AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST 
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AGRICULTURE IS THE MOST HEALTHY, THE MOST USEFUL, AND THE MOST NOBLE EMPLOYMENT OF MAN. -Washington. 
ORANGE JUDD, A. M., 
CONDUCTING EDITOR. 
Published Weekly by Allen &Co,, No. 189 Water-st. 
i UNDER THE JOINT EDITORIAL SUPERVISION OF 
A. B. ALLEN & ORANGE JUDD. 
VOL. XIII.—NO. 16.] 
NEW-YORK, WEDNESDAY, DEC. 27, 1854. 
[NEW SERIES.—NO. 68. 
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FLAX RAISING IN WASHINGTON COUNTY, N. Y. 
From Mr. Lemuel Palmer we learn some 
facts in regard to flax raising, which is car¬ 
ried on quite extensively in the southern 
part of Washington County. There are a 
number of mills in this section—the town of 
Cambridge alone has seven—some of which 
turn out from 75,000 to 100,000 lbs. of 
dressed flax per annum. The smallest mills 
probably prepare not more than 12,000 to 
15,000 lbs. At all these mills the flax is 
dew-rotted; that is, spread upon grass from 
four to six weeks. It is then prepared by 
machinery for the manufacturer, and shipped 
to different parts of the country. Formerly 
considerable quantities were sent to Ando¬ 
ver, Mass. 
The mill owners purchase the flax from 
the raisers, sometimes in the field, and 
sometimes delivered at the mill, with or with¬ 
out the seed removed. They also rent land 
and let out the working at so much per acre. 
The present season one man sold his crop, 
while standing, at $47 per acre, he to pull 
and deliver it at the mill. The cost of pull¬ 
ing is generally from $5 to $6 per acre, where 
the crop is heavy. 
The soil is described to be of a dark slaty 
character. No manure is used, though 
some apply ashes or plaster. About one 
bushel of seed is sown to the acre, and the 
entire cost of cultivation and delivery to the 
mill is estimated at $10 to $12 per acre. 
Mr. Hiram Darrow, of Cambridge, has rented 
and bought from 1,200 to 1,300 acres of flax 
this last season. For some he has paid as 
high as fifty dollars per acre. He took some 
of the flax raised on Mr. Allen Green’s farm 
to the State Fair, which measured five feet. 
He is dressing, at both of his mills, one thou¬ 
sand pounds, or more, per day, and he 
dresses from 230,000 to 240,000 pounds 
per year, employing twenty to thirty hands 
most of the time. Flax is also cultivated 
to very near the same extent, in portions 
of Rensselaer County. 
Worcester County (Mass.) Agricultural 
Society. —We are indebted to Mr. Wm. S. 
Lincoln, Corresponding and Recording Sec¬ 
retary of this Society, for a copy of the Re¬ 
port for 1854, which is just received. The 
style of the Report is excellent. We have 
not yet examined its contents. 
See “ Cent per Cent” next page. 
THE OLDEN TIMES-MODERN EXTRAVAGANCE. 
At the risk of being called “ an old fogy,” 
we feel for the moment disposed, in con¬ 
templating the present state of things around 
us in the embarrassments, fluctuations, and 
revolutions—economically and financially of 
the times—to compare somewhat the con¬ 
dition and manner of the living of our fathers, 
even down to thirty years ago,-with those of 
ourselves, their children, at the present day. 
We can not, of course, give the subject more 
than a glance ; but even that may not be 
without its interest, and cause us to reflect 
somewhat upon the utility and propriety— 
necessity is out of the question—of the helter- 
skelter pitch-ahead sort of life too many of 
us lead in the bustling affairs of the world ; 
and which is, we regret to say, too rapidly 
making its way into the quiet homestead of 
the farm. As we pass, it may be observed 
that we are not of that useless, repining sort 
of disposition which looks back on “the good 
old times ” as fraught with all that is good 
and worth having, nor upon the present as 
full of evil. The world has progressed faster 
within the last thirty years in the arts, as 
applied to human comfort and luxury, than 
within ar.y like period. This is all very 
well; and the only query of doubt about the 
good this progress has effected, is as to the 
use we have made of it for the benefit of hu¬ 
manity at large, and ourselves in partic¬ 
ular. 
Born in the valley of a large tributary of 
the Connecticut river, in Massachusetts, 
upon a farm looking out from near the base 
of one of the mountain ranges over some of 
its most striking and beautiful scenery, on 
which our venerable grandsire, after having 
passed through the long struggle of the 
American revolution, as a military officer, 
had retired to spend the remainder of his 
days in the quietude of agricultural life, our 
first breath drew in a love of rural things. 
The song of birds, the lowing of herds, the 
bleating of flocks, the cheerful voice of labor 
in the fields, the hum of household industry, 
the breath of blooming orchards, the sight of 
their golden and ruddy fruits, the gathered 
harvests—all these stamped their earliest 
impressions on our young life, and will re¬ 
main with its last pulsations. The district 
school, in its elements of education few 
and simple, but lasting in their influences, 
laid the substratum of what little beyond 
them we have since acquired. The village 
meeting-house, some miles away, where was. 
weekly dispensed by a plain and pious man 
those lessons of a strict theology, and an 
upright life which have given directness and 
energy of purpose to millions of men, aside 
from the moral teachings of the fire-side, 
gave us, in the clear and unmistakable pre¬ 
cepts we there treasured up—if not always 
acted upon—a code of philosophy and mor¬ 
als sufficient for our future government. 
The simple, earnest intercourse of the peo¬ 
ple around us, their honesty, their economy 
in life, and the sure success which accom¬ 
panied their endeavors, taught us the true 
value of industry and its steady application 
in working out permanent results. There 
were youth as well as children in those days, 
the former of which are scarcely known in 
the present, and in associations with them 
we grew to manhood—and thus it was with 
others of that generation. 
There were poor people in those days— 
but not half so many, and they not half so 
destitute as now ; nor were poor-houses half 
so frequent, because poor foreigners were 
not half so abundant. There were rich peo¬ 
ple, too, farmers as well as others, who 
lived in plain, comfortable houses, with 
nothing scarcely of the filagree, and ginger¬ 
bread work about them, either outside or in, 
as the same class of persons have now. In 
all the substantial of life they lived quite as 
well, and with far less pretension. Their 
wives and daughters were quite as industri¬ 
ous, and far less extravagant; were as grace¬ 
ful in their manners, and as virtuous in their 
actions ; their minds better stored with use¬ 
ful information, more economical, and less 
expensive in their habits, than now. Their 
reading, if not so extensive or miscellaneous 
as at the present day, was better in its kind, 
and made them more thoughtful women. If 
they had no cooking-stoves then, they had 
fewer negligent, lazy servants to look after, 
and were more independent in all their 
household affairs ; and far less the slaves of 
fashion than our wives and daughters are. 
They had household comforts and luxuries 
in profusion, not half so costly, or far fetched, 
but wholesome for both body and mind. 
The girls were more beautiful in person than 
now, because their complexions had the rosy 
hue of useful exercise. They were stronger 
in body, because they were inured to daily 
labor in household duties, fitting them for 
healthy mothers and provident housekeep¬ 
ers, which, sad to say, a vast number of those 
in like circumstances at this day, are not. 
So, according to their sex, were the young 
men. They did not tire of home, as soon as 
they had seen the sights of the neighboring 
village, and teaze their fathers to go into 
