326 [Assembly 



for food, already great, can be made yearly a greater source of wealth 

 and health, and presents in the apple, so abundant and useful as well' 

 as delicious, when carefully grafted, some apology for the original 

 sin of eating it when forbidden fruit. 



What a field, too, is now opening in Florida and Texas for the 

 production of some of the rich tropical fruits, so conducive to health, 

 when temperately used, and always so genial to the taste. 



But, above all things, in encouragement to agriculture, we must be 

 cautious to make every improvement simple, plain, easily intelligible. 

 Time and money should not be wasted on what is complicated, as 

 such machines are not suited to the taste of farmers, and much less 

 can they be made useful in the hands of unlearned labourers and boys, 

 who attend to most of the arduous duties of agriculture. A farming 

 instrument, which should possess the numerous parts and complexity 

 of Bigelow's invention for weaving carpets, would be generally as use- 

 less as the fifth wheel to a coach, and well deserves " the thorns ard 

 briars of reproof," Any change, likewise, which is very expensive, 

 cannot much benefit i.^^riculture at large. It may be within reach o{ 

 the wealthy, a patrician few, who sometimes usefully patronize her 

 labourers, rather than labour themselves ; but the masses, who worship 

 ilaily in her temple, with the skies for their canopy, and the earnings 

 of personal toil for their reward ; or those who, though " lords of soil," 

 cultivate with their own hands, like the Roman Cincinnalus, their small 

 freeholds cannot afford large extra expensts or large advances, and 

 look chiefly to yearly returns for yearly outlays. 



Farmers on such a moderate scale deserve, also, more encourage- 

 ment, as more can thus live in independence, as the mind of labour is 

 more exercised and elevated, as it cherishes more self-respect, and as 

 capital and labour are thus more closely united in one common 

 interest, and their efforts are more identical, rather than hostile. 

 Personally grasping all their own concerns, such farmers understand 

 them better, and thus govern them better. And however pleasant it 

 is to behold many broad acres and vast crops, belonging to a single 

 establishment ; and however profiliible it may be made at times, it will 

 be found wiser for most of our people to cultivate less in quantity, 



