HAMPSHIRE. HAMPDEN, <fcc. 61 



HAMPSHIRE, HAMPDEN AND FRANKLIN AGRICULTU- 

 RAL SOCIETY. 



The Hampshire, Hampden and Franklin Agricultural Society 

 held their twenty-eighth Cattle Show and Exhibition of Do- 

 mestic Manufactures, at Northampton, the 15th and 16th of 

 October last. The returns consist of the reports of commit- 

 tees, with the awards of premiums, unaccompanied, however, 

 by any statements from successful competitors. From the 

 reports the following selections are made. 



On Domestic Manufactures. 



The domestic arts are numerous, but not more so than they 

 are valuable. That many men have become thrifty and inde- 

 pendent, and that many more have been saved from bankruptcy 

 by the wheels and needles of industrious wives and daughters, 

 no one can doubt. The females of such families know nothing 

 of lawyers, except by the hearing of the ear: and their know- 

 ledge of sheriffs, nothing but a passing one ; for if they pass 

 their way, they surely pass their doors. Count those acres of 

 land well fenced and well cultivated, and those flocks now feed- 

 ing on our thousand hills, purchased directly or indirectly by 

 woman's labor, and you have facts of no ordinary interest to 

 the political economist. 



But the profits of the spinning-wheel, the distaff, the loom 

 and the needle, are not. all told in counting up. at the end of the 

 year, the shillings and dollars earned and saved for the pur- 

 chase of land with its flocks and herds. Fire-side industry has 

 other and higher bearings. It affects the mental, social and 

 moral condition of families. Time becomes valuable to us as 

 we understand our relations, and resolve to live answerably to 

 them, by a proper discharge of our appropriate duties. The 

 idea that we have something to do, and that constantly, for our- 

 selves and others, lies at the foundation of industrious habits. 

 And in tlioso persevering attempts to supply physical wants 



