SOUTHERN CULTIVATOR. 
349 
I have thus given you, in a very scattering manner, I 
admit, our modus operandi of making corn on loose, light 
land ; stitFer clay land Vv’e prepare in the same way, some 
times having to use a scooter instead of the turning plow 
for breaking — plant in the same manner This kind of 
land usually becomes hard from the heavy spring rains, 
and requires to be broken again with scooter or shovels the 
first plowing, after which we cultivate in the same way 
as before mentioned. If poor pine land, with a moderate 
quantity of cotton seed or seventy pounds of guano to the 
acre, can be made to produce more than 25 bushels by 
any other system, then we of Hancock want to know it. 
This we claim to have done under the system here given. 
And now, that I have concluded this (my first and it 
may be last) article for the Cultivator, how shall I sub- 
scribe myself — Rebeck, Cupid, F. J. R., A. B. C., or 
some other fictitious name'? No, I prefer to take the 
chances of such criticism and wilicism as may be heaped 
upon me. If I have said nothing that is sensible, I have 
certainly said nothing criminal. I giveyou, as I think all 
•others ought, my real name, A. J, Lane. 
Granite Hill, near Sparta, Ga., 1859. 
P. S. — I hope that some of the gentlemen specially call- 
ed on or mentioned in Col. Turner’s article, in your Au- 
gust number, will give “F. J. R.” the way in which we 
manage the cotton crop. 
ORDER OVERDONE. 
“Order is Heaven’s first law” and a good thing in any 
family ; but some people are painfully particular and neat, 
as the following from Blackwood abundantly proves : 
I once spent a week in one of these well-ordered fami- 
lies; it was a great punishment to me; I hope, also, in 
some degree, to my entertainers. The iron rule of that 
house was, “a place for everything and everything in its 
place.” I wasn’t. The disgrace my somewhat vagrant 
habits led me into there was dreadful. The very first 
morning, I opened Pater-familias’s newspaper, which was 
always laid in one particular spot upon the breakfast 
table, never to be violated by any hand but his. There I 
stood, with my back to the fire, conning the out-spread 
sheet and nodding a cheerful good morning to my host, 
when he entered. I had the hardihood even to read him 
(out of his paper!) the last Indian despatch— very polite- 
ly, as I thought — and to request his assistance to decipher 
the possible i^lace intended by a dozen letters which the 
telegraph clerk appeared to have selected at random. To 
do him justice, he bore this inroad on his rights with 
tolerable outward composure ; but I was formally made 
aware, on the first opportunity, by Mrs. P,, of the out- 
rage I had committed, and made to feel as uncomfortable 
as I deserved. Then I left my handkerchief on the draw- 
ing-room floor, one glove on the library table, another in 
the governess’ parasol, (which, certainly, was not the 
place for it, and how it got there, I have no conception) 
and was formally presented with each article separately, 
and an account of its discovery in the presence of the 
whole family assembled for dinner. 
One day, the whole household was under strict cross- 
examination as to who had come into the drawing-room 
with dirty shoes, I was the culprit, of course, but I was 
too great a coward to confess ; besides, the lady knew 
perfectly well who it was, but was polite enough to enter- 
tain the fiction that such conduct was impossible in any 
well-bred person ; it must have been one of the children or 
the housemaids, of course; and the whole investigation 
was intended for my solemn warning and improvement, 
just as they used to whip a little boy vicariously to strike 
terror into misbehaving little princes. 
Then the terrible punctuality which made slaves of all 
of us, and kept me always looking at my watch, and al- 
ways afraid of being late for something, as, indeed, I was 
once for dinner, in spite of all my precaution — four 
minutes and a half exactly. Shall I ever forget it'? If 
they had only the charity to sit down quietly without me 
— if they had put me off* with no soup, cold fish, and the 
last ragged cut of the mutton — if they had sent me to bed 
without any dinner at all, as once happened to me when 
I was a little boy, or inflicted upon me any other reason- 
able or humane form of punishment ; but, no, there th;y 
were, all waiting for me in the drawing-room, all stand- 
ing up, the door set wide open, and the head of the fami- 
ly opening fire upon me at once, before I was well inside 
it, with “Now, Mr. , will you take in Mrs. P. '?” 
Of course, I hammered and stammered over an apology — 
“quite untentional,” and so forth. “Oh! of course, they 
knew it must be quite unintentional — only” — in a semi- 
whisper — “Mr. P. did not like waiting for his dinner!” 
There was an abominable child, too, in that family, the 
very incarnation of premature method and order. All the 
I other children had redeeming points of carelessness and 
destructiveness about them; and we soon established a 
sort of freemasonry among ourselves, as fellow-culprits, 
trying to keep each other out of scrapes as much as pos- 
sible; they conveying to me private warnings as to how 
soon the prayer bell would ring in the morning, and fur- 
nishing me with much valuable secret intelligence as to 
the enemy’s weak points, and the interpretation of the 
laws of the Medes and Persians, to whom I was then in 
captivity; and I, finding substitutes for impounded pen- 
cils, mending a broken Cupid, who carried the wax 
matches in his quiver, brushing the boy’s clothes after 
birds’ nesting, “before mama saw them,” and actually cut- 
ing up the ribbon of my eye-glass into shoe strings, for 
one young lady who was generally in trouble on that 
score. But as to the imp I speak of, he was irreprach- 
able. If I left the door open, he got up and shut it— not 
quietly, you understand, but officially and reproachfully. 
If I took down a volume from its shelf, and it left my 
hand for a moment, if he could get at it, it was up in its 
place again before I knew what had become of it. I took 
courage one cold morning, there being no one but he and 
I in the room, to stir the fire, and put the poker, when I 
had done with it, under the grate, (which I take to be the 
natural place for a poker,) when up jumps this well-be- 
haved little monster, and arranges it by rule and measure, 
where he had been told it ought to be. I take credit to 
myself for the very great forbearance — he and I being 
alone — that I checked the inclination to punch his head 
with it. Is it excusable in any rational beings to put 
themselves under such a long penance as this, and to 
bring up their children, and to force the poor, unhappy 
stranger whom they get within their gates to do likewise 'I 
Simplicity of Dress. — Loveliness never appears to so 
good advantage as when. set off* with simplicity of dress. 
No artist ever decks his angels with feathers and gaudy 
jewelry, and our dear human angels, if they would make 
their title to that name, should carefully avoid ornaments 
which properly belong to Indian squaws and African 
princes. These tinselries may serve to give effect on the 
stage or upon the ball-room floor, but in daily life there 
is no substitute for the charm of simplicity. A vulgar 
taste is not to be disguised by gold and diamonds. The 
absence of true taste and refinement of delicacy cannot be 
compensated for by the possession of the most princely 
fortune. Mind measures gold, but gold cannot measure 
mind. A modest woman will dress modestly, and really 
refined and intellectual women will bear the marks of 
careful selection and faultless taste. 
[i^"Passions are the gales of life ; it should be our care 
to see that they rise not into a tempest. 
