MOORE’S RURAL NEW-YORKER: AN AGRICULTU UAL AND FAMILY JOURNAL. 
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TRENTON FALLS. 
Our engraving this week, rep¬ 
resents the “first fall” of the 
series of cascades at Trenton, 
Oneida county. N. Y., where the 
West Canada Creek, the princi¬ 
pal branch of the Mohawk, pours 
over a precipice thirty-three feet 
high, extending when the water 
is abundant, across the whole 
breadth of the chasm. The scene¬ 
ry of Trenton Falls has been so 
inimitably depicted by N. P. 
Willis, in his “Rural Letters,” 
that we can do no better than to 
copy his description:— 
“The peculiarity of Trenton 
Falls, I fancy, consists a good deal 
in the space in which you are 
compelled to see them. You walk 
a few steps from the hotel, through 
the wood, and come to a descend¬ 
ing staircase of a hundred steps, 
the different bends of which are 
so overgrown with wild shrubbery, that 
you cannot see the ravine till you are fairly 
upon its rocky floor. Your path hence, up 
to the first fall, is along a ledge cut out of 
the base of the cliff that overhangs the tor¬ 
rent; and when you get to the foot of the 
descending sheet, you find yourself in very 
close quarters with a cataract—rocky walls 
all around you — and the appreciation of 
power and magnitude, perhaps, somewhat 
heightened by the confinement of the place 
— as a man would have a much more re¬ 
alizing sense of a live lion, shut up with 
him in a basement parlor, than he would of 
the same object, seen from an elevated and 
distant point of view. 
“The usual walk (though this deep cave, 
open at the top.) is about half' a mile in 
length, and its almost subterranean river, 
in that distance, plunges over four prcci- 
<£f "Ir'il'j 
For the Rural New-Yorker. 
POETRY. 
. 
BY E. M. PHILLIPS. 
What is Poetry? The voice of angels, 
Soft breathing into man’s delighted ear 
The songs of other worlds. The voice of man’s 
Own spirit, pouring forth the tide of joy, 
Or jigony, in music like the swell 
Of some sweet song bird’s glad, exulting strain;— 
Or like the wind-harp’s wondrous melody— 
Now shrieking loud, in fitful phrenzy wild. 
Now sadly sweet the dulcet strings complain, 
And changing still, singing of cheerfulness. 
Yea, Poetry is found in every thing,— 
The glory of the golden light of day. 
And birds, and leaves, and trees, and blooming flowers, 
And clouds of brightest hue, or darkest gloom: 
The Ocean in its rage, and in its rest; 
And every stream, and every passing breeze— 
That plays about the woodland monarch’s crown, 
And night, with its majestic moon and stars, 
That seem to love to smile on quiet lakes. 
These and a thousand other tilings of earth. 
Have each a voice, and sing the praise of Him 
Who made them all, in true poetic strains. 
There’s poetry in human thoughts and love, 
In smiling infancy, in mother’s tears, 
In eyes that speak what tongues can never tell, 
And if we seek to speak it in a word, 
One comprehensive word, that word is Truth. 
Albion, N. Y., Oct., 1851. 
NEW ENGLAND AND HER PEOPLE. 
It must ever give pleasure to American 
mind to dwell upon tlie history of New 
England. We cannot select a spot in that 
portion of our Union, that is not rich in as¬ 
sociations of interest and delight. Whenev¬ 
er we pass the eastern boundary of our own 
“Empire State”, whether we climb the rug¬ 
ged, rocky sides of the Green Mountains, or 
walk the rich valley of the rolling Con¬ 
necticut, we can but feel that we tread up¬ 
on hallowed ground. We honor New Eng¬ 
land with a deeper reverence than we ever 
felt before. We love her for what she has 
been, and we respect her for what she is. 
Twenty-four States of this great Union 
cling to her as their mother. There was 
the nativity, and there are now the graves 
of the ancestors, of a great portion of the 
western settlers. There, three-fourths of a 
century ago, burst forth the spirit of Amer¬ 
ican liberty, which, like the words of In¬ 
spiration, shall some day gladden every in¬ 
habitant of Earth, and we rejoice to see 
that that same spirit dwells there still .— 
There, Freedom first wept for the blood of 
her martyrs, for whom, “ to die for liberty 
was a pleasure, and not a pain.” There, 
was preached and practiced in its'purity, 
the precepts of a holy religion—there, mo¬ 
rality was not an empty name, but a living, 
active, purifying principle, correcting the 
life and deeds of man—there, the Sabbath 
was a holy day of rest to all, and not of 
revelry and mirth—there, Industry garner¬ 
ed up her fruits, and gaunt Idleness “ beg¬ 
ged in harvest and had nothing.” 
