Farmer 

 is certainly not the least deserving of them all. 

 You may put this communication on the table, 

 or under the table, or in the Genesee Farmer, as 

 you please. Another Farmer. 



Batavia, January, 1847. 



Cutting Glass.— A great secret has been made 

 of a discbve^pfor cutting and boring glass — which 

 is nothing more or less than using a common drill 

 with spirits of turpentine. The bottom of a tum- 

 bler may be readily bored through by hand with a 

 common saw file ground to a bevil. * 



