ARCHITECTURE.

estimated by us far above all price. The first thing done in the new parts of our country, when a spot is determined on for a house, is to cut down all the trees within many rods of it; and then, year by year, the work of destruction goes on, as if the very sight of a forest tree were odious. The house stands alone in the clearing, its inmates, and particularly the children, roasted and browned under the hot summer's sun; but by and by, the nakedness and dreariness of the situa tion is felt, and then are planted some Lombardy poplars "all in a row." Now, the trees which we cut down with such an unsparing hand, are the very kind which English gardiners cultivate with the most persevering diligence, and are planted here just as they labor most to plant. And we too shall cultivate them before long, and shall then think, with the most bitter regret, of the sad destruction which we and our ancestors have made. But in vain; for all the art of man will not be able to restore in any length of time, such glades and thickets, and lawns, as we now possess. When about to build in a new country, we should save, near our house, an acre or two of the forest, and should guard it with the most watchful care. Morning, noon, and evening, it would be an agreeable retreat; its shade would be refreshing in our scorching heats; it would connect us in some measure, with ages long since gone, and bring before us the wild, but high-souled Indian, his council, his battle song, the war, the chase, the feast and dance; its noble and manly form would gratify our taste; it would raise our thoughts to Him who is "a shadow from the heat, a strength to the needy in his distress." Let us then spare our noble forest trees. Many political considerations might be adduced to shew the imprudence of our rude havoc among them, but for these we have not room."

PART V.

AGRICULTURE.

Agriculture, considered as a science, explains the means of making the earth produce, in plenty and perfection, those vegetables, which are necessary to the subsistence, or convenience of man, and of the animals reared by him for food, or labor.,

Considered as an art, every human being has an interest in it, since it is the foundation of all other arts-the basis of civilization and refinement-and essential to the existence of some of the nations which inhabit certain portions of our globe.

Besides the healthfulness of the pursuit, agriculture "is intimately connected"-to use the language of a distinguished literary journal of our country*" with our national character, because it powerfully acts upon the morals and constitution of our citizens. If it be true that the torch of liberty has always burned with a purer and brighter lustre on the mountains than on the plains, it is still more true, that the sentiments of honor and integrity more generally animate the rough, but manly form of the farmer, than the debilitated body of the artisan. There is in that primitive and honorable occupation, the culture of the earth, something which, while it pours into the lap of the State an increase beyond every other employment, gives more than the fabled stone, not only a subsistence, but a placid feeling of contentment; not only creates the appetite to enjoy, but guaranties its continuance, by a robust constitution, fortified with the safe-guards of temperance and virtue."

To this we may add a remark of Adam Smith, in his Wealth of Nations, viz. that "the capital employed in agriculture not only puts in motion a greater quantity of productive labor, than any equal capital employed in manufactures; but, also in proportion to the productive labor which it employs, it adds a much greater value to the annual produce of the land and labor of the country, while it increases the real wealth and revenue of its inhabitants."

Notwithstanding these high testimonials-and a hundred more equally weighty might be adduced-in favor of the profession of agriculture, it has been, until within a few years, "a degraded and unpopular pursuit among us." In Europe, the fact has been otherwise. In England and on the continent, every state, since the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, has turned its assiduous attention to this most important department of domestic economy, and ultimately borrowed from it the resources

* North American Review.

AGRICULTURE.

which have carried them through the prodigious conflicts of the last generation.

Several causes have contributed to lessen the apparent importance of agricultural skill in the United States. But two only can here be noticed.

The first is the peculiar situation of Europe since the peace of '83, which has afforded opportunities for commercial enterprise, too tempting to be resisted. "American merchants received in the lapse of a very few years, the most astonishing accessions of wealth and fortunes, ordinarily the fruit of a laborious life, and never the portion of many, were amassed with unparalleled rapidity, and by large numbers. Our domestic prosperity more than equalled the extension of our trade. It was then that the counting-houses of our merchants were filled with youth from the country, who forsook the slower but surer emoluments of agriculture, for the mushroom, but unsubstantial fortunes of commerce; nay, who preferred the meanest drudgery behind the counter of a retailer, to the manly and invigorating toil of the cultivator of his paternal acres. Unfortunately this spirit of migration was encouraged by too great a success in trade. Feelings of vulgar pride contracted in town, caused the manual labor of the farmer to be regarded as degrading. This unworthy sentiment spread its baleful influence; and when the compting-houses became overstocked, and afforded no longer a resource, it was no uncommon thing to see a young man, with no qualifications, but a little bad Latin, picked up at a miserable village school, forsake a large and comfortable farm, and apprentice himself to a poor country attorney."

