Contents
[THE GREAT EXHIBITION OF THE NEW-YORK STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY AT ROCHESTER.]
[WILLIAM ROSS WALLACE.]
[AMERICA AS ABUSED BY A GERMAN.]
[REMINISCENCES OF THE LATE MR. COOPER.—HIS LAST DAYS.]
[THE LONDON TIMES ON AMERICAN INTERCOMMUNICATION.]
[THE LAST EARTHQUAKE IN EUROPE.]
[MR. JEFFERSON ON THE STUDY OF THE ANGLO-SAXON LANGUAGE.]
[THE OBELISKS OF EGYPT.]
[DR. LATHAM ON THE MOSKITO KINGDOM.]
[GOLD-QUARTZ AND SOCIETY.]
[INEDITED LETTER OF DR. FRANKLIN.]
[A BALLAD OF SIR JOHN FRANKLIN.]
[REMARKABLE PROPHECY.]
[GREENWOOD.]
[AN AUGUST REVERIE.]
[HEROINES OF HISTORY—LAURA.]
[THE KING AND OUTLAW.]
[SAINT ESCARPACIO'S BONES.]
[DIRGE FOR AN INFANT.]
[THE CHIMES.]
[A STORY WITHOUT A NAME.]
[TWO SONNETS.]
[THE COUNT MONTE-LEONE: OR, THE SPY IN SOCIETY.]
[A GHOST STORY OF NORMANDY.]
[CREBILLON, THE FRENCH ÆSCHYLUS.]
[HABITS OF FREDERICK THE GREAT.]
[THE OLD MAN'S DEATH.]
[MY NOVEL.]
[FRAGMENTS FROM A VOLUME OF POEMS.]
[AUTHORS AND BOOKS.]
[THE FINE ARTS.]
[NOCTES AMICÆ.]
[HISTORICAL REVIEW OF THE MONTH.]
[SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERIES AND PROCEEDINGS OF LEARNED SOCIETIES.]
[RECENT DEATHS.]
[LADIES' AUTUMN FASHIONS.]
THE GREAT EXHIBITION OF THE NEW-YORK STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY AT ROCHESTER.
EXTERIOR OF THE FAIR.
This is an age of Exhibitions. From the humble collection of cattle and counter-panes, swine and "garden sauce," at the central village of some secluded County, up to the stupendous "World's Fair" at London, wherein all nations and all arts are represented, "Industrial Expositions," as the French more accurately term them, are the order of the day. And this is well—nay, it is inspiring. It proves the growth and diffusion of a wider and deeper consciousness of the importance and dignity of Labor as an element of national strength and social progress. That corn and cloth are essential to the comfortable subsistence of the human family, and of every portion of it, was always plain enough; but the truth is much broader than that. Not food alone, but knowledge, virtue, power, depend upon the subtle skill of the artificer's fingers, the sturdy might of the husbandman's arm. Let these fail, through the blighting influence of despotism, licentiousness, superstition, or slavery, and the national greatness is cankered at the root, and its preservation overtasks the ability of Phocion, of Hannibal, of Cato. A nation flourishes or withers with the development and vigor of its Industry. It may prosper and be strong without statesmen, warriors, or jurists; it fades and falls with the decline of its arts and its agriculture. Wisely, therefore, do rulers, nobles, field marshals and archbishops, unite in rendering the highest honors to eminence in the domain of Industry, dimly perceiving that it is mightier and more enduring than their petty and fragile potencies. The empire of Napoleon, though so lately at its zenith, has utterly passed away, while that of Fulton is still in its youth.
A State Agricultural Society, numbering among its members some thousands of her foremost citizens, mainly but not wholly farmers, is one of the most commendable institutions of this great and growing commonwealth. Aided liberally by the State government, it holds an Annual Fair at some one of the chief towns of the interior, generally on the line of the Erie Canal, whereby the collection of stock and other articles for exhibition is facilitated, and the cost thereof materially lessened. Poughkeepsie, Albany, Saratoga Springs, Utica, Syracuse (twice), Auburn, Rochester (twice), and Buffalo, are the points at which these Fairs have been held within the last ten years. Recently, the railroads have transported cattle, &c., for exhibition, either at half-price, or entirely without charge, while the State's bounty and the liberal receipts for admission to the grounds have enabled the managers to stimulate competition by a very extensive award of premiums, so that almost every recurrence of the State Fair witnesses a larger and still more extensive display of choice animals. Whether the improvement in quality keeps pace with the increase in number is a point to be maturely considered.
