n 
Written for Moore's Kural New-Yorkor 
YOUTHFUL ASPIRATIONS. 
Written for Moore’s Rural New-Yorker 
HAS THE RURAL COME?” 
Written for Moore’s Rural New-Yorker 
ARTIFICIAL LIGHT AND HEAT. 
Tears unbidden dim the 
StrrvuKe 'montr strancers we ».>■ 
Xow must break the magic 
Long the hearthstone has been 
Earth te receding from our 
Round the groat Eternal’s 
How many eager voices every week echo the 
question, “Has the Rural come?*’ “Has the 
Rural come?” say the merry, school children, 
as they come bounding in from school; and soon 
they are busily engaged in perusing its welcome 
contents, especially “Reading for the Young." 
“Has the Rural come?" says the older and 
more dignified farmer's boy, who is just verging 
on manhood, and who feels the importance 
thereof. “ Has the Rural come?’’ exclaims the 
sturdy, toiling, sun-burned farmer, as he comes 
in from his daily labor; and Soon he is absorbed 
in the well-freighted pages of the Agricultural, 
Horticultural andSheep Husbandry Departments. 
And, “ last, tmt not least," 
sre parting 
are meeting 1 
are parties! 
are mooting! 
are parting! 
are mooting! 
N ^ 
C # 9 0 
l«rting! 
meeting! 
parting! 
meeting! 
parting! 
meeting! 
BT FROF. EDWARD WEBSTER 
How often do wo hear the childish desire ex¬ 
pressed, “ 0, l wish l were a man/” To boa 
real genuine “big body"—wear large panta¬ 
loons, great coats, ride fast horses, smoke cigars 
and be like grown people, generally—Is, la the 
mind of an aspiring youth, ou the lower aide of 
minority, a desideratum — a thing “devoutly to 
be hoped for." Wheu time rolls onward and 
brings forward the dayB of manhood, uiauy an 
aspiring lad, who grew petulant with “Old 
Father Time,” because he drove his car so 
slowly, realizes that to be a man is not to bo 
“ everything ”—that older people have cares and 
anxieties as well as the young, and that even 
cigar smoke and “ big clothes ” can’t hide all the 
“ills to which humanity is heir.” 
Many a youth forms noble and exalted ideas of 
what he will do, and what he will be, when he be¬ 
comes a man. One would bo benevolent — give 
largely to the poor, assist the needy and cast 
roses in the paths of those who tread the down¬ 
hill road of sorrow; another would be an educa¬ 
tor — help dispel the hldloii* night of ignorance 
which envelops the world — teach men to <w<r, to 
read, to think, and transform this into a “world 
of letters;" while a third would be a moralist — 
inculcate the true principles of virtue —fill earth 
with goodness, and heaven with the redeemed. 
How seldom, hoW very seldom, do the glowing 
anticipations of childhood become realities 1 He 
who in his youth pictured out for himself a work 
of benevolence, will, perchance, engrossed and en¬ 
twined by the cares and perplexities of life, be¬ 
come a/ /rasping mixer; ho who would have been 
an educator, will, perhaps, from an acquaintance, 
with vice and error, become a debauchee „• and he 
who wished to be ft teacher of morality, may be¬ 
come an ini)) of Satan — one of the “devils 
angels.” Hopes are often blasted! Disappoint¬ 
ment Is one of the first of life’s lessons t 
But after all, If childhood’s hopes are blasted 
and blighted by the stern realities of life, is it not 
a happy delusion, which gives many happy days, 
Tis far better 
It is all very well la theory to Insist upon the 
old proverb of “ Early to bed and early to rise." 
but in civilized society of all ages and in all coun¬ 
tries, men will, more or less, turn day into the 
night, aud night into the day. The rising of the 
sun is a phenomenon of daily occurrence, but at 
the same time one not usually witnessed by the 
maiority of mankind. The business man, the 
statesman, the philosopher, the poet, the scholar, 
the pleasure seeker, each in his sphere seeks the 
aid of artificial light for the consummation, if 
not for the beginning, of each day’s successes or 
failures. 