The second cause of the late depressed state of agriculture in the United States, especially in New-England, has been owing to the constant emigration to the West. No sooner had the farmer reduced his land by successive crops, than he removed to a country, which offered him an untouched surface, needing for some years no aid of composts and

manures.

But it is occasion of gratitude, that, at length, the importance of a regular and more enlightened and more energetic system of farming is beginning to be felt in our country. Men of talents, wealth, and distinction, no longer think it beneath them to enrol their names on the list of practical farmers. By means of agricultural associations, and liberally patronized, and ably conducted papers, information on the subject, considered both as an art, and a science, is rapidly spreading abroada taste for farming is diffusing itself, and ere long, it is believed, that this species of employment will be as much prized and coveted, as once it was considered low and despicable.

To aid in advancing the interests of this important branch of national industry will be the object of the pages which we design to appropriate to this subject.

NEAT CATTLE.

SECTION I.

DIFFERENT BREEDS OF NEAT CATTLE IN GREAT BRITAIN AND THE UNITED

I. The WILD CATTLE-of a bull of which race the above is a portrait,-were the original stock of the kingdom of Great Britain before ́enclosures were known. They are said to be still found at Chartley Park, in Derbyshire, and perhaps, in one or two more; but it is believed that the only pure breed is that preserved, in a wild state, at Chillingham Castle in Northumberland, the seat of the Earl of Tankerville, whose steward, Mr. Bailey, thus describes them:

Their color is invariably white; muzzle black; the whole of the inside of the ear, and about one-third of the outside, from the tip downwards, red; horns white with black tips, very fine and bent upwards. Some of the bulls have a thin upright mane, about an inch and a half or two inches long: the weight of the oxen is from thirty-five to fortyfive stone, of fourteen pounds; and that of the cows, from twenty-five to thirty-five stone the four quarters. The beef is finely marbled and of excellent flavor.

"The mode of killing them was, perhaps, the only modern remains of the grandeur of ancient hunting. On notice being given that a wild bull would be killed upon a certain day, the inhabitants of the neighborhood came in great numbers, both horse and foot; the horsemen rode off the bull from the rest of the herd until he stood at bay, when a marksman dismounted and shot. At some of these huntings, twenty or thirty shots have been fired before he was subdued: on such occasions the bleeding victim grew desperately furious from the smarting of his wounds, and the shouts of savage joy that were echoing on every side. From the number of accidents that happened, this dangerous mode has been seldom practised of late years; the park-keeper generally shooting them with a rifle gun at one shot.

"When the cows calve, they hide their calves for a week or ten days in some sequestered situation and go and suckle them two or three times a day, If any person come near the calves, they clap their heads

NEAT CATTLE.

close to the ground, and lie like a hare in a form, to hide themselves. This is a proof of their native wildness, and is corroborated by the following circumstance, that happened to the writer of the narrative, who found a hidden calf two days old, very lean and very weak; on stroking its head, it got up, pawed two or three times, like an old bull, bellowed very loud, retired a few steps, and bolted at his legs with all its force; it then began to paw again, bellowed, stepped back, and bolted as before; but knowing its intention, and stepping aside, it missed him, fell, and was so very weak that it could not rise, though it made several efforts; but it had done enough; the whole herd were alarmed, and coming to its rescue, obliged him to retire; for the dams will allow no person to touch their calves without attacking them with impetuous ferocity.

"When any one happens to be wounded, or grown weak or feeble through age or sickness, the rest of the herd set upon it and gore it to death."

II. The DEVONSHIRE BREED, delineated above, is supposed to have descended directly from the wild race. It is found in its purest state in North Devon; in the agricultural report of which district its peculiar qualities are thus described by the late Mr. Vancouver :

"Its head is small, clean, and free from flesh about the jaws; deerlike light and airy in its countenance; neck long and thin; throat free from jowl or dewlap; nose and round its eyes of a dark orange color; ears thin and pointed, tinged on their inside with the same color that is always found to encircle its eyes; horns thin, and fine to their roots, of a cream color, tipped with black, growing with a regular curve upwards, and rather springing from each other; light in the withers, resting on a shoulder a little retiring and spreading, and so rounded below as to sink all appearance of its pinion in the body of the animal; open bosom, with a deep chest, or keel; small and tapering below the knee,

*

*The late Rev. Arthur Young, formerly Secretary to the Board of Agriculture, describes thorough bred Devons as of a bright red, neck and head small, eye prominent, and round it a ring of bright yellow; the nose round the nostril having the same color; the horn clear and transparent, upright, tapering, and gently curved, but not tipped with black.