398 AGRICULTURE. 



leave " dull care " to dull spirits, and choose some field of life which 

 has more attractions, as well as more risks, than their own. 



We have stated all this frankly, because we believe it to be a 

 false and bad state of things which cannot last. The farming class 

 of America is not a rich class but neither is it a poor one 

 while it is an independent class. It may and should wield the 

 largest influence in the state, and it might and should enjoy the 

 most happiness the happiness belonging to intelligent minds, peace- 

 ful homes, a natural and independent position, and high social and 

 moral virtues. We have said much, already, of the special schools 

 which the farmer should have to teach him agriculture as a practi- 

 cal art, so that he might make it compare in profit, and in the daily 

 application of knowledge which it demands, with any other pursuit. 

 But we have said little or nothing of the farmer's home education 

 and social influences though these perhaps lie at the very root of 

 the whole matter. 



We are not ignorant of the powerful influence of woman, in any 

 question touching the improvement of our social and home educa- 

 tion. In fact, it is she who holds all the power in this sphere ; it is 

 she, who really, but silently, directs, controls, leads and governs the 

 whole social machine whether among farmers or others, in this 

 country. To the women of the rural districts the more intelligent 

 and sensible of the farmers' wives and daughters, we appeal then, for 

 a better understanding and a more correct appreciation of their true 

 position. If they will but study to raise the character of the farmer's 

 social life, the whole matter is accomplished. But this must be done 

 truthfully and earnestly, and with a profound faith in the true no- 

 bility and dignity of the farmer's calling. It must not be done by 

 taking for social growth the finery and gloss of mere city customs 

 and observances. It is an improvement that can never come from 

 the atmosphere of boarding-schools and colleges as they are now 

 constituted, for boarding-schools and colleges pity the farmer's igno- 

 rance, and despise him for it. It must, on the contrary, come from 

 an intelligent conviction of the honesty and dignity of rural life ; a 

 conviction that as agriculture embraces the sphere of God's most 

 natural and beautiful operations, it is the best calculated, when rightly 

 understood, to elevate and engage man's faculties ; that, as it feeds 