The sun’s rays arc the great promoter of the ac¬ 
tivities of nature; and most organisms, whether 
animal or vegetable, must feel the vivifying influ¬ 
ence of tho sunlight, or speedily perish. Indeed, 
the theory is now boldly and plausibly main* 
tained that heat and illumiuation by combustion 
are but the reawakening of the solar rays, which 
have been combined aud stored away by the I 
action of organic life. The mighty forests of 
the tropics, the numberless coal fields buried 
beneath t he mountains, the petroleum reservoirs 
within their subterranean and rock-ribbed vaults, 
are all results of the same general causes,- namely: 
the life-giving principle of the solur ray. Water 
and carbonic ackl, by their chemical decompo¬ 
sition, through the potent instrumentality of 
organic life, stimulated by the sunlight, repro¬ 
duce through the ages a frosh supply for what 
has been wasted and consumed. 
To say nothing of the desperate strait to 
which the human race wonid be reduced for fuel 
without, the coal fields, hhw would civilized so¬ 
ciety get along without artificial light which 
results from the same geological formation? At 
a period of time so remoto that human chro¬ 
nology amounts to nothing iu comparison, a 
gigantic vegetation through successive ages grew 
and perished. Could a human intellect, without 
the light of our own era, have viewed and rea¬ 
soned then upon the earth’s condition, it would 
have pronounced it an aimless and profitless 
waste. Would any human being now pronounce 
such a presumptuous verdict upon the designs 
of the Almighty, or consent to have the carbon¬ 
iferous period, with its momentous and fearful 
results, stricken from the stony leaves of the 
earth’s past history? 
As X write this article, long after the god of 
day has withdrawn from our meridian, and gone 
to illuminate with his noon-tide rays the Islands 
of the Pacific sea, where docs the light come 
from to aid me in the work V The coal of Penn¬ 
sylvania, the buried product of vegetable life of 
partin*! 
Home anil kindred—ftU wo w leaving. 
Cut at .wisdom's nhrtno low bowing. 
Heart to heart amt hands uniting. 
Cheerful *rail<» and voices greeting 
Round our death-couch friends are woepmg 
No more sorrow! No more portingi 
come the women 
folk, who, after all other members of the family 
are through, (meek, retiring creatures that they 
are,) are busily engaged, as all the rest have been, 
in looking over the Rural, particularly the 
“Ladios’ Department,” and the “Domestic 
Economy,"—reading with delight, the various 
articles and rich recipes they contain, (and most 
too rich arc some of them, for poor folks,) and 
making sundry comments thereupon — some 
flattcriug, some the opposite. 
By the Farmer and Mechanic, Clergyman and 
Teacher, Merchant and Doctor, Sailor and Sol¬ 
dier, the Rural is always heartily welcomed 
and eagerly read,— for therein is found many 
things desired. If you wish to see the market 
prlpes in the cities about you — if you wish to 
read a good story or fine poetry— if you wish to 
see the numberless things required of a good 
Family Newspaper, you find them all in the 
Rural. And it is reliable, too. I have read the 
Rural nearly ten years, regularly, and we con¬ 
sider it one of the family institutions. Then 
welcome, thrice welcome to the Rural! the 
Prince of Newspapers, weekly or daily. 
Admiration for the Rural and its cause in¬ 
duced this first attempt to write for its interest¬ 
ing pages and if acceptable I may “try again.” 
Allegany Co., N. Y., 1866. U. M. K. 
pye; 
pe»r; 
spell; 
lone: 
view; 
throne 
Hon*: and kindred, all we’rn 
tears unbidden dim the eye 
Good bye, 
Welcome 
Farewell, 
Woieom ■ 
■' Adieu ” 
1 Wokvme. 
Softly bieatbo the sad 
leaving, 
•* Good bye w 
come home, 
“Fare - well.’’ 
come home 
adieu." 
come home.” 
Softly breathe tho 
Soon we fen! the 
Sndly Sighs the 
Joy to apeak the 
Transient jf»ya 
Angel* chanting, 
’Adieu 
sunny smiles and joyful laughs ? ’ 
to have, some happy days, even though the source 
of their happiness is delusive, than to be envel¬ 
oped forever in dread, gloomy, cheerless realities. 
Hopedalc, Ohio, 1865. 
