306 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Oct. 



alone the heat and burden of the day ? Do you 

 not, young man, hear the voice of duty calling 

 upon you to "Stick to t\\^ Farm ?" 



Look again at the chances you have for suc- 

 ceeding in life. This is a subject that ought to 

 interest every one — a comfortable home with a 

 hapjoy family being the common desire of all. If 

 you remain on the farm, are sober and industrious, 

 and blessed with health, which is so common to 

 the inhabitants of the country, your success in 

 life is almost beyond a doubt. Can you direct 

 your capital, your energies and labors in a more 

 sure and safe direction ? Are your chances for 

 success in the city equally flattering P Take 

 heed of the startling facts, that only five out of 

 every one hundred of our merchants retire from 

 business with a competency ! Look at the profes- 

 sional gentlemen of our cities. Look over the 

 roll of attorneys, and select the names of the few 

 who have risen to distinction and wealth. Many 

 a young man is now but a slave in tlie city, who, 

 if he had stuck to the farm might have been one 

 of nature's own noblemen, free and independent ! 



Young men from the country are generally fas- 

 cinated with the glare and show of our cities ; but 

 as the weeks wear away, so will the flattering as- 

 pect of the city alike depart. Go visit the large 

 retail houses, and see the long row of pale, sickly 

 looking clerks, standing all day behind the coun- 

 ters, breathing the heated atmosphere of the store. 



Are they happy ? Do they not say to you, al- 

 most audibly, as you pass them, "Young man, 

 'Stick to the Farm ?' " What would they not 

 ^ive, think you, lor one day in the free, open 

 country ! Look again at the dangers that you 

 must meet in the city. I mean dangers of the 

 mind and soul. How many young men have been 

 unable to withstand them and have fallen ! 



Lastly, are you willing to sacrifice jour home in 

 the country, with all its comforts and privileges, to 

 that of one in the city ? Compare them and judge 

 for yourself. How many sweet memories cluster 

 around that ancient homestead ! Are they not 

 strong bands that bind you to it ? Is it easy for 

 you to turn your back upon that homestead and 

 say, 



"Ancient Homestead, quaint and dreary, 



Wiien shall I thy threshold tread ! 

 When return to those that love me, 



If, alas I they are not dead 1" 



Are there not a thousand things connected with 

 it that murmur in gentle language, "Remain on 

 the Farm ?" There is the farm-house itself, the 

 rastic porch, the woodbine, fluttering in the breeze, 

 under whicli you may have sat so many liours, af- 

 ter the labors of the day were over, — the cool 

 streamlet winding through the pasture lands, 

 where at noon, 



"the dapi^led cattle in shaded waters stood." 



Do not these all prompt you to "Stick to the 

 Farm," and be happy ? j. r. K. 



Bpring Valley. 



PUT FLOWERS ON" YOUB TABLE. 

 Set flowers on your table — a whole nosegay if 

 you can get it, or but two or three, or a single 

 flower ; a rose, a pink — nay a daisy. Bring a few 

 daisies and butter-cups from your last field walk, 

 and keep them alive in a little water ; aye, pre- 

 serve but a branch of clover or a handful of flow- 

 ering grass — one of the most elegant, as well as 



cheapest of all Nature's productions — and you 

 have something on your table that reminds you of 

 the beauties of God's creation, and gives you a 

 link with the poets and sages that have done it 

 much honor. Put out a rose, or a lily, or a vio- 

 let, on your table, and you and Lord Bacon have 

 a custom in common ; for that great and wise 

 man was in the habit of having flowers in season 

 upon his table — morning, we believe, noon, and 

 night ; that is to say, at all his meals, for his din- 

 ner-time, was taken at noon. And why shoulci he 

 not have flowers at all meals, seeing that they were 

 growing all day ? Now here is a tashion that shall 

 last forever, if you please — never changing with 

 silks, and velvet, and silver forks, nor dependent 

 upon caprice and change to give them importance 

 and a sensation. The fashion of the garments of 

 heaven and earth endure forever, and jou may 

 adorn your tables with specimens of their drapery 

 — with flowers out of the fields, a.nd golden beams 

 out of the blue ether. Flowers on a morning ta- 

 ble are especially suitable to the time. They look 

 like the happy wakening of the creation ; they 

 bring the perfumes of the breath of Nature into, 

 your room ; they seem the representatives and 

 embodiments of the very smiles of your home, the 

 graces of its good morrow — proofs that some in- 

 tellectual beauty is in ourselves, or those about us ; 

 some home Aurora (if we are so lucky as to have 

 such a companion) helping to strew our life with 

 sweets, or in ourselves some masculine mildness 

 not unworthy to possess such a companion, or un- 

 likely to gain her. 



A BSAZILIAKT EOKEST. 



We often read in books of travels of the silence 

 and gloom of the Brazilian forests ; some of which 

 extend unbroken for hundreds and hundreds of 

 miles in all directions. They are realities, and 

 the impression deepens on a longer actpaintance. 

 The few sounds of birds are of that pensive or 

 mysterious character which intensifies the feeling 

 of solitude, rather than imparts a sense of life and 

 cheerfulness. Sometimes, in the midst of the still- 

 ness, a sudden yell or scream will startle one ; this 

 comes from some defenceless fruit-eating animal, 

 which is pounced upon by a tiger-cat or stealthy 

 boa-constrictor. Morning and evening the howl- 

 ing monkeys made a most fearful and harrowing 

 noise, under which it is diflScult to keep up one's 

 buoyanc}- of spirit. The feeling of inhospitable 

 wildness which the forest is calculated to inspire 

 is increased ten-fold under this fearful uproar. 

 Often, even in the still hours of midday, a sudden 

 crash will be heard resounding afar through ihe 

 wilderness, as some great bough or entire tree 

 falls to the ground. There are, besides, many 

 sounds which it is impossible to account for. I 

 found the natives generally as much at a loss in 

 this respect as myself. Sometimes a sound is 

 heard like the clang of an iron bar against a hard, 

 hollow tree, or a piercing cry rends the air ; these 

 are not repeated, and the succeeding silence tends 

 to heighten the unpleasant impression Avhich they 

 make on the mind. With the natives it is always 

 the Curupira, the wild man or the spirit of the 

 forest, which produces all noises they are unable 

 to ex])lain. jNIyths are the rude theories which 

 mankind, in the infancy of knowledge, i-ivent to 

 explain natural phenomena. The Curupira is a 

 mysterious being, whose atti'ibutes are uncertain, 



