64-2 



NEW FNGLAND FARMER. 



Dec. 



hidden in the axils of branches, having stored, 

 or are storing np food for the production of 

 future leaves and blossoms and fruits. So 

 millions of roots are seeking new sources of 

 supply, pumping and imbibing and gaining 

 new power, even though winds are chill and 

 the earth is covered with a n)antle of snow. 

 These operations are not so obvious as the 

 summer growth ; but the summer growth could 

 do nothing without them. 



Dkcembkr, then, need not be a dark and 

 gloomy season. It has its peculiar bright 

 and cheerful aspects ; the cloudless winter 

 evenings ; the starry heavens ; the cry.'ital 

 snowh, contrasting with the evergreen of the 

 pines, hemlocks, spruces and firs. The 

 house-plants, also, become more beautiful and 

 more highly valued than ever. How bright 

 and cheerful they stand in the sunny nooks of 

 the parlor, shedding their fragrance all around 

 them, and teaching us lessons of gratitude and 

 trust. 



Then there is one circumstance in Decem- 

 ber which ought to inspiie us with a deeper 

 gratitude than any thing in our material life. 

 It is Christmas — the festival of the Christian 

 church, — in memory of the birth of Ilim who 

 brought "Life and Immortality to light." Our 

 English ancesters celebrated this event with 

 the most lively gratitude. They made it a 

 holiday for all, young and old, rich and poor, 

 master and servant. They adorned their 

 houses with green boughs. The whole nation 

 were in as happy a ferment at Christmas, with 

 the warmth of exercise and their firesides, as 

 they were in May with the new sunshine. 



This is the way to turn winter to sumn)er, 

 and make the world what heaven has enabled 

 it to be ; but as some people manage it, they 

 might as well curn summer itself to winter. 

 Hear what a poet said who carried his own 

 sunshine about with him : — 



"A« for those chilly orbs, on tlie verge of creation , 

 Wlii-re 8unshiiU! and emiles miist be equally rare, 



Di'l ih'-y want a supply of coM hearts for ihat station, 

 H'.-aveii knows we have plenty on earth we could 

 spare. 



Oh, think what a world we should have of it here. 

 If the haters of peace, of afl'ection, and i^lee, 



Were to tly up to t^aluin's comfortless sphere, 



And leave earth to such spirits, as you, love, andme.' 



" But there is Life in Death. Not in man's in- 

 spired writings only, but in every lineament, in 

 every movement of our ^rcaX. mother Earth all 

 around us. All over this globe, Death seems to stalk 

 triiim pliant. Tlie summer passes away, flowers 

 fade and forests decay; field and meadow are 



buried in deep slumber. Broad lands are swal- 

 lowed up by the hungry ocean, and gigantic moim- 

 tains sink to be seen no more. But Death has 

 found his conqueror in Nature also. What per- 

 ishes, rises again ; what fudes away, changes but 

 form and shape. Sweet spring follows winter ; new 

 life blossoms out of the grave." 



NUMBSKULLS AND BOOK FARMERS. 

 The author of "Elements of Agriculture" and 

 writer of the "Ogden Farm Papers" has under- 

 taken to test the principles of scientific agricul- 

 ture in farm management. It is understood that 

 he is not stinted or cramped for want of means 

 necessary to prosecute such experiments as his 

 theoretical knowledge or Ins practical experience 

 may suggest. But as time is required for the de- 

 velopment of any new system of agriculture, peo- 

 ple ought not to be too impatient for results. That 

 some of his country neighbors are not only impa- 

 tient ])ut impudent we infer from one of his late 

 "Papers" in the American Agricultutist, in which 

 he waxes indignant : — 



But, unless one has a particnlarl}' tender hide, 

 the skiving that he gets in a few years' experience 

 of tlie twaddle of country neighborhoods will turn 

 his cuticle to leather, and, unless his wits are un- 

 usually dull, will teach him the art of chaffing back 

 again sufficiently for liis own protection. I gener- 

 ally know, wlien I write, just about what sort of 

 comments I shall elicit from a class of numbskulls 

 that collect at the Four Corners store on a rainy 

 afternoon for the discussion of book farmers such 

 as I ; and 1 am sufiiciently used to the process not 

 to be deterred bj' it from writing whatever I think 

 more intelligent men may be glad to read. 



He alludes to the request that was made some- 

 time since for his "balance sheet" and to some 

 questions more recently asked, and says, — 



"Having spent a good sliare of my time, first 

 and last, gossiping with brother farmers in stores 

 and grist-mills, I am not at all blind to the fact 

 that even simpler questions than these lead to my 

 being hauled over the coals and chaflod about in a 

 sufficiently uncomplimentary way to satisfy any 

 modest man's liighest ambition." 



George E. Waring as well as Tim Bunker are un- 

 fortunate in their association with farmers at grist- 

 mills and the Four Corners' store, and we would 

 advise them to call on fanners in their fields or 

 at their firesides, where any suggestions, however 

 scientific, will be listened to respectfully, though 

 we may not promise that the visitor will not be 

 "hauled over the coals" of a thoughtful inquiry, 

 or that questions will not be propounded that could 

 hardly be expected to originate in skulls that are 

 numb. 



Poultry on a Large Scale. — The Rural JVew 

 Yorker publishes an article from the London Field, 

 which characterizes the account of the great poul- 

 try establishment of Mme. De Linas, at Charney, 

 South America, in Mr. Wright's Practical Poultry 

 Keeper, as a fiction ; and also the storj' of a great 

 Paris establishment, where it was said the poultry 