DAYS OF THE WEEK-HOW NAMED 
The days of the week were each sacred to a 
certain deity; Sunday and Monday to the sun 
and moon respectively; Tuesday has its name 
from Tuescn, whom the Saxons supposed to be 
supreme ruler ; Wednesday, named after Woden, 
the god of war. Hero is an explanaton of one of 
FalstafTs questions concerning “ honor." “ Who 
hath it? He that died on a Wednesday’’—that 
is, killed lu battle, iu the service of Woden. 
Thursday is from Thor, the god of thunder; Fri¬ 
day from Frlgu, the deity supposed to preside 
over trade; and Saturday from Sacter, the god of 
liberty. From which last I suppose has de 
sccnded the custom of observing that day as a 
holiday, and which, I am thankful to say, Is 
pretty duly kept by all who can afford the need¬ 
ful relaxation, with one remarkable exception, 
namely, those who follow the useful art of shoe- 
making. It, Is well known that they favor Mon¬ 
day as their day of recreation, which custom is 
said to have had its origin in the time of Oliver 
Cromwell. The story is that one of his generals, 
named Muuday, committed suicide. The pro¬ 
tector ofi’ored a reward for the most suitable 
epitaph commemorating the death of his friend. 
The successful competitor was a worthy son of 
Crispin, who carried off the palm by the follow¬ 
ing epigram 
God bless tho Lord Protector! 
And cursed be worldly pelf; . 
Tuesday shall begin the week. 
Since Monday’s hanged himself. 
Written for Moore’s Rural New-Yorker. 
THE BELTED KINGFISHER-Aicedo Alcyou, 
coma homo 
chon tlu 
IGNORANCE AND POVERTY 
ALEXANDER HAMILTON. 
The Natural History of New York, title Orni¬ 
thology, thus describes this bird; —Bill with a 
longitudinal furrow on each side of the ridge of 
the. upper mandible.. Tail short, nearly even, 
slightly rounded, ruaehlug beyond the tips of the 
closed wings. Color bluish slate above; breast 
bluish white; a white spot above and beneath 
the eye. Quills black, barred with white at 
tho base. Secondaries spotted and tipped with 
white, forming narrow bars on expanded wings. 
Head crested. 
Ignorance Is not the inevitable lot of the ma¬ 
jority of our community; and with ignorance a 
host of evils disappear. Of all tile obstacles to 
improvement, Ignorance Is the most formidable; 
because the only true secret of assisting t he poor 
Is to make them agents In bettering their own 
condition, and to supply them, uot with a tem¬ 
porary stimulus, but with a permanent energy. 
A.s fust as the standard of Intelligence is raised, 
the poor become more and more able to co-ope¬ 
rate in any plan proposed for their advantage, 
more likely t,o listen to any reasonable sugges¬ 
tion, more able to understand It, and therefore 
more willing to pursue it.. Hence it follows, that 
when gross ignorance is once removed, and right 
principles are introduced, a great advantage has 
been already gained against squalid poverty. 
Many avenues to tho improved condition are 
opened to one whose faculties are enlarged and 
exercised; he sees his own interest more clearly, 
he persucs it more steadily, he does not study 
immediate gratification at the expense of bitter 
and late repentance, or mortgage the labor of bis 
future life without an adequate return, Indi¬ 
gence, therefore, will rarely be found in company 
with good education.— Arehblxhoj) Sumner. 
What strikes us most forcibly in considering 
Hamilton’s career, is tho remarkable early devel- 
opemnts of his powers. At thirteen, he was 
found competent to take charge of a mercantile 
establishment. At. fifteen, his writings win for 
h im public applause, and the aid of friends. At 
seventeen, lie addresses with success a great pub¬ 
lic meeting. At eighteen, his anonymous pro 
duetlons arc attributed to some of tho leading 
men of America. At nineteen ho has thought 
out that principle of government which Is indeli¬ 
bly associated with his name. At twenty, ho Ids 
uot only approved himself a skillful and coura- 
the esteem of the 
gcous soldier, but he has 
grave and reserved Washington, and placed by 
that great man in a post of the closest confidence, 
and which really makes him the second man iu 
the American service. 
