13 



business when the good times do come." So with us farmers, 

 we canuot aford to let our farms go to waste — to let our 

 trees die of neglect, and be eaten up by insects. We should 

 be ujp and doing ; the " good times" will come before we are 

 aware of it. More than half of the farmers in this county 

 with whom I have any acquaintance have money in the Sav- 

 ings Bank. Which is the best investment, money in the 

 Five Cent Savings Banks, and Railroad shares, or in beautify- 

 ing and making comfortable our own homes, in underdrain- 

 ing land, buying manure, reparing fences, and in a thousand 

 ways adding to the value and convenience of our farms, at 

 the same time aiding the unemployed, who stand waiting and 

 asking for our assistance. 



But it is not all dollars and cents that we live or should 

 live for. Culture and refinement are equally to be sought 

 after. It is a law of our being, that after the immediate 

 wants of the body are supplied, we turn to the study and en- 

 joyment of the beautiful, both in nature and art. The man 

 who leaves his New England home among the hills for the 

 western prairie, goes for gain ; a very commendable object 

 certainly, if it is not carried too far, but as soon as he has 

 made himself a comfortable home, and provided for the wants 

 of his domestic animals, he naturally thinks to beautify his 

 surroundings — planting a group of trees here, or a line of 

 evergreens there, not forgetting the vines, shrubs and flowers, 

 which will do so much to make his home cheerful and his 

 family happy. In older countries this is carried still further, 

 till the parks and gardens of England, France and Germany, 

 are known world-wide, and are held out as examples to us 

 on this side of the Atlantic, oftentimes not so much to our 

 help as discouragement. 



Our two largest cities. New York and Philadelphia, have 

 expended immense sums in laying out public parks, and in 

 both instances have copied and imitated nature as far as 

 possible. Beautiful lawns, wooded glens, and primeval trees 

 are preserved in their natural beauty, and the highest style of 

 landscape gardening takes nature for its teacher. 



