AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
GOOD NIGHT. 
Good Night! a word so often said, 
The heedless mind forgets its meaning ; 
’Tis only when some heart lies dead 
On which our own was leaning, 
We hear in maddening music roll, 
That last “ good night ” along the soul. 
Good night!—in tones that never die, 
It peals along the quickening ear ; 
And tender gales of memory 
Forever waft it near, 
When stilled the voice—O crush of pain !— 
That ne’er shall breathe “ good night ” again. 
Good night! it mocks us from the grave— 
It overleaps that strong world’s bound 
From whence there flows no backward wave; 
It calls from out the ground, 
On every side—around—above— 
“Good night,” “good night ” to life and love ! 
Good night! O, wherefore fades away 
The light that lived in that dear word 1 
Why follows that good night, no day 1 
Why are our souls so stirred 1 
0, rather say, dull brain, once more, 
“Good night! thy time of toil is o’er.” 
Good night!—no w cometh gentle sleep. 
And tears that fall like gentle rain, 
Good night! 0, holy, blest and deep, 
The rest that follows pain, 
How should we reach God’s upper light, 
If life’s long day had no “ good night.” 
[Chambers’ Journal. 
LICENSED! TO DO WHAT? 
BY REV. MR. ROOD. 
Licensed to make the strong man weak ; 
Licensed to lay the wise man low ; 
Licensed a wife’s fond heart to break, 
And make her children’s tears to flow. 
Licensed to do thy neighbor harm ; 
Licensed to kindle hate and strife ; 
Licensed to nerve the robber’s arm ; 
Licensed to whet the murderer’s knife. 
Licensed thy neighbor’s purse to drain, 
And rob him of his very last; 
Licensed to heat his feverish brain, 
'Till madness crowns thy work at last. 
Licensed, like spider for a fly, 
To spread thy nets for man, thy prey ; 
To mock his struggles—suck him dry— 
Then cast the worthless hulk away. 
[Christian Chronicle. 
Gutting. —The following lines, by the Boston 
Post, on the marriage of Thomas Hawk to Sarah 
J. Dove, are rather sharp: 
It isn’t often that you see 
So queer a kind of love ! 
O what a savage he must be, 
To Tommy-Hawk a Dove ! 
Banks. —A “ good ’un” is told upon the au¬ 
thority of a high judicial functionary. The 
wife of the owner of one of the Indiana 
free banks being in company with some 
friends, the all-absorbing financial crisis be¬ 
came the theme of conversation. The lady 
above referred to, remarked that she hoped 
her husband’s bank would “hold out till the 
fall rains come on—in that case there would 
be no danger of its breaking before next 
May.” When interrogated for an explana¬ 
tion, she gave as a reason for the faith that 
was in her, that the place in which the 
Bank was located could not be approached 
after the fall rains, on account of the mud. 
Ohio Statesman. 
When you speak to a person, look him in 
the face. 
HARD WORK 
Mr. A.—“ Good morning, Mr. B.; I called 
to see if you wanted a clerk. I should like 
to put my son into your store for a while.” 
Mr. B.—“ Indeed, I thought you needed 
him on your farm.” 
“ So I do need him—but I don’t want my 
children to have to work as hard as I have 
had to—digging and delving. I tell you it’s 
too hard ; I’m fairly worn all out.” 
“ Ah! but you look more hale and hearty 
than the most of us, and yet you must be 
quite as old.” 
“Yes, I am turned of 70. But I grow 
lame and stiff, and it’s all from hard work.” 
“ Over 70 ? And I am but 60, and my 
partner younger still—yet see our gray 
hairs.” 
“ Well, well—something in families about 
that, may be. But do you want my boy ?” 
“ No sir.” 
“ Why not ?” 
“ Because you want to put him here to 
live easy , and he’ll be good for nothing, as 
clerk or merchant either, in that way. We 
merchants have to work hard if we would 
gain anything ; and we have to work a great 
many more hours in a year than you do.” 
“ Yes, yes, more hours perhaps—but the 
work isn’t half so hard. Here you are in a 
cool room in summer and a warm one in 
winter, while we are exposed to heat and 
cold, wet an dry.” 
“ I know it looks so to you. But now do 
you go into a room and spend all one long 
day walking it from side to side, dodging this 
way and that, and see if long before night 
you do not want to get out of prison ; see if you 
are not tired enough before supper time to 
be glad to sit down in the evening with your 
family and your newspaper. But no, you 
must go back to your prison, and dodge and 
jump all the evening harder than ever. And 
when bed-time comes, you must post books.” 
“Oh, you tell it all on your side. But sup¬ 
pose it is so—you made money, and when 
old age comes on, you can retire from busi¬ 
ness and live easy.” 
