DEVOTED TO AGRICULTUKE AND ITS KIHDBED AKTS AND SClEA'UJiJS. 



VOL. XV. 



BOSTON, JANUARY, 1863. 



NO. 1. 



NOURSE, EATON & TOLMAN, Proprietors. 

 Office... .100 Washington Street. 



SIMON BROWN, Editor. 



HENRY F. FRENCH, Associate Editor. 



JANTJAKY. 



"The wintry West extends his blast, 



And hail and rain do blow ; 

 Or the stormy North sends driving forth 



The blinding sleet and snow. 

 While tumbling brown, the burn comes down, 



And roars from bank to brae ; 

 And bird and beast in covert rest 



And pass the heartless day," Burns. 



HE New Year comes 

 again to us laden with 

 blessings and duties. 

 We have passed once 

 more the annual cycle, 

 and another chapter 

 of life is written and 

 stamped with its final 

 seal. How important 

 it is, at this time, that 

 we pause and review 

 the past. It speaks to 

 us from its tomb with 

 a voice both of warn- 

 ing and encouragement, and points, with its dead 

 finger, the pathway through the fields of the fu- 

 ture which we, as rational beings, should pursue. 

 What lessons can be more important or impres- 

 sive than those of "dead Time ?" More eloquent 

 than the preachings of Melancthon or a Luther, 

 are the prelections and sermons of the vanished 

 months which died like saintly (but mistaken) 

 nuns, breathing out their balmy life in the still- 

 ness and quiet of cloistral solitude, with the rosa- 

 ry, and badge of salvation upon their breasts. 



Although we cannot now, as in the bloom and 

 flushing spring and summer, or amid the purple 

 and golden glories of autumn, wander "o'er bank 

 and brae," or on the "sloping hillsides," drinking 

 in the inspiration of the poet, and dreaming dreams 

 of rare enchantment and beauty, yet we are not 

 destitute of ample means of enjoyment within the 

 circle of home engrossments ; and while the skies 

 are veiled in "thick clouds," and the loud winds 



howling their paeans through the dismantled trees, 

 we can draw around us the great and good of 

 every clime, and hold familiar intercourse with su- 

 perior minds upon the various topics which con- 

 cern us, and the interests of the little world of so- 

 cial life by which we are surrounded, and of which 

 we are the protectors and the heads. 



It is one of the rarest immunities of our social 

 system, that, amid the desolation of this season of 

 the common year, Ave are at liberty to enjoy the 

 fruits of our labors unannoyed by the cares and 

 perplexities which abate the happiness of the mart 

 of more worldly and sordid aims. Peace reigns 

 within the farmer's domicil, and contentment — 

 the greatest blessing that the human mind can en- 

 joy — crowns him with perennial delight, while the 

 merchant, whose canvas whitens every sea, is 

 plunged into distress by perils of war and the 

 waters, or by every change in the markets not 

 favorable to his wishes, and made miserable by 

 every mutation in business and the price of stocks. 

 With the close of the vegetative year, he can close 

 his doors upon care, and isolate himself effpctually 

 i from its annoyances. Surrounded by his family 

 and a few select fi-iends, he can devote his mind 

 to study or mental recreation, with the assurance 

 that in the acquisition of useful knowledge^ he is 

 not only gratifying an imperative and heaven-in- 

 stituted want of his nature, but actually contribut- 

 ing to the happiness and well-being of the world 

 around him, as contemplated in the results which 

 his acquisitions are calculated to promote. . 



Wisely has the poet counselled : 



"Sow, though in days of gloom, the seeds 

 Of manful toil and generous deeds. 

 Of stern self-sacrifice, that heeds 



Little the world's behest ; 

 Cast out the lying thought that pleads 



'Enough, now take thy rest.' 



"That which was sown in the wintry air 

 Shall blossom and ripen when skies are fair, 

 Though thine should be many an anxious care 