At twenty-three, he lias shown that he is mas¬ 
ter of the intricate subject of finance. At twenty- 
five, after an active military life that had allowed 
no time for study, he is known as a lawyer of the 
first order. At twenty-six, he is distinguished as 
a member of Congress. At thirty, he takes a 
leading part iu framing the constitution of the 
United States. And iu his thirty-second year, he 
became the most, extraordinary finance minister 
the world has ever seen. He was a statesman, 
soldier, writer, and orator, and first In each de¬ 
partment ; and he was as ready for alt the parts 
which he filled as if he had been long and stu¬ 
diously trained for each of them by the best of 
instructors. 
When Mr. Webster so happily compared the in¬ 
stantaneousness and perfection of his financial 
system to “ the fabled birth ofMlnerva," hodidbut 
allude to what is to be remarked of all of Hamil¬ 
ton’s works. All that he did was perfect, aud no 
one seems to have been aware of his power until 
he had established the fact of its existence. 
Such a combination of precocity and versatility 
stands quite unparalleled. Octavious, William the 
Third, Henry St. John, Charles James Fox, and 
William Pitt the younger, all showed various 
powers at early periods of their lives; but no 
oue of them was the equal of Hamilton in respect 
to early maturity of intellect, or Ln ability to 
command success in every department, to which 
he turned his attention. The historical charac¬ 
ter of whom he most reminds us is the elder 
Africanus. 
In the early development of his faculties, in 
his self-reliant spirit, in his patriotism, in his 
kindness of mind, in his personal purity, in his 
generosity of thought and of action, aud in the 
fear and envy he excited in Inferior minds, he 
was a repetition of the most, majestic of all the 
Romans. But, unlike the Roman soldier-states¬ 
man, he did not desert the land be had saved, but 
which had proved ungraetfui; and the grave 
only was to be bis Llternum. He died not far 
from the same age as that which Africanus reach¬ 
ed. In comparing him with certain other men 
who aeldeved fame early, it should be remem¬ 
bered that they all were regularly prepared for 
public life, and were born to it as tofan inherit] 
ance; whereas he, though of patrician blood, 
was possessed of no advantages of fortune, and 
had to fight the battle of life while fighting the 
battles of the nation .—November Atlantic Monthly. 
BE YOUR OWN RIGHT-HAND MAN 
People who have been bolstered up and lever¬ 
ed all their lives are seldom good for anything in 
a crisis. When misfortune comes they look 
around for something to cling to or lean upon. 
If the prop is not there, down they go. 
Once down, they are as helpless as capsized 
turtles, oruuhorsed men in armor, and cannot 
find their feet again without assistance. 
Such silken fellows no more resemble self-made 
men, who have fought their way to position, 
making dittcuities their stepping-stones, and de¬ 
riving determination from defeat, than vines 
resemble oaks, or sputtering rushlights the stars 
of heaven. Efforts persisted into achievements 
train a man to self-reliance, and when he has 
proved to the world that he can trust himself the 
world will trust him. 
It is unwise to deprive young men of the ad¬ 
vantages which result from their own energetic 
action by “ boosting” them over obstacles which 
they ought to surmount alone. 
OLD-FASHIONED WEDDINGS. 
It is well known that the Puritan fathers used j 
to enjoy long prayers and sermons. A prayer of 
an hour's length and a sermon of two hours 
were nothing extraordinary in Sabbath worship. 
Their patience and digestive powers astonish the 
effeminate Christians of our generation. 
It may uot he so well known that wedding cere¬ 
monies wore often equally prolonged. They 
would have been shocked at brevity of tho ser¬ 
vice lu our day. I have thought it not singular 
that divorces are frequent when little solemnity 
invests the rite of marriage, In Prof. Hovey’s 
“Life of Dr. Backus," the following extract is 
given from the doctor’s journal; 
“ We arrived near night, and found some hun¬ 
dreds of people assembled. So matters being 
prepared, Squire Paine, of that, town, married 
them, while, at his motion, I prayed before and 
gave a word of counsel after the transaction; 
then, also at his desire, Brother Hines offered 
prayer, we* sung part of Psalm exlv, and Brother 
Hines preached an excellent memon from Solomon's 
Song v. 9." c 
We arc afraid marriage ceremonies would be 
deserted, like many conference meetings, if the 
guests knew that “an excellent, sermon" was to 
be a part of the service .—National Baptist. 
