Protect Public Property.—What if it does concern everybody else as much as it does you? Some one ought to see that the fences about every square are kept in repair. Some one ought to save the trees from cattle; some one ought to have things in such trim as that the inhabitants can be proud of their own town. Pride is not decent when there is nothing to be proud of; but when things are worthy of it, no man can be decent who is devoid of a proper pride. The church, the schoolhouse, fences, trees, bridges, roads, public squares, sidewalks, these are things which tell tales about people. A stranger, seeking a location, can hardly think well of a place, in which the distinction between the house and stye are not obvious; in which every one is lazy when greediness does not excite him, and where general indolence leaves no time to think of the public good.
When politicians are on the point of dissolving in the very fervent heat of their love for the public, it would recall the fainting soul quicker than hartshorn or vinegar to ask them—Did you ever set out a shade-tree in the street? Did you ever take an hour’s pains about your own village? Have you secured it a lyceum? Have you watched over its schools? Have you aided in any arrangements for the relief of the poor? Have you shown any practical zeal for good roads, good bridges, good sidewalks, good schoolhouses, good churches? Have the young men in your place a public library?
If the question were put to many distinguished village patriots, What have you done for the public good?—the answer would be: “Why, I’ve talked till I’m hoarse, and an ungrateful public refuse me any office by which I may show my love of public affairs in a more practical manner.”
FARMERS AND FARMING SCENES IN THE WEST.
If any one goes to Holland they are all Dutch farmers there; if he goes to England he finds British husbandry; in New England it’s all Yankee farming. A man must go to the West to see a little of every sort of farming that ever existed, and some sorts we will affirm, never had an existence before anywhere else—the purely indigenous farming of the great valley. Within an hour’s ride of each other is the Swiss with his vineyard, the Dutchman with his spade, the “Pennsylvany Dutch” and his barn, the Yankee and his notions, the Kentuckian and his stock, the Irishman and his shillelah, the Welchman and his cheese, besides the supple French and smooth Italian, with here and there a Swede and a very good sprinkling of Indians.
Away yonder to the right is a little patch of thirty acres owned by a Yankee. He keeps good cows, one horse only (fat enough for half a dozen); every hour of the year, save only nights and Sabbath-days he is at work, and neat fences, clean door-yard, a nice barn, good crops, and a profitable dairy, and money at interest, show the results. What if he has but thirty acres, they are worth any two hundred around him, if what a man makes is a criterion of the value of his farm. But a little farther out is a jolly old Kentucky farmer, the owner of about five hundred acres of the best land in the county, which he tills when he has nothing else
to do. He is a great hunter and must go out for three or four days every season after deer. He loves office quite well, and is always willing to “serve the public” for a consid-er-a-tion, as Trapbois would say. As to farming, he hires more than he works; but, now and then, as at planting or harvesting, he will lay hold for a week or a month with perfect farming fury, and that’s the last of it. As to working every day and every hour, it would be intolerable! He is a great horse-raiser, is fond of stock, and if a free and easy fellow ready to laugh, not careful of his purse, nor particular about his time, will ride over his grounds, admire his cattle, his bluegrass pasture, his Pattons and his Durhams; and above all, that blooded filly, or that colt of Sir Archie’s—our Kentucky farmer will declare him the finest fellow alive, and his house will be open to him from year’s end to year’s end again.
Right along side of him is a “Pennsylvany Dutch,” good-natured, laborious, frugal and prosperous. He minds his own business. Seldom wrangles for office. Is not very public spirited, although he likes very well to see things prosper. He farms carefully on the old approved plan of his father, plants by the signs in the moon, seldom changes his habits, and on the whole constitutes a very substantial, clean, industrious, but unenterprising farmer.
Then there is a New York Yankee; he has got a grand piece of land, has paid for it, and got money to boot; he knows a little about everything; he “lays off” the timber for a fine large house—bossed the job himself. When it was up he stuck on a kitchen, then a pantry on to that, then a pump-room on that, then a wood-house on that, and then a smoke-house for the fag end; a fine garden, a snug little nursery well tended, good orchards; by and by a second farm, pretty soon a boy on it, all married and fixed off; by and by again another snug little farm, and then another boy on it, with a little wife to help him; and then a spruce young fellow is seen about the premises, and after a while