Proceedings of the Farmers' Club. 245 



four western States, that we most certainly prefer tlie pioneer 

 life in onr own shantj, to the shop or factory of an eastern capi- 

 talist, and onr own soil to that of some eastern landlord, and 

 we jfind this pnre electrical air, as it comes sweeping down the 

 declivity from the Rocky mountains quite as invigorating as the 

 foul, greasy air of a cotton mill ; and we do most solemnly declare 

 ourselves fully as much inclined to good, light, wholesome corn bread, 

 and pure, sweet milk and cream, with a sprinkling of juicy, tender 

 huffalo beef, as we are to the filthy lard, pies and cakes, and fried 

 pork of a factory boarding-house. And we further declare that this 

 magnificent scenery is a continual inspiration, and fully as ennobling 

 as we ever found the gray walls of a factory to be. Here we see a 

 future for our children, while the eastern mechanic sees nothing but 

 daily toil to leave his offspring, though his wife may wear silk dresses 

 to church, and his children medals from school. We have lost all 

 fears of our children growing up fools, for we find that all necessary 

 education is not taught even in a New England school-house. Let 

 the mechanic there remember, while he pegs or hammers away day 

 by day, thereby keej)ing his family in fashionable attire, and walking 

 on carpets, that the bold, unflinching pioneer is sweeping the conti- 

 nent for a civilization broader and nobler than the sickly, aristocratic, 

 and showy sentimentalism of IsTew England ; and though our children 

 may not stand at the head of their class, learn to dance or play a 

 piano, nevertheless they are learning that privations and hardships 

 beget true self-reliance, which, in connection with simplicity of habit 

 and honesty of purpose, constitute the only sure basis of a pure demo- 

 cratic government. The girls may not learn all the pretty manners 

 of a boarding-school miss, yet we hope they will, soon after learning 

 the alphabet, learn that industry, sobriety, and plain practical com- 

 mon sense are the rounds in the ladder of future prosperity. Our 

 children may not attend church regularly on Sunday, yet we hope 

 they will find truth and divinity in the bounties and beauties of 

 natm-e around them, and extract enough living daily inspiration 

 from each newly discovered variety of prairie flower to teach them 

 that all preaching calculated to purify their aspiring souls, and rid 

 them of the catechisms and dogmatisms of written creeds, comes not 

 from human lips. 



Say, then, to the Springfield mechanic, and to all others toiling in 

 those overcrowded villages and cities, come to the heart of the continent 

 and help to make farms, towns, cities, and States, and lay the founda- 