New England has ever been character¬ 
ized by the activity, energy, and enterprise 
of her inhabitants. From infancy they 
TRENTON FALLS — LOWER CASCADE. 
pices in exceedingly beautiful cascades.— 
On the successive rocky terraces between 
the falls, the torrent takes every variety of • 
rapids and whirlpools, and, perhaps, in all 
the scenery of the world, there is no river 
which, in the same space, presents so many 
of the various shapes and beauties of run¬ 
ning and falling water. The Indian name 
of the stream, (the Kanata, which means 
the amber river,) expresses one of its pecu¬ 
liarities, and, probably from the depth of 
shade cast by the two dark and overhang¬ 
ing walls ’twixt which it flows, the water is 
everywhere of a peculiarly rich lustre and 
color, and, in the edges of one or two of the 
cascades, as yellow as gold. Artists, in 
drawing this river, fail, somehow, in giving 
have been taught to labor. They can not 
sow and reap with as little toil as the far¬ 
mer of Western New York, for theirs is a 
stubborn soil. In many parts, to us, the 
rocks would seem to “ make the earth as 
brass,” yet it yields its increase to the pa¬ 
tient husbandman. 
They are rn emigrating people. On 
every accessible portion of the earth, the 
hardy New Englander seems to be at work. 
The Far West becomes bis adopted home. 
His axe makes the wild woods ring, and 
the forest sinks before him, while his broth¬ 
er furrows the rich prairie. He lays the 
railway irons, over which he drives the 
flighty locomotive, while its shrill whistle is 
music to his ear—he traverses the Rocky 
Mountains, and leaves his footprints in their 
eternal snows, and descends to hunt and 
trap the furs of Oregon—he measures 
; swords with the wily Mexican, and hoists 
! the “ stars and stripes” above the capitol 
of his antagonist, and afterward he washes 
gold upon the banks of the Sacramento. 
But a continent is too limited for him— 
he must fret the ocean with his toil. His 
proud ship floats on every sea, laden with 
th<$ surplus products of his own country, 
and foreign millions feast upon the richness 
of his cargo—he strikes the whale in the 
broad Pacific, or, from the mast-head, he 
gazes among the icebergs of the North Pole 
for Sir John Franklin—he bears the Bible 
to the heathen, thirsting for “ that living 
water,” and proclaims to him a Savior, 
dead and risen—the toil-worn slave flees to 
him for protection, and Ireland looks over 
to him for deliverance, in some future day, 
from her oppression—and she expects it, too. 
Thus in every enterprise of gain or glory, 
of ease or suffering, the daring son of New 
England is ever ready to act his part; and, 
wherever the enslaved are to be emanci¬ 
pated, or the heathen christianized and en¬ 
lightened, there he is in the true spirit of 
philanthropy and self-devotion. 
Wymond. 
Churchville, N. Y., 1851. 
Knowledge of Men. —We know them, 
we judge them, only in the strangest, most 
complex, and often most unnatural relations, 
far away from their proper selves, in situa¬ 
tions and in atmospheres where they are 
shaken and troubled and become dim. We 
look away one way—down — down into 
some muddy pond, where the real character 
of a man is tossed on the waves of a vain 
opinion. Pitiful! look up at at once into a 
man’s face—into his soul—where God gives 
you opportunity. 
Let us never forget that every station in 
life is necessary; that each deserves our re¬ 
spect; that not the station itself, but the 
the worthy fulfillment of its duties, does 
honor to a man. 
the impression of deep-down-itude which i B 
produced by the close approach of the two 
lofty walls of rock, capped by the overlean¬ 
ing woods, and with the sky apparently 
resting, like a ceiling, upon the leafy archi¬ 
traves. It conveys, somehow, the effect of 
a sw&ter-natural river—on a different level, 
altogether, from our common and above¬ 
ground water-courses. If there were truly, 
as the poets say figuratively, “ worlds with¬ 
in worlds,” this would look as if an earth¬ 
quake had cracked open the outer globe, 
and exposed, through the yawning fissure, 
one of the rivers of the globe below—the 
usual underground level of ‘ down among 
the dead men,’ being, as you walk upon its 
banks, between you and the daylight.” 
