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Autrasm~-Cnlt«re of Cotton—Vegetable Compass, 
nal friends. Nature now seems to have tasked her 
powers, for one last effort, to tint the waning year 
with unrivalled brilliancy. The skies in the earlier 
part of this changing season, are clearer and more 
bright, and clouds less frequently cast their shadows 
over the world below. The artist’s pallet can afford 
no hues as gay as those which now bedeck the mead¬ 
ows, and the sylvan heights which encircle them; and 
he aims in vain at grouping as graceful as the un¬ 
studied negligence of heaven-inspired nature. By 
night she pencils with her frosty fingers, and how won¬ 
drous the glories which the morn reveals over the 
scene recently so soft in its cheerful green. The con¬ 
trast is as striking, and affects us in like manner, as 
does the unadorned simplicity of the fair maiden in her 
young and joyous beauty, and the richly decked ap¬ 
pearing of the matured woman in her prime. We 
linger while we may, in the sweet and charming pre¬ 
sence of the former, though we have our willing tribute 
of admiration for the more commanding beauty of the 
latter. We now feel sensibly, the loss of the sweet 
harmonies, which so lately made our fields and groves 
vocal with song. The parent birds, prompted by in¬ 
stinct, have taught their young ere this, to extend 
their flights, preparatory to their long migration, and 
the less hardy, are already on their trackless way. 
Rarely, indeed, do the cheerful f ( wood-notes wild,” 
which so late delighted us, remind our saddened spirits 
of the merrier days gone by, unless aroused to a live¬ 
lier emotion by the occasional melody of the feathered 
loiterers, which remain till the universal brown of 
late autumn succeeds to the transient glories of the 
early frosts, and wraps forest, flower and lawn in its 
own sombre hue, which is soon to be followed by the 
more chastened livery of winter.. Yet in this mourn¬ 
ful appearance of the departing season, it is animating 
to know that over the apparently barren earth, the en¬ 
lightened husbandman has diffused the germ of another 
harvest for the succeeding year; that unpromising as 
the scene now is, nature is yet silently busy in con¬ 
veying her living juices to the countless buds she has 
so carefully enveloped ; and that what seems the grave 
of nature is but the cradle of a new existence. The 
season too is approaching, when in quiet fire-side en¬ 
joyment, our life, unlike the bright dream of summer, 
will seem a more real thing, and if our spirits are not 
as joyous, our happiness will be more substantial, and 
in the reciprocation of sweet, domestic sympathy, less 
selfish. 
But there are some, we fear, who have no eye to 
enjoy, nor soul to appreciate, the vicissitudes of the 
varied year— 
“ The sweet approach of even, or morn, 
Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer’s rose, 
Or flocks, or herds,”— 
or bounteous autumn richly clad in brown and gold, 
yet it is surely well to study in the arrangement and 
operations of our seasons the love and wisdom of crea¬ 
tion’s great Author, though sometimes, on the herald¬ 
ing of winter, we may, with the birds, wish for the 
favored climes of perpetual verdure, where the eye re¬ 
galed with nature’s softest charms, and the ear en¬ 
tranced with song, like them we may enjoy only asso¬ 
ciations of unfading youth and beauty. 
September, 1842. ELLA. 
Preservation of Herbs. —Every diligent house¬ 
keeper should complete her stock of herbs without a 
moment’s delay, as the frost will soon place them be¬ 
yond her reach. Many of these are invaluable for the 
little necessities that occur from time to time, while 
the green plants are hoarded in the earth not to be 
come at till another season. When gathered and dried 
in the shade, they should be carefully packed away 
beyond the reach of vermin, dampness, or other injury, 
and the fragrant herbs should be closely sealed up in 
jars, air-tight boxes, or paper bags to retain their odour. 
SELECTIONS. 
Culture of Cotton. —There are many around us 
who think the surface-culture of cotton, or of crops, 
a new-fangled notion, and scout at the idea. All en¬ 
croachments on established usages and customs are 
received in this very way. There are others who think 
it has done and will do for the north, but will not in 
the south. I will state one circumstance, and close by 
citing one fact. In 1833, I think, I planted in the same 
field, about twenty acres of cotton, as usual barred off 
and scraped. The subsequent culture was entirely 
with the hoe and sweep, the latter merely shaved the 
surface, probably to the depth of one-half to one inch 5 
also three acres, and cultivated as was customary: 
plowing three times and hoeing. There was but a 
path of eighteen to twenty-four inches dividing. Land 
as near similar as could be, only the first piece had been 
cleared five years, and the second piece only two 
years ; therefore, the latter should have resisted the 
drought best. Mr. Wrn. Montgomery, my neighbor, 
a practical farmer of some thirty years’ standing, ridi¬ 
culed my notion, as I had been but recently from 
school. I took him into the field to look at it. He 
admitted that the unploughed land was the best crop, 
and had sustained itself the best through the season, 
but could not account for it. Now every gardener 
knows the fact, that his garden returns him a greater 
income than any other spot he can cultivate. The 
plough never enters, nor is the earth disturbed two 
inches from March till July. He cultivates the surface 
entire, having previously spaded deep and manured 
well. Then, if this be so in reference to raising vege¬ 
tables of the top-rooted and horizontal-rooted families 
in the garden, may it not be well to try it elsewhere, 
especially as more land can be cultivated and kept 
cleaner ?—Western Farmer, 
A Vegetable Compass. —A correspondent has sent 
to the editors of the National Intelligencer, a dry-press¬ 
ed specimen of the Polar Plant of the western prairies. 
It is a species of fern, which generally attains the 
height of from 10 to 16 inches, with one large flat leaf, 
whose plane always points to the north and south. The 
specimen was plucked from the prairies near Fort Gib¬ 
son, west of Arkansas. It is spread profusely in large 
beds over all the western prairies, from the far north¬ 
west to the far south-west. It has been seen in the 
prairies of Wisconsin and other regions east of the 
Mississippi. It is never found in the forests, or in 
other words, out of the prairies. It has been well 
known to the hunters and trappers of the west, and to 
the officers of dragoons; but it is believed that its ex¬ 
istence has never (at least extensively,) been made 
known to the world. Its plane is always in the plane 
of the meridian, when not disturbed by high winds or 
other external causes. The indications are always 
most accurate in the valleys, where the beds are shel¬ 
tered from the winds, and where the traveler finds 
them arranged in parallel positions, faithfully pointing 
out the direction of meridian. The leaf is symmetri¬ 
cal, and thus there is nothing in its indications to 
distinguish the north from the south.— Nat. Intel . 
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