The Fair of this year was held at Rochester, in a large open field about a mile south of the city, and of course near the Genesee river. Gigantic stumps scattered through it, attested how recently this whole region was covered with the primeval forest. Probably fifty thousand persons now live within sight of the Rochester steeples, though not a human being inhabited this then dense and swampy wilderness forty years ago. And here, almost wholly from a region which had less than five thousand white inhabitants in 1810, not fewer than one hundred thousand persons, two-thirds of them adult males, were drawn together expressly to witness this exhibition. The number who entered the gates on Thursday alone exceeded seventy-five thousand, while the attendance on the two preceding days and on Friday, of persons who were not present on Thursday, must have exceeded twenty-five thousand. Of course, many came with no definite purpose, no previous preparation to observe and learn, and so carried home nothing more than they brought there, save the head-ache, generated by their irregularities and excesses while absent; but thousands came qualified and resolved to profit by the practical lessons spread before them, and doubtless went away richly recompensed for the time and money expended in visiting the Fair. This Annual Exhibition is as yet the Farmers' University; they will in time have a better, but until then they do well to make the most of that which already welcomes them to its cheap, ready and practical inculcations.
ROCHESTER.
The President of the State Society for this year is Mr. John Delafield, long a master spirit among our Wall-street financiers, and for some years President of the Phenix bank. He was finally swamped by the rascality of the State of Illinois in virtually repudiating her public debt, whereby Mr. Delafield, who had long acted as her financial agent in New-York, and had staked his fortune on her integrity, was reduced from affluence to need. Nothing daunted by this reverse, he promptly transferred his energies from finance to agriculture, taking hold of a large farm in Seneca County, near the beautiful village of Geneva; and on this farm he soon proved himself one of the best practical agriculturists in our State. Before he had been five years on the soil, he was already teaching hundreds of life-long cultivators, by the quiet force of his successful example, how to double the product of their lands and more than double their annual profits. His enlightened and admirable husbandry has finally called him to the post he now occupies—one not inferior in true dignity and opportunity for usefulness to that of Governor of the State. And this is a fair specimen of the elasticity of the American character and its capacity for adapting itself to any and every change of circumstances.
INTERIOR OF THE FAIR.
The Annual Address at this Fair was delivered by the Hon. Stephen A. Douglas, now U. S. Senator from Illinois, and a very probable "Democratic" candidate for next President of the United States. It was an able and well enunciated discourse, devoted mainly to political economy as affecting agriculture, taking the "free trade" view of this important and difficult subject, and evidently addressed quite as much to southern politicians as to New-York farmers; but it embodied many practical suggestions of decided force and value. This address has already received a very wide circulation.
A public entertainment was proffered on Thursday evening to the officers of the State Society, on behalf of the city of Rochester, which was attended by ex-President Tyler, Gov. Washington Hunt, ex-Governor and ex-Secretary Marcy, Gen. Wool, Governor Wright of Indiana, &c. &c. Senator Douglas arrived in the train just before the gathering broke up. The presence of ladies, and the absence of liquors, were the most commendable features of this festivity, which was convened at an absurdly late hour, and characterized by an afflictive amount of dull speaking. Such an entertainment is very well on an occasion like this, merely as a means of enabling the congregated thousands to see and hear the celebrities convened with them; but it should be given in the afternoon or beginning of the evening, should cost very little (the speaking being dog-cheap and the eatables no object), and should in nearly all respects be just what the Rochester festival was not. As an exercise in false hospitality, however, and a beacon for future adventurers in the same line, this entertainment had considerable merit.
AZALIA.
The best Short-Horned Durham Cow over Three Years Old: Owned by Lewis G. Morris.
LORD ERYHOLM.
The best Two Year Old Short-Horned Durham Bull: Owned by Lewis G. Morris.
Neat Cattle stood first in intrinsic value among the classes of articles exhibited at the Fair. Probably not less than One Thousand of these were shown on this occasion, including imported bulls and cows, working-oxen, fat steers, blood-heifers, calves, &c. &c. Of these we could not now say whether the Durham or Devonshire breed predominated, but the former had certainly no such marked ascendency as at former Fairs. Our impression from the statements of disinterested breeders was and is, that where cattle are bred mainly for the market, a larger weight of flesh may be obtained at an early age from the Durham than from any rival breed, though not of the finest quality; while for milk or butter the Devon is, and perhaps one or two other breeds are, preferable. But this is merely the inference of one, who has no experience in the premises, from a comparison of the statements of intelligent breeders of widely differing preferences. Probably each of the half-dozen best breeds is better adapted to certain localities and purposes than any other; and intelligent farmers assert, that we still need some breeds not yet introduced in this country, especially the small Black Cattle of the Scottish Highlands, which, from their hardiness, excellence of flesh, small cost for wintering, &c., are specially adapted to our own rugged upland districts, particularly that which half covers the north-eastern quarter of our State. The subject is one of the deepest interest to agriculturists, and is destined to receive a thorough investigation at their hands.