A NOBLE EXAMPLE. 
Whenever wc see a small crowd in the 
street, we always suspect there is some¬ 
thing worth seeing or hearing on the spot, 
and we are seldom disappointed in this ex¬ 
pectation. Yesterday, for example, we saw 
a little miscellaneous congregation of citi¬ 
zens in Second street; and, on approaching 
the point of attraction, we observed a very 
gentlemanly young man, dressed up to the 
mark, and sporting a magnificent goatee 
and pair of whiskers, who was handling a 
paver’s rammer among several other per¬ 
sons engaged in the same kind of labor— 
some repairs being in progress on that part 
of the street. 
The young gentleman, as intimated above, 
was dressed in the most fashionable mode, 
and this excited the curiosity of the spec¬ 
tators, who seemed to consider it something 
uncommon for such a dandyish person to 
be occupied with such a work of utility. — 
We suppose that our readers generally are 
aware that driving down paving stones with 
a “ rammer” is no lady’ play; in fact, the 
toilsome employment made our dandy per¬ 
spire freely, and imparted a most enviable 
ruddiness to his complexion. Observing 
that the bystanders took a lively interest in 
his pursuits, he came to a pause, wiped his 
brow with a rich silk handkerchief and ad¬ 
dressed the assembly: 
“ Ladies and gentlemen, I perceive that 
you are anxious to know why I am thus 
engaged: and, not to keep you in the ten¬ 
ter-hooks of surprise, I will let you have an 
abridgement of my history. My father 
died several years ago, and left me in easv 
circumstances, with respect to money; but 
my idle and inactive habits placed me in 
uneasy circumstances with respect to diges¬ 
tion. For want of exercise, I became dys¬ 
peptic; the doctor advised me to use the 
dumb-bells. For several days I swung 
two heavy pieces of lead to and fro, when 
it occurred to me that this was all labor 
thrown away. If I do work, (thought I,) 
why may I not just as well do something 
useful. 
While reflecting on this subject, I hap¬ 
pened to be passing this spot, and, seeing 
the pavers at work, I requested one of them 
to take a seat on that pile of stones, and 
allow me to use his rammer for half an 
hour. I found this exercise much more 
agreeable than the dumb-bells; besides, I 
I have the satisfaction that my toil now tends 
I to a noble purpose, namely, the welfare of 
my fellow citizens* Every day, I employ 
myself for half an hour with the rammer, 
and since I adopted this plan, the dyspep¬ 
sia has entirely disappeared. My appetite 
is tremendous, and I can digest anything, 
except James’ last novel.” 
The applause of the spectators followed 
this explanation; and we resolved, on the 
instant, to make the case public for the ben¬ 
efit of other dyspeptics, who may not have 
discovered what medical virtue resides in a 
“ rammer.”— Pennsylvanian. 
The knowledge of evil many help to 
good, and assist us to measure its value; 
every new idea should be to us anew feather 
in the wings that bear us upward. 
They who drink away their estate, drink Prayer was not invented; it was born 
the tears of their widows and the very with the first sigh, the first joy, the first 
blood of their impoverished children. sorrow of the human heart. 
“ ACCIDENTAL.’' 
Among the swift items of the last week, 
which have been despatched, as we Amer¬ 
icans despatch almost every thing—with the 
hurry of a breakfast roll, — has been a 
steamboat explosion in the far away West, 
which landed some twenty odd persons, • 
without even the warning of a whistle, in 
the land of the Dead. Another affair, 
milder, but nearer home, shattered some 
score of limbs, made as many creditable 
contusions, and drove one poor passenger 
mad. The first item found its origin in the 
swift steamer Jackson, of Shawneetown, and 
the second boasts of birth upon the Ver? 
mont Central Railway. 
It is odd how easy these matters are of 
digestion, for, with the exception of some 
few crotchety individuals, who have fathers j 
or mothers, or wives or brothers that fall * 
victims, and who insist in manifesting their 
regret, we take it all as quietly as a salad 
for dinner. It does not seem at all strange 
or out of the Christian order of things, 
that a Captain should allow his Engineer 
to blow up a boat or two now and then, 
and send twenty or thirty passengers to 
eternity; or for a conductor to a Railway 
to forget to look at his watch, and so 
change a score of stalwart men to as many- 
cripples. 
