The Illinois Faemer. 



VOL. VII. 



SPRINGFIELD, AUGUST, 1862. 



NO. 11. 



August. 



The summer is now culminating and draw- 

 ing the robes of ripeness about her. The 

 music of the reaper still floats out upon the 

 the heated air, but will soon die away in the 

 distant north. Its first notes came up from 

 Egypt, with the summer zephyrs, that kissed 

 the roses of June ', for weeks its song was 

 sung to the winter ceralia of that wonder- 

 ful country, faint and distant at first, but 

 day after day its march, slow and steady, was 

 to the north, and at last reached us ; here it 

 met the seried ranks of spring wheat, of oats 

 and of barley, but its march was still north- 

 ward : onward it went, and now its faint notes 

 come up to us on the north wind, and must 

 now be busy with the cereals that wave along 

 the borders of the great forest that belts in 

 the northern lakes. To the south, the boom- 

 ing of cannon is the music that harvests thou- 

 sands in the valley of death, and sends back 

 the wail of the widow and the orphan, its 

 notes grow strong as the march is southward, 

 and come back to us in frightful echoes. 

 We have little hopes that it will cease until 

 the banner of liberty shall have been kissed 

 by every breeze that shall come up from the 

 gulf, and the fields of the South drenched 

 with the blood of the sons of the North. 



This war, as we predicted, is making great 

 changes in commercial products, in com- 

 merce, and in the social condition of the 

 people. Where it will lead, we know not ; 

 but its track will be marked with graves. 

 The vast drain upon our laboring population 

 is being felt, for there is scarcely a family 

 but has one or more of its members eng£^ed 

 in it. The culture of cotton in the southern 



States is nearly suspended, and an immense 

 breadth of corn planted in its stead. The 

 stock of hogs have been carefully increased 

 and the grown ones fattened to their utmost 

 capacity, thus making a home supply of corn 

 and bacon, which had heretofore been mainly 

 drawn from the West, and in no event will 

 our corn and pork be wanted South before 

 another year, or until cotton shall again be- 

 come the great staple, when the usual de- 

 mand may be made upon us, but of this 

 event we must not be too certain, for we must 

 bear in mind that the high price of cotton 

 is stimulating other countries to grow it, and . 

 it is not improbable that our own praires 

 may not come in for its quota. The presump- 

 tion is gaining ground that the old system 

 of farming at the South is about to be brok- 

 en up and one more rational, more humane, 

 and more conducive to the development of 

 the masses, will take its place. In a late 

 visit through Kentucky, Tennessee and part 

 of Mississippi, we saw no country school 

 house, and but few village academies, where 

 the rich receive not an education, but a 

 smattering of learning. In this way the 

 rich are not elevated, while the mass of the 

 people become ignorant and superstitious, 

 if not degraded. The progress of the wor d's 

 art has passed them by, and they have not 

 felt the throbs of genius, that for long years 

 has been awaking the mind of man and ex- 

 panding his field of enjoyment. 



If it costs millions of money to plant the 

 district school house throughout the South, 

 it will prove an instrument of inestimable 

 value. 



In the mean time, we must take these 



