630 SELECTIONS FROM ADDRESSES. 



a cat's earl Deny it who may, one's claims to be called a 

 practical farmer are generally judged by outward appearances. 

 His hands, are they hard — showing labor ? His dress, is it 

 coarse — to stand work? His boots, are they of cowhide, and 

 heavy ? All tending to prove that it is the amount of labor 

 that a man performs with his own hands, and not his mental 

 qualifications and proficiency, that procures the verdict in his 

 favor. Yet, according to the ordinary definition of a practical 

 farmer, the patient ox might put in a pretty fair claim. His 

 hands and boots are harder than his biped brother's ; his dress 

 is stouter, and is of the same stuff that his great-grandfather 

 wore ; and he toils, at the plough or at the cart-tongue, all the 

 day and every day. But, gentlemen, this is not my definition 

 of a practical farmer. Clothed in what dress it pleaseth him 

 to wear, with hands hardened by toil or not, in this land of 

 common schools and of general intelligence, ^Hhe mixd is the 

 measure of the man." 



Because yonder individual came from the hands of his 

 Maker small in stature, does it necessarily follow that in all 

 the practical employments of life, or even in those that seem 

 to require the most physical strength, he must be the inferior 

 of his stalwart brother, who stands "six feet in his stockings?" 

 Stand, then, awhile, upon the quarter-deck of a ship, as she 

 strips for a contest with the storm. The bullying winds roar 

 around her, the dark sky seems to descend upon her, the angry 

 waves lift up their heads, threatening to ingulf her. That 

 tempest-tost bark, now piercing the clouds with her trembling 

 masts, now driving headlong into the yawning trough of the 

 sea, is freighted with human souls. Who now trusts to the 

 boasted strength of his right arm ? who feels security in the 

 height of his stature ? All turn their anxious eyes upon the 

 practical sailor, who commands the craft, — a man puny in 

 person, very possibly ; with clean, delicate hands, sporting, 

 mayhap, a seal ring ; dressed as if holding tar in contempt, — 

 he alone, with the blessing of God, without which we can do 

 nothing, can rescue those giant sons of the ocean from 'their 

 imminent peril. And, when storm-driven from their course, 

 he alone can pilot them in safety to the desired haven. If, 

 then, in the hour of danger, when Death rages for his prey and 

 a yawning sea shows the ready grave, men acknowledge the 