The Engineers in both these cases were 
probably in a hurry; and who, pray, ini 
oui good Republican country, has not a ! 
right to be in a hurry ? The papers tell 
us they have both run away; they are per A' 
haps ashamed of their bad Engineering; 
they certainly cannot fear any punishment; 
well authenticated cases of punishment for 
such slight slips are hardly to be found in 
the whole history of our tribunals; and -we 
do not know of any person authorized to, 
.capture them, even if they should makjgq 
their appearance. We are quite sure that 
neither the Steamboat Company, or the 
Railroad Company would wish their return; 
for they gain by their escape, all the unpaid 
arrearages of their salaries. 
As for the Public, it is a most lenient' 
judge in these matters. The Public calls 
it an accident, and accepts it as a nice rel¬ 
ish for its breakfast roll; and if the sufferers 
are only deck passengers, or Irish brake- 
men, the papers announce the fact with a 
good deal of satisfaction. Deck passengers 
and Irish brakemen seem to the good pub¬ 
lic to have been brought into the Western 
World very much for such kind of rough 
and tumble service. But if the list of 
sufferers chance to number names that are 
known, and some few mothers and children, 
“ it is very sad,” and the most independent 
talkers will say, in a quiet way, that “ it was 
careless.”— N. Y. Times. 
INSULTS. 
Whether an act becomes an insult, de¬ 
pends almost as much on location and sur- 
sounding circumstances, as our faith and 
prejudices do. Ask a Hindoo to partake of 
your meat, and he would spit in your face; 
neglect to ask an Englishman to do so, and 
he would probably request the favor of 
meeting you in the Park. To offer wine to 
a Turk would be to make an enemy of 
“enlarged breeches” forever. The same 
act to a Frenchman would probably secure 
you an unending friendship. Among our 
Oriental friends, for a man to introduce 
himself into the presence of a married wo¬ 
man would be to the husband an unpardon¬ 
able injury; a bare request to see her an 
affront. The person who would call upon 
an American, however, without inquiring 
for the partner of his bosom, would be con¬ 
sidered as having lost his title to a gentle¬ 
man. • 
On the coast of Malabar, if a Hallachore 
chance to touch a man of superior tribe, 
the outrage is so great that the laws allow 
the injured party to punish the insult with 
death; in almost any other country, it would 
be treated as an act too frivolous to notice. 
In France, duelling is looked upon as an 
accomplishment; in Japan it’s murder.— 
Suicide, on the contrary, is thought by the 
Frenchman an act of baseness—while the 
Japanese^ people esteem it the most satis¬ 
factory, proof of your possessing bravery. 
To wipe out a disgrace, the Frenchman 
slioots you; the Japanese, on the contrary, 
shoots himself; while your refusal to follow 
his example, would be considered such an 
act of poltroonery, that your family would 
consider themselves disgraced to all eterni¬ 
ty.— Dutchman. 
Uses of the Hair. —Being a bad con¬ 
ductor of heat, it secures and equalizes 
the warmth of the body. It defends ani¬ 
mals from the sun’s rays, and from the 
bites of insects when piercing the skin to 
suck blood, or to deposit eggs. It reduces 
concussions from blows; hence warriors had 
plumes of feathers or horses’ tails on their 
helmets, Its uses over the eyebrows, on 
the eyelids, at the entrance of the ear, are 
obvious. The hair makes us sensible to 
external objects; thus we feel a fly on the 
hair of our head when the creature is at a 
considerable distance from our skin. The 
long hairs on the upper lip of the cat, and 
other feline animals, are an agent of touch. 
— Wesley Banner. 
For the Rural New-Yorker. 
MIDNIGHT M USINGS. 
Dark the shades of night are falling, 
Fast the clouds are hurrying by, 
One bright star, alone, is keeping 
Wakeful vigils in the sky. 
Gentle sleep, with winning magic. 
Has resumed her mighty sway, 
All around will calmly slumler, 
’Till the dawning of th; day. 
Vainly do i close my eyelids, 
Aching hearts can never sleep, 
Gazing on that star or beauty, 
I the midnight watch must keep. 