EARL SEAHAM.
The best Short-Horned Durham Bull over Three Years Old: Owned by J. M. Sherwood and A. Stevens.
DEVON.
The best Devon Bull over Three Years Old: Owned by W. P. and C. S. Wainwright.
TROMP.
The best Hereford Bull, over Three Years Old: Owned by Allen Ayrault.
KOSSUTH AND BRISKA.
Best Foreign (Hungarian) Cattle, over Two Years Old: Owned by Roswell L. Colt.
Of Horses, the number exhibited was of course much smaller—perhaps two hundred in all—embracing many animals of rare spirit, symmetry, and beauty. Some Canadian horses, and a few specimens of a famous Vermont breed (the Morgan) were among them. Our attention was not specially drawn in this direction, and we will leave the merits of the rival competitors to the awards of the judges.
DEVON HEIFER.
Best three-fourth bred Devon Heifer: owned by George Shaeffer.
OLD CLYDE.
Best Foreign Horse: owned by Jane Ward, Markham, Canada West.
CONSTERNATION.
Best thorough-bred horse over four years old: owned by John B. Burnet.
SOUTH DOWN SHEEP.
Best Middle-Wooled Ewe, over Two Years Old: Owned by Lewis G. Morris.
Of Sheep, there were a large number present—at a rough guess, Two Thousand—embracing specimens of widely contrasted varieties. The fine-wooled Saxonies and Merioes were largely represented; so were coarse-wooled but fine-fleshed Bakewells and Southdowns. For three or four years past, the annual product of wool, especially of the finer qualities, has been unequal to the demand, causing a gradual appreciation of prices, until a standard has this year been reached above the value of the staple. Speculators, who had observed the gradual rise through two or three seasons, rushed in to purchase this year's clip, at prices which cannot be maintained, and the farmers have received some hundreds of thousands of dollars more for their wool than the buyers can ever sell it for. This has naturally reacted on the price of sheep, whereof choice specimens for breeding have been sold for sums scarcely exceeded during the celebrated Merino fever of 1816-18. Bona fide sales for $100 each and over have certainly been made; and it is confidently asserted that picked animals from the flocks of a famous Vermont breeder were sold, to improve Ohio flocks, at the late Fair of that State—a buck for $1,000, and six ewes for $300 each. These reports, whether veritable or somewhat inflated, indicate a tendency of the times. Where sheep are grown mainly for the wool, it is as absurd to keep those of inferior grades, as to plant apple-trees without grafting and grow two or three bushels of walnut-sized, vinegar-flavored fruit on a tree which might as well have borne ten bushels of Spitzenbergs or Greenings. But there is room also for improvement and profit in the breeding of sheep other than the fine-wooled species. The famous roast-mutton of England ought to be more than rivaled among us; for we have a better climate and far better sheep-walks than the English in the rugged mountain districts of New-England, of Pennsylvania, and of our own State. The breeding of large, fine-fleshed sheep of the choicest varieties, on the lines of all the railroads communicating with the great cities, is one of the undertakings which promise largest and surest returns to our farmers, and it is yet in its infancy. A hundred thousand of such sheep would be taken annually by New-York and Philadelphia at largely remunerating prices. Thousands of acres of sterile, scantily timbered land on the Delaware and its branches might be profitably transformed into extensive sheep-walks, while they must otherwise remain useless and unimproved for ages. These lands may now be bought for a song, and are morally certain to be far higher within the next dozen years.
LONG-WOOLED SHEEP.
Best long-wooled buck and ewe over two years old: owned by J. McDonald and Wm. Rathbone.
Of Swine there were a good many exhibited at the Fair, but we did not waste much time upon them. The Hog Crop once stood high among the products of the older States, but it has gradually fallen off since the settlement of the great West, and the cheapening of intercommunication between that section and the East, and is destined to sink still lower. Pork can be made on the prairies and among the nutwood forests and corn-bearing intervales of the West for half the cost of making it in New-England; no Yankee can afford to feed his hogs with corn, much less potatoes, as his grandfather freely did. Only on a dairy farm can any considerable quantity of pork be profitably made east of the Ohio; and he who keeps but a pig or two to eat up the refuse of the kitchen cares little (perhaps too little) for the breed of his porkers. So let them pass.
