DEVOTED TO AGRICULTTJBE AND ITS KTNDKED AKTS AND SCIENCES. 



VOL. XIV 



BOSTON, OCTOBER, 1862. 



NO. 10. 



KOURSE, EATOX & TOLMAN, Proprietors. 

 Office.... 100 Washington Street. 



SIMON BROWN, Editor. 



HENRY F. FRENCH, Associate Editor. 



SUGGESTED BY OCTOBER. 



"All through the night 

 The subtle frost hath plied its mystic art, 

 And in tlie day the golden sun hatli ■nTought 

 True wonders ; and the vrings of morn and even 

 Have touched with magic breath the changing leaves, 

 And now, as wanders the dilating eye 

 Athwart the varied landscape circling far, 

 What gorgeousncss, what blazonry, what pomp 

 Of colors, burst upon the ravished sight." 



Gallagher. 



HE sad leaves 

 are now falling, 

 sere and with- 

 ered, from the 

 branches -which 

 so recently they 

 adorned ; the 

 wailing wind 

 sighs through 

 the forest, and 

 speaks with 



more than Cice- 

 ronean or De- 

 mosthenean elo- 

 quence, of decay 

 and death. But 

 nothing is lost 

 to human happi- 

 ness, or the ad- 

 vancement of society, by this change from activity 

 to torpor. Xature suffers no diminution of her 

 powers — no declension of her glorious preroga- 

 tives, by hybernating. In the beautiful economy 

 of nature there are no harsh antagonisms, for in 

 ever}' department, every development tends to a 

 common end. Xot so in the human mind and 

 character. The alchymy of vice not only trans- 

 forms, — it destroys. 



Wc have read somewhere of an artist, who, 

 meeting with a child of exquisite loveliness, de- 

 sired to preserve its features for fear he should 

 never meet such loveliness again. He painted 



the face upon canvas and suspended the picture 

 upon the wall of his studio. To him, in his som- 

 bre hours, that sweet, gentle face was like an an- 

 gel of light, filling his soul with the purest aspira- 

 tions. If ever I find, said he to himself, a perfect 

 contrast to this lovely countenance, I will paint 

 that also, and suspend the two, side by side, as 

 an ideal of heaven and hell. 



At length it chanced that, in a distant land, he 

 beheld in a prison the most hideous and revolting 

 object he had ever met — a fierce, haggard fiend, 

 with glaring eyes, and forehead furrowed with the 

 lines of lust and crime. The artist remembered 

 his vow, and painted a picture of the loathsome 

 form to hang beside the lovely portrait that al- 

 ready adorned his studio walls — the picture of the 

 lovely boy. The contrast was perfect, but most 

 revolting ; his dream was realized — the antipodes 

 — the two extremes of human character, were viv- 

 idly before him. But what was the surprise of 

 the painter when he ascertained the history of 

 this disgusting abortion, to find that it was the 

 lovely boy whom he had painted ! These pictures 

 — the Angel and the Demon — now hang side by 

 side in a Tuscan gallery. Let us look at the ef- 

 fects of vice on man, and on society, and we shall 

 see changes equally as marked and mournful as 

 that which realized the idea of the painter's dream. 

 We need not travel to a foreign gallery to see il- 

 lustrated the transforming power of vice upon our 

 physical and moral nature. 



"Of the soul, the body form doth take, 



For soul is form, and doth the body make." 



"That brazen-faced, wanton-looking wreck of 

 womanhood, was once a sweet, modest little girl, 

 that blushed at the slightest indelicate allusion. 

 That obese, bloated, brandy-burnt visage, was 

 once a joyous, light-hearted boy. What strange 

 alchymy has wrought this bestial transformation ? 

 They have been in the hard battles of appetite, 

 and bear the scars of many campaigns." When 