Could I weep, ’twoulif ease my sorrow. 
But my teardrops all are spent, 
And a sigh’s the only token, 
Of a heart with anguish rent. 
W Happy they who pass life’s morning, 
’Neath a gentle mother’s care, 
And whom cruel Fate doth never. 
From the home of childhood hear. 
Such as they, may calmly slumber. 
Calmly close their peaceful eyes. 
And in dreams their souls arc carried 
To the gates of Paradise. 
Could I hear my mother’s accents. 
Stealing o’er my senses now, 
Could I feel her soft hand pressing 
On my fevered, aching brow; 
Could I hear her words of comfort, 
Hear her voice, so soft and low, 
O: ’twould give me strength and courage. 
In my onward path to go. 
But no mother now is near me. 
Childhood’s home is far away, 
Mid the tall and waving tree tops, 
W T here the sunny shadows p'.ay. 
in that blessed home was gathered. 
Once a bright and happy band. 
Like a chain, with links unbroken. 
Brothers, sisters, hand in hand. 
Fast my teardrops now are falling, 
O’er the memories of the past, 
O’er those dreamy days of gladness, 
Which were never meant to last; 
And the burden now is lifted 
From my crushed and broken heart, 
For a vision of the future. 
Bids my sadness all depart. 
Yes! my tears shall flow no longer, 
O'er my sorrows here below, * 
For I know there’s One in Heaven, 
Who my onward path will show. 
And though far from home and kindred, 
He, I know, is with me still. 
And though others should forsake me. 
He hath said He never will. 
„ „ ‘Jenny.” 
WOMAN’S RIGHTS. 
David Hale, late editor of the Journal 
of Commerce, once wrote a jeu d’esprit on 
the “ Rights of Women,” in which he show¬ 
ed that the balance of wrongs was decided¬ 
ly on the side of the men. “ When the 
simple question of superiority is at issu< j , the 
men always have to give up. If ladies and 
gentlemen meet on the sidewalk, who has 
to turn out ? If there are not seats enough 
for all the company, who has to stand up? 
When there is danger to face, who must go 
•forward? If there is curiosity to gratify, 
who goes behind? If there is too much 
company for the first table, who eats at the 
second? W T ho has always the right hand 
and the most respectable position ? We 
could mention a hundred other cases, in 
which, on the simple question of right, eve¬ 
rything is yielded to the women. 
But there are many cases in which the 
condition of men is still worse. For instance, 
if on any public occasion a pew at a church, 
or a seat anywhere, be occupied by men 
ever so respectable or aged, a smirky little 
beauty trips along and presents herself at 
the top of the seat, and they must all jump 
up and clear out as if they had been shot. 
Especially ought it to be noticed, that when 
matrimonial negotiations are to be made, the 
whole burden of performing the delicate and 
often very embarrassing part of making pro¬ 
posals is thrown upon the men, while the 
women sit and say no, no, no, as long as 
they like, and never say yes, until they have 
a mind to.” 
MOTHERLY LOVE. 
Last among the characteristics of wo¬ 
man is that sweet motherly love with which 
nature has gifted her. It is almost inde¬ 
pendent of cold reason, and wholly remov¬ 
ed from all selfish hope of reward. Not 
because it is lovely, does the mother love 
her child, but because it is a living part of 
herself—the child of her heart, a part of 
her own nature. 
In every.uncorrupted nation of the earth 
this feeling is the same. Climate, which 
changes everything else, changes not that. 
It is only the most corrupting forms of so¬ 
ciety which have power gradually to make 
luxurious vice sweeter than the tender cares 
and toils of maternal love. In Greenland, 
where the climate affords no nourishment 
for infants, the mother nourishes her child 
up to the third or fourth year of its life. — 
She endures from it all the nascent indica¬ 
tion of the rude and domineering spirit of 
manhood with indulgent, all-forgiving pa¬ 
tience. The negress is armed with more 
than manly strength when her child is at¬ 
tacked by savages. We read with aston¬ 
ished admiration the accounts of her match¬ 
less courage and contempt of danger. But 
if death robs that tender mother whom we 
are pleased to call a savage, of her best 
comfort—the charm and care of her exist¬ 
ence—where is the heart that can conceive 
■her sorrow ? The feeling which it breathes 
is beyond all expression. 