"Fancy" Fowls are among the hobbies of our day, as was abundantly evinced at the State Fair. Coops piled on coops, and in rows twenty rods long, of Chinese, Dorking, and other breeds of the most popular domestic bird, monopolized a large share of attention; while geese, ducks, turkies, &c., were liberally and creditably represented. The "Hen Convention," which was a pet topic of Boston waggery a year or two since, might have been easily and properly held at Rochester. Many of these choice barn-yard fowls were scarcely inferior in size while doubtless superior in flavor to the ordinary turky, while the farmer who opens the spring with a hundred of them may half feed his family and at the same time quite keep down his store-bill with their daily products. Small economies steadily pursued are the source of thrift and competence to many a cultivator of flinty and ungenial acres; few farmers can afford to disregard them. If thrice the present number of fowls were kept among us, their care and food would scarcely be missed, while their product would greatly increase the aggregate not only of thrift but of comfort.
J. DELAFIELD'S CHINESE HOGS.
"Floral Hall" was the name of a temporary though spacious structure of scantling and rough boards, in which were exhibited, in addition to a profusion of the flowers of the season, a display of Fruits and Vegetables whereof Rochester might well be proud. This city seems the natural centre of the finest fruit-growing district on the American continent—yes, in the whole world. Its high latitude secures the richest flavors, while the harsh northern winds, which elsewhere prove so baneful, are here softened by passing over lake Erie or Ontario, and a climate thus produced, which, for fruit, has no rival. Large delicious grapes of innumerable varieties; excellent peaches; delicate, juicy, luscious pears; quinces that really tempt the eye, though not the palate; and a profusion of fair, fragrant, golden, mammoth apples,—these were among the products of the immediate vicinity of Rochester exhibited in bounteous profusion. In the department of Vegetables also there were beets and turnips of gigantic size; several squashes weighing about one hundred and thirty pounds each; with egg-plants, potatoes, tomatoes, and other edibles, which were all that palate could desire. The fertility of western New-York is proverbial; but it was never more triumphantly set forth than in the fruit and vegetables exhibited at the State Fair.
Of butter, cheese, honey, (obtained without destroying the bees,) maple-sugar &c., the display was much better than we have remarked on any former occasion. And in this connection the rock salt from our own State works around Syracuse deserves honorable mention. New-York salt has been treated with systematic injustice by western consumers. In order to save a shilling or two on the barrel, they buy the inferior article produced by boiling instead of the far better obtained by solar evaporation; then they endeavor to make a New-York standard bushel of fifty six pounds do the work of a measured bushel of Turks Island weighing eighty pounds; and because the laws regulating the preservation and decomposition of animal substances will not thus be swindled, they pronounce the New-York salt impure and worthless. Now there is no purer, no better salt than the New-York solar; but, even of this, fifty-six pounds will not do the work of eighty. Buy the best quality, (and even this is dog cheap,) use the proper quantity, and no salt in the world will preserve meats better than this. The New-York solar salt exhibited at Rochester could not be surpassed, and that which had been ground has no superior in its adaptation to the table.
There were many tasteful Counterpanes and other products of female skill and industry exhibited, but the perpetual crowd in the 'halls' devoted to manufactures allowed no opportunity for their critical examination. Of stoves and ranges, heating and (let us be thankful for it, even at this late day) ventilating apparatus and arrangements, there was a supply; and so of daguerreotypes, trunks, harness, &c. &c. Nothing, however, arrested our attention in this hall but the specimens of Flax-Cotton and its various proportions exhibited by E. G. Roberts, assignee of Claussen's patents for the United States. We saw one intelligent influential citizen converted from skepticism to enthusiasm for flax-cotton by his first earnest examination. It will go inevitably. A cotton fibre scarcely distinguishable from Sea Island may be produced from flax by Claussen's process for six cents per pound; and a machine for breaking out the fibre from the unrotted stalk was exhibited by Mr. Clemmons of Springfield, Massachusetts, which is calculated materially to expedite the flax-cotton revolution. This machine renders the entire fibre, with hardly a loss of two per cent. as 'swingle-tow,' straight and wholly separated from the woody substance or 'shives,' at a cost which can hardly equal one cent per pound of dressed flax. Its operation is very simple, and any man who has seen it work a day may manage it. Its entire cost is from $125 to $200, according to size. It will be a shame to American agricultural enterprise if flax-cotton and linen are not both among our country's extensive and important products within the next three years.