This bird, the denizen of our rural districts, 
where How the gentle waters and the limpid 
streams, is a familiar acquaintance of every 
school-boy. Tbo beauty of his form, the viva¬ 
city of his movements, the sharp notes of his 
somewhat unmusical voice, tho sudden plunge 
into the. stream when bis eye has once detected 
the tinny prey, the deep holes he bore# in tho 
shelving gravel bank as a protection for the 
callow young, are home pictures to many of us 
whose later lives have been severed from all our 
dearer and earlier associations. The Kingfisher, 
the Bluejay, aud the Woodpecker are three sprites 
of the field aud forest associated with tho writer’s 
remotest recollections; and many a ramble with 
early friends Was enlivened by their stirring notes 
and gluuciug wings. The same identical birds 
seem now to be occupying the same nooks and 
corners, the same Add trees whose drooping 
branches afforded a lookout for the Fisher, or 
whose mouldering trunks furnished the Wood¬ 
pecker a place to drum, seem to be still stand¬ 
ing ; but the companions of those early rambles, 
where arc they? Dead or scattered like the 
autumn leaves, and the places that knew them 
once know them uo more ! 
SCIENTIFIC ITEMS, 
The transmission of sound through a deal 
board is four times quicker than through air, 
and through iron or glass more thau fifteen times. 
Pins were introduced into England from 
France iu 1543; they were first made in Eng¬ 
land in 1620. Umbrellas were not used until 
1768. 
At Genoa ou the 25th of October, 1862, thirty 
inches of water fell ou the occurrence of a wa¬ 
ter-spout. This is the greatest fall of water on 
record. 
The presence of silver in the copper sheath-1 
ing of ships after long-continued voyages has 
been showu, even to the extent of 7 ounces to 
the tun. 
A body projected from the lunar surface with 
a velocity of about 7,770 feet per second, would 
be detached from the moon and brought to the 
earth by terrestrial gravitation. 
The quantity of water supplied by the whole 
of the aqueducts in ancient Rome is calculated 
to have amounted to the enormous quantity of 
nearly fifty millions of cubic feet daily. 
Is silver wire gilt, the coating of gold is 
usually only the 3,384,000th part of an inch in 
thickness; nevertheless it is so perfect as not to 
exhibit tracks when examined by the microscope. 
By th; spectrum analysis Bunsen was able 
to detec, the 70,000,000th part of a grain of 
lithium h a compound; while of sodium the 
108,000,001th part of a grain could bo made per¬ 
ceptible. 
FLORAL RELICS, 
Sot Bernard Burke, in his “Vicisitudes of 
Families,” gives us a touching instance of the 
tendency of flowers to linger upon the spots 
where they were once tenderly nurtured. “ Be¬ 
ing in search," he tells us, “of a pedigree with 
reference to the Findernes, once a great family 
seat in Derbyshire, I sought for their ancient 
hall. Not a stone remained to tell where it 
stood. I entered the ehurch; not a single record 
of a Findemc was there! I accosted a villager, 
hoping to glean some stray traditions of the Fin- 
demes. ’Findernes!’ho-aid; 4 we have no Fin- 
derues here; but we have something that once 
belonged to them—wc have Findernes flowers.’ 
‘ Show me them,’ I replied, and the old man Led 
me into a field which still retained faint traces of 
terrace and foundation. ‘ There,’ said he, pointing 
to a bank of garden flowers grown wild, 1 these 
are Findernes flowers, brought by Sir Geoffrey 
from the Holy Land, and do what we will, they 
i will never die.’ " 
FOR BOYS AND GIRLS, 
The Little Corporal is bright, sparkling, and 
pule, both iu typography and contents. It 
already excels every children's paper we know of 
in this country .—Chicago Evening Journal. 
This beautiful child’s paper Is published 
monthly by Alfred L. Sewell, in Chicago, 
Illinois. Price, $1. a year. Specimen copies ten 
cents. 
