Vol. 8. 



ROCHESTER, N. Y. — DECEMBER, 1847, 



No. 12. 



THE GENESEE FARMER : 



Issjied the first of each month-, in Rochester, N. Y,, by 



D. D. T. MOORE, PROPRIETOR. 



DANIEL LEE. EDITOR. 



p. BARRY, Conductor of the Horticultural Department. 



With this number closes the eighth volume 

 of the Genesee Farmer, We have not space 

 for extended remarks, and must therefore omit 

 noticing some matters pertinent to the occasion. 

 Were we to adopt a custom much in vogue at 

 the present day, we should perhaps state that we 

 have accomplished much less than we intended — 

 and then promise ample amends for the future. 

 But we are not inclined to discourse in that wise, 

 for we have endeavored faithfully to discharge 

 our duty to the readers of this journal, and the 

 agricultural community. Whether that duty has 

 been performed as it ought, and in the manner 

 best calculated to benefit those for whom we have 

 labored, each subscriber will judge for himself. 

 We do not expect that all our readers have 

 been particularly interested or benefitted by the 

 perusal of the Farmer, yet we trust its pages 

 have imparted appropriate and useful information 

 to a large majority. 



Our subscription list is now the largest, with 

 a single exception, of any agricultural journal 

 published in the United States— and we think 

 our contributors and correspondents, in numbers 

 and ability, are at least equal to those of any other 

 similar journal. We are under gr^at obligations 

 to the numerous persons who have aided in pro- 

 moting the usefulness of the Farmer, by extend- 

 ing its circulation and contributing to its pages. 

 If continued, the assistance of such generous 

 friends — without whose approval and influence 

 we could do little or nothing to advance the cause 

 of improvement — will enable us to make our 

 next volume still more interesting and valuable. 

 In consequence of the very Ioav price of the 

 Farmer a larger subscription list is necessary to 

 sus^in it properly. But we leave this matter with 

 the Farmers and Horticulturists of the Country. 



A Farmer's Library. 



Long winter evenings are close at hand. The 

 season for reading good books, for studying the 

 Science of Agriculture, has already arrived. — 

 How greatly can we elevate our standing in so- 

 ciety, our usefulness in the world, and increase 

 our ability to command an independent liveli- 

 hood, by the due improvement of all our leisure 

 hours! Few young men justly appreciate the 

 advantages which cheap books, and periodical 

 journals like the Farmer, place within their reach. 

 Rapid, careless, slips-hod reading is the crowning 

 folly of the young men and women, whom it is 

 our fortune to meet. They lack patience, perse- 

 verance, and untiring industry in the prosecution 

 of useful studies. How few young farmers can 

 show an agricultural library of twenty volumes. 

 What would they think of the professional attain- 

 ments of a lawyer, physician, or clergyman, 

 whose reading in his calling was thus limited ? 



Permit a friend to suggest the purchase and 

 careful study of Johnston's Lectures on Agricul- 

 tural Chemistry and Geology ; Boussingault's 

 Rural Economy ; Allen's American Agriculture; 

 Lindley's Theory of Horticulture ; and Liebig's 

 Chemistry — not to name more expensive works. 



We know of no contemporary agricultural 

 journal unworthy of support ; but to commend 

 any one would seem invidious and unkind to- 

 ward the others. ^We ask attention to the fact 

 that, of the four millions of male adults employed 

 in agriculture in the United States, not far from 

 three millions nine hundred thousand, or thirty- 

 nine in forty, take no paper of the kind. To them 

 the experience and carefully conducted experi- 

 ments of other practical farmers, becomo utterly 

 valueless, so soon as they are printed on paper! 

 The number who take agricultural papers in the 

 State of New York is much larger than one in 

 forty. But take the whole Union together, and our 

 estimate is rather above than below the ti-uth. — 

 Friends of the Farmer and of the Writer, will 

 you not aid the cause by doubling tha subscription 

 list of this journal for 1848 ? The volume shall 

 be worthy of a place in any man's library. 