The department of Agricultural Machinery and Implements was decidedly the most interesting of any. No other can at all equal it in the rapidity and universality of progress from year to year. Of Plows, there cannot have been less than two hundred on the ground, exhibiting a great variety of novel excellence. One with two shares, contrived to cut two furrows at once, seemed the most useful of any recently invented. The upper share cuts and turns the sward to the depth of five inches, which is immediately buried seven inches deep by the earth turned up by the deeper share. Since it is impossible to induce one farmer in twenty to subsoil, this, as the next best thing, ought to be universally adopted.
Seed-Sowers, Corn-Planters, Reapers, Fanning-Mills, Straw-Cutters, &c., &c., were abundant, and evinced many improvements on the best of former years. A Mower with which a man, boy, and span of horses, will cut and spread ten acres per day of grass, however heavy, on tolerably level land—both cutting and spreading better than the hand-impelled scythe and stick will do—was among the new inventions; also two threshers and cleaners, each of them warranted to thresh and nearly clean, by the labor of four men, a boy, and two horses, over one hundred bushels of wheat or two hundred bushels of oats per day. The testimony of candid citizens who had used them, and the evidence of our own senses, left no doubt on our mind of the correctness of these assertions. But we do not write to commend any article, but to call attention to the great and cheering truth which underlies them all. Agriculture is a noble art, involving the knowledge of almost all the practical sciences—chemistry, geology, climatology, mechanics, &c. It is not merely progressive, but rapidly progressing, so that fifty days' labor on the same soil produce far more grain or hay now than they did half a century ago. And every year is increasing and rendering more palpable the pressing need of a Practical College, wherein Agriculture, Mechanics, and the sciences auxiliary thereto shall be ably and thoroughly taught to thousands and tens of thousands of our countrymen, who shall in turn become the disseminators of the truths thus inculcated to the youth of every county and township in the country.
And thus shall Agriculture be rendered what it should be—not only the most essential but the most intellectual and attractive among the industrial avocations of mankind.
Horace Greeley
THE VIRGINIA REAPER. Exhibited at the Crystal Palace, and the New-York State Agricultural Fair, by Cyrus H. McCormick.
WILLIAM ROSS WALLACE.
Of the large number of young men in this country who write verses, we scarcely know of one who has a more unquestionable right to the title of poet than William Ross Wallace, who has just published, in a very handsome volume, a collection of his writings, under the title of Meditations in America. Mr. Wallace has written other things which in their day have been sufficiently familiar to the public; in what we have to say of his capacities we shall confine ourselves to the pieces which he has himself here selected as the truest exponents of his genius, and without giving them indiscriminate praise shall hope to find in them evidences of peculiar and remarkable powers, combined with a spirit eminently susceptible to the influences of nature and of ideal and moral beauty.
Mr. Wallace is a western man, and was born in Lexington, Kentucky, in the year 1819. His father was a Presbyterian minister, of good family, and marked abilities, who died soon after, leaving the future poet to the care of a mother whose chief ambition in regard to him was that he should be so trained as to be capable of the most elevated positions in society. After the usual preparatory studies, he went first to the Bloomington College, and afterwards to the South Hanover College, in Indiana, and upon graduating at the latter institution studied the law in his native city. When about twenty-two years of age, having already acquired considerable reputation in literature, by various contributions to western and southern periodicals, he came to the Atlantic states, and with the exception of a few months passed in Philadelphia, and a year and a half in Europe, he has since resided in New-York, occupied in the practice of his profession and in the pursuits of literature. Of his numerous poetical compositions, this is the first collection, and the only volume, except Alban, a Romance, intended to illustrate the influence of certain prejudices of society and principles of law on individual character and destiny, which was published in 1848.
His works generally are distinguished for a sensuous richness of style, earnestness of temper, and much freedom of speculation. Throughout the Meditations in America we perceive that he is most at home in the serious and stately rhythms and solemn fancies of such pieces as the hymn "To a Wind Going Seaward," "The Mounds of America," "The Chant of a Soul," &c.; but he occasionally writes in livelier and less peculiar measures.
The late Mr. Poe in his Marginalia refers to the following as one of the finest things in American literature; it is certainly very characteristic.