THE GENESEE FARMER. 



279 



pens upoQ a gallery, No. 7, leading to the yard, 

 fnder this gallery is the outside entrance to the 

 iOi^ement. 



The second floor contains four chambers, each 

 arnished with a large clothe.s-press. Two of these 

 hanihers are lighted by dormer windows. 



Cost — about $1,600 near Boston. 



THE AMEEICAN FAEMER 



Not all men who cultivate the earth are farmers ; 

 lot all farmers are American farmers. The Amer- 

 can farmer brings to that avocation the highest 

 idvantages of science and skill, of virtue and in- 

 lustry, owning the soil which he cultivates, and 

 lonoring his labors by the spirit of an American 

 litizen. There is a tendency to undervalue this 

 iphere of life. The pride which professional and 

 jommercial prosperity generates, hesitates to ac- 

 knowledge the farmer as a social equal; and even 

 armers' sons have caught the infection, and joined 

 n the clamor of depreciation. Men are ready 

 inough to be lawyers or physicians, — these are 

 lonorable professions; — ready enough to sell tape 

 jy the yard, or pins by the dozen, — even this is 

 ijonorable. But to breathe the air of newly-turned 

 sarth, to feel its touch, to hear the rustling of 

 growing crops, to drive loaded wains to market, to 

 exchange heavy golden grains for grains of heavy 

 gold, to live amid scenes of natural beauty, amid 

 conditions of physical health, God's truest^ noblest 

 freemen, — this is dishonor. Let us see. 



Of lawyers, few rise to eminence, or even liberal 

 success. Physicians succeed a little better ; while 

 mercantile pursuits are well nigh a lottery. The 

 best symbol of successful merchants is found in the 

 adage of angels' visits. How different from the 

 precarious prospects of these are the prospects of 

 an intelligent, skillful, industrious, and virtuous 

 American farmer. Such a man, cultivating his 

 own soil, and engaging in no outside speculation, 

 never fails. He never fears that poverty will come 

 upon him so long as God fructifies the earth with 

 the dew, the rain, and the sunshine. To him, suc- 

 cess is as universal and as certain as the fultilment 

 of the divine promise which assures the seed time 

 and the harvest. The pursuits of such a man lie in 

 eonscious proximity to Providence; and he stands, 

 because he leans directly upon God. Compare, 

 then, his free and healthful life with the constrained 

 and unnatural conaitions under which professional 

 men and merchants live. These you find, it may 

 be, shut up by day in great piles of 'brick, or thread- 

 ing their way through narrow streets, where the 

 sun pours down his rays unmitigated by a single 

 retVeshing breeze ; and by night shut up again in 

 similar walls, changing the place but keeping the 

 pain, waked in tlie morning to the eternal discord 

 of rumbling carts, of milkmen's bells, of crios of 

 chimney sweeps, and barking of uncounted dogs. 

 Is this Ufel Do men live amid such scenes, or do 

 they only abide, constrained by some necessity of 

 fate, or punished for their sins? Even the birds 

 shun the city as they w^ould a prison. All the 

 powers of man are enervated and hurried to decay. 

 Witli such a scene, contrast the quiet of woodlands, 

 pastures, and meadows, delighting the eye with 

 their beauty, — the balmy airs which send vigor 

 through every fibre of man's structure, and make 



him strong to serve God and his fellow men. 

 With toils and anxieties forgotten, with windows 

 broad open, making his chamber as wide as the 

 universe, the farmer sleeps soundly and sweetly as 

 an infant, waking in the morning to the music of f 

 birds, and bounding to his task with a physical re- 

 generation. Tlds is life! How true it is that 

 "God made the country, man made the town." 

 Such comparisons might be indefinitely pursued, 

 and with similar results. It is enough to say that 

 no man's condition is more favorable to culture 

 than the farmer's, and that his opportunities of 

 social influence are sufficient to satisfy a true am- 

 bition. Science brings its aid to his labors, and so 

 perpetually beckons him to inquiries in her depart- 

 ments. To him every evening is free, and during 

 the winter he may devote himself almost exclusive- 

 ly to intellectual pursuits. Men of genius have 

 often found their inspiration in cultivated fields. 

 The scenes which surround him are the very homes 

 of studies in botany and geology. Nor are these 

 scenes less favorable to aesthetic culture. 



The charms of country life are of almost infinite 

 variety. Fruits more delicious than ever grew in 

 the garden of Pomona ; flowers that would grace a 

 Paradise ; herds of cattle such as Jupiter never saw 

 in a hecatomb ; horses as noble as ever contested in 

 the Olympic hippodromes; — all these and n-.uch 

 more strengthen and develop the best qualities of 

 his mind and heart. To stimulate the agricultural 

 zeal of his neighbors by illustrations of his own ; to 

 promote intelligence by the liberal support of 

 schools ; to contribute by his example and influence 

 to the improvement of roads, bridges, and ]>ubiic 

 building's ; to nourish and sustain the institutions 

 of religion; to aid the progress of public morals; 

 to instruct and elevate his dependents; to add in 

 this way to the qualities of a good farmer the high- 

 er and more comprehensive qualities of a christian 

 man; — this constitutes a life which has in it far 

 more of the elements of a true nobility than are 

 often found amid the emblazonry of rank and the 

 splendid ceremonies of courts. Such is the true 

 life of the American farmer. If there be demanded 

 an example which will forever command the vene- 

 ration of the world, we turn to one who formed 

 amid the peaceful scenes of husbandry the great 

 character which drew to him a nation's confidence, 

 which made him the repository of a nation's desti- 

 ny, and who, when he had fulfilled that mission, 

 returned to those scenes again, uncorrupted by am- 

 bition, and desirous only to renew the cares and 

 duties of a farmer, in the seclusion and happiness 

 of his own Mount Vernon, A. b. eathbun. 



Oakfi^ld, Genesee Cownty, JV". T. 



TnEEB are many who suppose it necessary to 

 leave the second growth of grass undisturbed, to 

 rot on the ground, in order to preserve the fertility 

 of old meadows in grass where top-dressing with 

 manure is not resorted to. But such management 

 is oftentimes extremely hurtful, and the injury is 

 proportioned to the amount left untrodden and un- 

 fed. If the amount left standing, or laying loose 

 upon the surface, be considerable, it makes a har- 

 bor for mice, which will, under cover of the old 

 grass, intersect the surface of the land with paths 

 innumerable, from which they cut all the grass that 

 comes in their way. — E. W. BeecJier. 