“Not a whit better than you can. I 
thought as you do once, and tried it. I 
thought I could give up the confinement and 
labor, and only oversee. But this did not give 
me ease or leisure; so I got a head clerk 
and ‘retired,’ as you call it—and what was 
the result? Why, I failed. And what did 
you and eveiybody else say? Why, I had 
‘quit work and tried to be a gentleman, and 
no wonder I smashed—it was good enough 
for me—I might have kept at work like other 
folks.’ ” 
“ I know such things were said, but we 
didn’t know you heard of them ! But now 
just look at the poor farmer’s crops this sum¬ 
mer—half dried up. Just think of such loss¬ 
es after all our labor.” 
“ Yes, and the day laborers too, who are 
out of work in consequence of the unfavor¬ 
able season, will all fall upon me to knock 
off ‘ just a little of their store accounts, be¬ 
cause everything they buy of the farmer 
comes so high ’—and I must do it too, or be 
‘ such a stingy tight Jew they’ll never go there 
to trade again,’ to say nothing of those that 
go off without paying at all.” 
“ Well, I suppose merchants do have loss¬ 
es as well as farmers. But it seems as if 
you did’nt have half so many vexations— 
showers coming up—tools breaking—cattle 
in the corn, and what not.” 
“Vexations' You know nothing about 
it. Come here and wait upon ungoverned 
children—try to satisfy an old woman that 
a ten cent calico wont fade—lower the price 
of a pair of shoes or a plug of tobacco to suit 
an Irishman—find something nice enough 
for a fashionable young lady—grave enough 
for a quaker—gay enough for a darkee—styl- 
187 
ish enough for a dandy—and can’t suit one 
of them till they have ‘ looked somewhere- 
else ’—and you may fold up and pile up your 
goods to be ready for the next unsatisfyable 
set. Mi'- B., you know nothing about vexa¬ 
tions. No wonder we grow bald and gray 
before our time.” 
“ And so you are sure merchants have the 
hardest of it. But I don’t know what to do 
with my boy. He thinks farming too hard, 
and he don’t like to go to a trade—feels— 
well, I don’t know.” 
“/know, my friend. You have taught 
him to feel that a trade is too low, and farm¬ 
ing too hard, and now he is half spoilt for 
being successful in anything.” 
“ I wish I could get him into a bank with a 
salary—he’d like that. I tried hard for it 
last week; but they ask such an awfnl sum 
for bonds ; I don’t see what that’s for.” 
“ Mr. B., you sometimes pray for yourself 
and your children, ‘ Lead us not into tempta¬ 
tion—but here you are, trying to get your 
only son into a situation where the tempta¬ 
tions and the facilities for dishonesty are so 
great that those best acquainted with the 
business find it necessary to put every one 
under heavy bonds before he can been trusted 
with it. Now, my good friend, take my ad¬ 
vice and keep your son with you. He need 
not ‘ dig and delve’ as hard as you say you 
have done, and make such haste to be rich, 
for you have made a large property; but 
learn him to work reasonably and take the 
comfort of it as he goes along ; not put off 
enjoying it till old age. That is the ’secret 
of happiness. ‘ A little with contentment is 
great gain;’just as good as great wealth .” 
Pittsfield Cultivator. 
THE POET PEECIVAL. 
This gifted man long since disappeared, 
like a meteor from the sky. The Louisville 
Journal thus recurs to his singular retire¬ 
ment : 
“ Self-immured in a room of the hospital in 
the extreme suburbs of New-Haven—a city 
of which a poet should be proud—this gifted 
and eccentric being lives, as he has lived for 
the last quarter of a century, a purely soli¬ 
tary and ascetic life. He is wholly absorbed 
in intellectual pursuits, and shrinks with pain¬ 
ful sensitiveness from all the luxuries and 
amenities of life. No Eastern anchorite 
ever abjured more completely the comforts 
and refinements of elegant rank for the blank 
privations of his cell—no storied recluse ever 
more voluntarily renounced a brilliant career 
of usefulness and fame for the lonely vigils 
of a hermitage. In this desolation, rejoicing, 
it is said, in but a single chair, he has sur¬ 
rounded himself with a magnificent library 
and with philosophical apparatus, from 
which friend and foe are alike excluded, and 
in which, though dead to all beside, he 
seeks and finds the solace and charms of 
intellect.” 
Arkansas Insects. —A citizen of Arkan¬ 
sas while on board of a steamer on the Mis¬ 
sissippi, was asked by a gentleman, “ wheth¬ 
er the raising of stock in Arkansas was 
attended by much difficulty or expense ?” 
“ Oh, yes, stranger—they suffer much from 
insects.” “Insects! Why, what kind of 
insects, pray ?” “ Why, bears, catamounts, 
wolves, and such like insects.” 
The hen-pecked husband is happy enough 
if he were only left alone ; but he generally 
has some kind friend, who is perpetually 
urging him “ not to stand it.” 
Make few promises, and live up to your 
engagements. 
