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BATEHAM & COLMAN, 



^Proprietors 



HENRY COLMAN, Editor. 



PUBIilSIIED MOx\TIIL.Y. 



TERMS, 



FIFTV CK.VrS, per year, payaljle always in advance. 



Posr Masters, Agents, and others, seiuiinE current nMin- 

 ey free of postajie, will receive seren coities for ®3, — Ticctvt 

 copies (or So,— TVenty-Jiie copies for filO. 



T/ie poslaffe o( IMa paper is only one cent to anyplace 

 wiitiin this state, and one and a half cents to any part of 

 the I'liited Slates. 



Address BATKIIAM & COLMAN. Rochester. N. V. 



ICr For Contents see last page. 



Publishers Notice. 



" We wish a happy New Year'' to our numerous 

 frienjs who have so promptly sent in their new 

 subscriptions. Those who have not itone so will 

 not receive this number till tliat duty is attended 

 to, and we insert this Hibernian Notice to inform 

 them thereof ! 



CanJid'i and Pennsyhanin money, is at a discount 

 of 7 to 10 percent, here, and some of our agents 

 complain because we refuse to allow them a com- 

 mission on it. We now say that we will allow them 

 one half of the usual rate of commission on such 

 money, if sent free of postage. 



Asents anl officers of Agricultural Societies in 

 Canada, are requested to remit payments to Messrs. 

 Ljfmiin I'lirr, \ Co., Toioiito. Those who do so 

 will be allowed the same rate for Canada money 

 as last year. 



A New-Years Gift. 



We print n few hundred extra copies of this num- 

 ber, and send ihem (with show bill) to I'ost Mnstere 

 and others oe n New. Years Gift in return for the nu- 

 merous favors they hnvo granted us. We hope they 

 will Vy "plcrise read iind Cimilatc." 



Sditorial Notice. 



The necessity of Mr. Colraan'sattendins to com- 

 plete the publication of his Fourth Report on the 

 Agriculture of JVIassachusetfs, and a multiplicity 

 of cares and labors incident to a removal from one 

 home to another distant home, prevent his doing 

 but very little for this number of the N. G. Far- 

 mer. He will endeavor to atone for present defi- 

 ciencies hereafter. It is his expectation to take 

 up his abode in Rochester about the 20th of Janu- 

 ary ensuing, if a kind Providence permits ; and 

 there at that lime he requests his friends to ad- 

 dress him. 



EDSTORIALi ABDUX^SS. 



Few men who have had much experience of life 

 venture upon any new enterprise mthout an oppre.s- 

 Bivc and embarrassing feeling of the uncertainty of 

 success. The young may be confident ; the old know 

 how many reasons there arc for being wary and dis- 

 trustful — of themselves as well a.s others. It is not 

 alw.iys easy to satisfy one's self; it is often difficult to 

 satisfy others ; and what is best to be done and how it is 

 bc-=it to do it, the mest sanguine arc often at a loss to de- 

 termine. But it will not on tliat account do for us to 

 hesitate to act ; or to stand like the traveller on the riv- 

 ers bank, who deter.iiined not to cross until tlie waters 

 had all !\o-xn by. We must act; and in attempting to 

 do the best we can, we may at least satisfy our own con- 

 science, if we satisfy no one else. 



I have now this strategic to go through with in under- 

 taking the editorial department of the New Genesee 

 Farmer ; and I do not know how other.visc to determine 

 it than as above. I promise my best ser\'ices. I will 

 do what 1 can to render this paper instructive and usc- 

 fij, agreeable and entertaining ; ecrvieeable to agricul- 



tural improvement ; conducive to thedilVusion of whole- 

 some knowledge; and the iiromotion of sound morals. 



I enter upon the undertaking with an unfeigned dif- 

 fidence, but at the same tune ivith great pleasure. My 

 mind has been many years occupied with agricultural 

 inquiries and my heart has been long and deeply inter- 

 ested in the improvement of the farming art and the 

 fanners themselves. My habits through Ufe have cal- 

 led me to mingle with them conslantly. There is no 

 rural or agricultural labor with which I have not been 

 fimUiar. My enthusiasm in the cause of agricultural 

 improvement has never in the slightest measure flagged 

 or abated. I know no more reasonable or useful object 

 to which I can devote the power of doing any thing for 

 my fellow man which Heaven has given me. With 

 these sentiments I enter upon a now field of enterprize 

 and labor ; and I shall be happy to do what I can to 

 enrich and adorn it, and to render it more and more pro- 

 ductive. 



