AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
107 
an argument, it will occur in perhaps nine 
cases out of ten,that the listener’s whole atten 
tion is occupied in casting about for an ob¬ 
jection or new proof, instead of weighing 
the argument of the speaker; consequently, 
at the end of the dispute, neither party is a 
whit the wiser, but rather more confirmed 
in his previous opinion, from the fact that no 
argument or proof to the contrary was al¬ 
lowed a hearing. I will just step aside a 
moment here to make a useful suggestion, 
for being “ free born," and in a remarkably 
“ free country ,” so said at least; so free in¬ 
deed, that if you differ from anybody else 
upon any subject, or fail to walk in the ex¬ 
act track of your predecessors, or do or say 
anything different to Mr. Everybody, you are 
considered a ninny, or a mule ; being as I 
have just said, a citizen of this remarkably 
free and tolerant country, why should 
I be bound to stick to the literal text for 
six or eight pages; persons meandering 
along the cow paths in the woods, like to 
step aside occasionally and pick an inviting 
flower, which otherwise would have wasted 
its sweetness on snakes, lizards, and spiders; 
so I step aside from my consideration of dis¬ 
ease and malaria, and cull a flower for my 
reader, relative to argumentation. It is such 
an important truth, so eaily practised, would 
save so many hard words, and harder 
thoughts, so many wounded feelings, so much 
love’s labor lost, and by the way accomplish 
so much good, that I think it is worth the 
whole year’s subscription price to the Jour¬ 
nal—it is this : 
* If you want'to Convince anybody of any¬ 
thing, argue alone. 
Having delivered ourselves of this great 
and useful apothegm, we will resume the 
thread of the argument, taking it for granted 
that the reader has not forgot the subject 
matter of discussion, it being so imaginative¬ 
ly beautiful— a summer morning's walk. It 
sounds charmingly, it brings with its mere 
mention, recollections so mournfully pleas¬ 
ing, or associations so delightful, that we 
long for the realization, at least until “ sun¬ 
up ” to-morrow, then what a change! we 
Avould not give one half-awake good stretch, 
one five minutes’ second nap, for all the sum¬ 
mer morning walks of a whole year. Who 
does not feel that the vis inertia of the first 
waking moments of a May morning, is worth 
more than a dozen rambles before breakfast. 
I am for the largest liberty of epjoyment; I 
am not among the multitude of weak-mind¬ 
ed folk, the negative sort of minds, to dis¬ 
card what is good to eat or drink, or enjoy, 
for no other reason, that I can perceive, than 
that it is good, and a cross is meritorious. 
One man says tea is injurious ; another Sol- 
oman avers that coffee makes people bilious, 
a third, and he a Broadway author too, has 
written a whole book to prove that if we eat 
wheat bread, it will make our bones brittle, 
and that if we live to get old at all, the first 
time we fall, we'll break all to pieces like a 
clay pipe-stem. Verily this is a free country, 
for if everybody is to be believed, we are 
free to eat nothing at all. So I do not advise 
a denial of that most deliciously enjoyable 
entity, a summer morning’s nap, because it 
is for the reasons I have just named, more 
healthful than the so lauded “ exercise before 
breakfast if you must remain in bed until 
breakfast, or be out in the open air an hour 
or two before breakfast, on an empty stom¬ 
ach, then I say, as far as health is concerned, 
the nap is better than the exercise, for the 
incontrovertible reasons I have already 
given. 
It requires no argument to prove the im¬ 
purity of a city atmosphere about sunrise 
and sunset, reeking, as it must, with the 
odors of thousands of kitchens and cess¬ 
pools, to say nothing of the innumerable 
piles of garbage which the improvident poor 
allow to accumulate in front of their dwel¬ 
lings, in their back yards and their cellars; 
any citizen may satisfy himself as to the ex¬ 
istence of noisome fumes by a summer eve¬ 
ning’s walk along any of our by-streets ; 
and although the air is cooler in the morn¬ 
ings, yet the more hurtful of these malaria 
saturate it, but of such a subtile nature are 
they, that no microscopic observation, no 
chemical analysis, has as yet been able to 
detect, in an atmosphere thus impregnated, 
any substance or subsistence to which these 
deadly influences might be traced, so subtile 
is the poison, so impalpable its nature ; but 
invisible, untraceable as it maybe, its influ¬ 
ence is certain and immediate, its effects 
deadly. 
Some will say, look how healthy the farm¬ 
er’s boy is, and the daily laborers, who go to 
their work from one year’s end to another by 
“ crack of dawn!” My reply is, if they are 
healthy, they are so in spite of these expo¬ 
sures ; their simple fare, their regular lives, 
and their out-door industry, give their bodies 
a tone, a vigor, a capability of resisting dis¬ 
ease, which nullifies the action off malaria to 
a very considerable extent. Besides, women 
live as long as men, and it cannot be said that 
they generally exercise out of doors before 
breakfast. 
