When once a mind has been touched with zeal in floriculture it seldom forgets its love. If our children were early made little enthusiasts for the garden, when they were old they would not depart from it. A woman’s perception of the beauty of form, of colors, of arrangement, is naturally quicker and truer than man’s. Why should they admire these only in painting, in dress, and in furniture? Can human art equal what God has made, in variety, hue, grace, symmetry, order and delicacy? A beautiful engraving is often admired by those who never look at a natural landscape; ladies become connoisseurs of “artificials,” who live in proximity to real flowers without a spark of enthusiasm for them. We are persuaded that, if parents, instead of regarding a disposition to train flowers as a useless trouble, a waste of time, a pernicious romancing, would inspire the love of it, nurture and direct it, it would save their daughters from false taste, and all love of meretricious ornament. The most enthusiastic lovers of nature catch something of the simplicity and truthfulness of nature.
Now a constant temptation to female vanity—(if it may be supposed for the sake of argument, to exist) is a display of person, of dress, of equipage. In olden times, without entirely hating their beauty, our mothers used to be proud of their spinning, their weaving, their curiously-wrought apparel for bed and board. A pride in what we have done is not, if in due measure, wrong or unwise; and we really
think that rivalry among the young in rearing the choicest plants, the most resplendent flowers, would be altogether a wise exchange for a rivalry of lace, and ribbons, and silks. And, even if poor human nature must be forced to allow the privilege of criticising each other something severely, it would be much more amiable to pull roses to pieces, than to pull caps; all the shafts which are now cast at the luckless beauty, might more harmlessly be cast upon the glowing shield of her dahlias or upon the cup of her tulips.
A love of flowers would beget early rising, industry, habits of close observation, and of reading. It would incline the mind to notice natural phenomena, and to reason upon them. It would occupy the mind with pure thoughts, and inspire a sweet and gentle enthusiasm; maintain simplicity of taste; and in connection with personal instruction, unfold in the heart an enlarged, unstraitened, ardent piety.
KEEPING YOUNG PIGS IN WINTER.
There is both negligence, and mistake, in the way of wintering pigs. I am not talking to those whose manner of keeping stock is, to let stock take care of themselves; but to farmers who mean to be careful. Hogs should be sorted. The little ones will, otherwise, be cheated at the trough, and overlaid and smothered in the sleeping-heap. There should not be too many in one inclosure; especially young pigs should not sleep in crowds; for, although they sleep warmer, they will suffer on that very account. Lying in piles, they get sweaty; the skin is much more sensitive to the cold, and coming out in the morning reaking and smoking, the keen air pierces them. In this way, young pigs die off through the winter by being too warm at night. If you have the land-shark and alligator breed, however, you should crowd these together, for the more they die off the better for the farmer.