I have often thought, indeed I think eveiy day of my 

 life, what a curious process this writing and printing is ; 

 and I never receive a letter but I look upon it as a kind 

 of standing miracle. When Capt. Smith was threat- 

 ened with death by the Intlians in Virginia, he was re- 

 leased by the interposition of Pocahontas upon a con- 

 dition that he would give a certain amount of arms or 

 ammunition for his ransom. To obtain these he mitst 

 communicate with his friends. In order to do this he 

 wrote a few lines upon a leaf torn from his pocket book 

 and having sent this by a messenger to his friends, the 

 ransoniwas immediately p.aid. The Indians looked at 

 this proceeding with unutterable astonishment. What 

 indeed can be more a.stonishing than that by a few 

 scratches, a few black marks, a few mystic characters, 

 we can communicate with each other as effectually as 

 if we grasped each others hands or looked in each 

 others eyes; that we can tell our thoughts, feelings, 

 purjMses, history, with certainty and precision, though 

 those with whom we communicate may be hundreds 

 and thousands of miles removed from us, though moun- 

 tains may raise their inaccessible summits, and oceans 

 spread their unfathonable depths between us ; that we 

 can live indeed after we aredead ; achieve as it were an 

 immortality on earth; and transmit that which shall 

 materially affect men's condition, their subsistence, con- 

 duct, virtue and happiness, far on the line of time, with 

 generations yet unborn, who never knew us nor ever 

 heard our names. 



But it is not merely the wonder workings of this 

 wonderful invention that impress us ; but there is con- 

 nected with it a moral responsibility that is most seri- 

 ous. Whoever ^vields a pen wields a powerful instru- 

 ment for evil or for good, indeed in many cases far more 

 powerful than the sword of the victorious hero, leading 

 on his thousands to conquest. The martial victory 

 may be soon forgotten; the blood-stained field be 

 cleansed; and the field covered with the dead and 

 dying become again verdant and waving with the 

 beautiful products of the husbandman. But what io 

 written is written, and cannot he taken back. It must 

 remain to work its effects as much in the end as the be- 

 ginning ; and how long and to what extent do human 



s.igacity can predict or even imagine. It is said to the 

 singular praise of one that he never wrote a line, which 

 "dying he would wish to blot." This is a most covcta- 

 ble eulogy, and happy, thrice happy shall I be if I can 

 but approach so high an honor. 



The New Genesee Farmer has two objects; to im- 

 prove the soil and to improve the man. To illustrate 

 the best modes of culture by precept, by example, and 

 by experiment ; to treat of plants and products, soils 

 and manures ; of the influences of light and heat and 

 rain and dew and frost ; of farm stock, farm buildings 

 and implements, and every thing connected with hus- 

 bandry and domestic economy. This will be its first 

 object. The second will be to treat of all such useful 

 knowledge and inventions in the mechanical depart- 

 ments as will be particularly interesting to farmers, the 

 tillers of the earth, and persons dwclUng in the cotintry 

 and interested in rural pursuits. The third will be to 

 treat of markets and trade and commerce, and all facts 

 and laws bearing upon these subjects as far as they con- 

 cern that particular class in the community to whom 

 the paper is mainly addressed. The fourth object is the 

 moral improvement of the young and of the rural pop- 

 ulation generally ; and if possible to render the profes- 

 sion of agriculture attractive and respectable. As we 

 claim for it to be the most Important of all pursuits, 

 vitally affecting every condition in society, so we wish 

 to see it not exalted above any other respectable pro- 

 fession in the community, but not degraded and dis- 

 dained as it has too often been; and taking its proper 

 rank with the first and best. 



These are the general objects and views by which I 

 shall govern myself in the conduct of this paper. I 

 shall not now enter into details. The New Genesee 

 Farmer has not now character to estabhsh. By the 

 ability and intelligence with which it has been conduct- 

 ed it has already obtained a wide circulation and has 

 been held in liigh esteem. I am happy to say that I 

 am not to be deserted by those, who have hitherto served 

 in its ranks. I shall do what I can therefore to main- 

 tain its character and to extend its usefulness. . Besides 

 the co-operation of those,who have hitherto contributed 

 to its columns, I am promised other and most valuable 

 aid, from some of the best minds in the country; and 

 from such co-operation in a cause so important we may 

 anticipate the best results. I have many more things 

 to say in relation to these matters ; but I will not ex- 

 tend my editorial at this time; and these matters will 

 come in in various forms and on other occasions. 



It has always been common in the clerical profession 

 to preach on the Sunday after their ordination on the 

 duties of a minister. A very shrewd friend and one 

 of the best of men said to mc that he took care after 

 his settlement not to do this, lest he should come short 

 of his promises, (as who in an untried case does not) 

 his people might not forget to remind hhn of what he 

 promised. Perhaps it would have been wise in me on 

 taking my seat in this editorial chair to have said noth- 

 ino; but having said what I have, I shall after this 

 avowal have, in a due regard for my word, very strong 

 motives ts act upon the principles, which I have laid 

 d,,n. HENRY COLMAJf. 