Our Knickerbocker ancestry! the very 
mention of them suggests—fat! a double fat¬ 
ness in fact—fat as to body and fat as to 
purse ; if you catch hold of one of them, in¬ 
stead of getting a little pinch of thin skin, as 
you would from a lean Yankee, you clutch 
whole rolls of fat, solid fat—what substan¬ 
tial people the real, identical, original old 
Knicks are! how long they live too ! expect¬ 
ant sons-in-law echo, sighingly, “ how long!" 
in fact, I do not recollect of their dying at 
all, at least as we do; they simply ooze out., 
or sleep away. May we not inquire if there 
is not at least some connection between their 
health as a class, and the very general habit 
of the sons here, derived from their sires in 
fatherland, of eating breakfast by candle¬ 
light]? Another very significant fact in point 
is, that the French in the south are longer 
lived, and suffer far less from the fevers of 
the country than their American neighbors ; 
in truth, their exemption is proverbial; and 
as a class they have their coffee and boiled 
milk, half and half, with sugar, brought to 
their bedsides every morning, or take it be¬ 
fore they leave the house. 
It is not an uncommon thing for persons 
to go west to select a new home for their 
rising families, never to return: “ took'sick 
and died this is the sad and comprehen¬ 
sive statement of the widowed and the fath¬ 
erless, owing doubtless, in many instances, 
to their traveling on horseback early in the 
morning and late in the evening, in order to 
avoid the heat of the day. 
Many a traveler will save his life by tak¬ 
ing a warm and hearty breakfast before 
starting in the morning, and by putting up 
for the night not later than sundown. 
It is of considerable practical importance 
to answer the question, why more persons 
have died in “ the States ” from Isthmus 
fever than in California? Simply, because 
on their way out, their bodies are compara¬ 
tively vigorous, and there is in addition a de¬ 
gree of mental and moral excitement, which 
repels disease ; but on the return, it. is strik¬ 
ingly different.; the body is wasted by hard¬ 
ship and privation, while the spirit is broken 
by disappointment., or the mind falls into a 
species of exhaustion, when successful, from 
the long and anxious strife for gold: both 
causes operating, one to weaken the body, 
the other to take away all mental elasticity, 
it is no wonder that the whole man becomes 
an easy prey to disease. 
In subsequent numbers I may discuss other 
[“Popular Fallacies” in reference to the 
all-important subject of health. A whole 
number could be easily filled with them; but 
it was not my intention to tell too much at 
once, it would not be remembered ; and then 
again, Wifey has several times given a gen¬ 
tle but a very decided admonition, “ Thy 
Journal reads very well, William, but I am 
afraid thee will gn-e out." I have, however, 
a ready quietus to these groundless appre¬ 
hensions, in a basket under my table, well 
filled with scraps, each of which affords 
matter for a leading editorial. The truth is, 
when I think it all over, the world has so 
many things to learn and unlearn, I am 
afraid I will get gray—what a delightful 
Tense that is—before I can set it right at all 
points, my ideas of right, and propriety, and 
truth, being considered the standard! What 
a vain creature is poor know-nothing man ! 
how little indeed does the wisest of us right¬ 
ly and truly know ! 
“A little humor now and then, 
Is relished by the best of men.” 
THE WORLD WOULD BE THE BETTER FOR IT. 
If men cared less for wealth and fame, 
And less for battle-fields and glory ; 
If w rit in human hearts, a name 
Seemed better than in song and story ; 
If men, instead of nursing pride, 
Would learn to hate it and abhor it— 
If more relied 
On Love to guide, 
The world would be the better for it. 
If men dealt less in stocks and lands, 
And more in bonds and deeds fraternal; 
If Love’s work had more willing hands 
To link this world to the supernal; 
If men stored up Love’s oil and wine, 
And on bruised human hearts would pour it ; 
If “ yours ” and “ mine ” 
Would once combine, 
' The world would be the better for it. 
If more would act the play of Life, 
And fewer spoil it in rehearsal; 
If Bigotry would sheath its knife 
Till Good became more universal; 
If custom, gray with ages grown, 
Had fewer blind men to adore it— 
If talent shone 
In Truth alone, 
The world would be the better for it. 
If men were wise in little things— 
Affecting less in all their dealings ; 
If hearts had fewer rusted strings 
To isolate their kindly feelings ; 
If men, when Wrong beats down the Right, 
Would strike together and restore it— 
If Right made Might 
In every fight, 
The world would be the better for it. 
Getting Married. —It. is curious to some 
to note how people’s ideas of preparation for 
this species of amusement vary. Moze and 
Lize “ take a notion ” to each other. Moze 
buys a second-hand bedstead, three wooden 
chairs, a table, a small looking-glass and a 
light stand; while Lize provides a hen 
feather bed, four sheets and two coverlids, 
a table-cloth, six towels, some little arrange¬ 
ments, with a disposition to make the best 
of everything forthwith; two dollars are 
paid for the minister’s blessing upon their 
joint adventure on housekeeping ; the scene 
whereof is a three-story back room, with a 
seven-by-nine chamber attached, where the 
first baby is born soon after the parents are 
of age. Mr. Count-the-cost, on the other 
hand, never thinking of the matter until he 
is thirty, courts Miss Prudence for fourteen 
years, perpetually putiing off the “ happy 
day,” because he hadn’t got quite enough to 
buy a nine-storied marble front on Style 
