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over the whole arrangement. This is accomplished by describing every operation in the season it should be performed, and this condition necessarily implies the subdivision of the arrangement into four seasons. Authors of Farmers' Calendars divide their subject-matter into calendar or fixed months, being apparently inattentive to the influences of the seasons. Such an arrangement cannot fail to create confusion in the minds of young farmers; as any operation that is directed to be done in any month, may not, in every year, be performed in the same month, on account of the fluctuating nature of the seasons.

In adopting the seasons as the great divisor of the labours of the farm, the months which each season occupies are not specified by name, because the same season does not occupy the same number of months, nor even exactly the same months, in every year. The same work, however, is performed in the same season every year, though not perhaps in the same month or months.

In arranging the seasons themselves, the one which commences the agricultural year, which is Winter, has the precedence. The rest follow in the natural succession of Spring, Summer, and Autumn, in which last, all farming operations, having finished their annual circuit, finally terminate. A few remarks, illustrative of its nature, and the work performed in it, are given at the commencement of each season. By comparing these introductory remarks one with the others, the nature of the principal operations throughout the year may be discovered, and by perusing them in succession as they follow, an epitome of the entire farm operations for the year may be obtained.

Throughout the four seasons, from the commencement of winter to the end of autumn, the operations of the farm, both great and small, are described in a continued narrative. This narrative is printed in the largest type used (small pica). The reader will soon discover that this narrative does not extend uninterruptedly through the whole pages; portions of smaller type (bourgeois), intervening, and apparently interrupting it. On passing over the small type, it will be perceived that it is really written, and may be perused without interruption. The object of this plan is to permit the necessary descriptions of all the operations, performed in succession throughout the year, to be read in the large type, to the exclusion of every other matter that might distract the attention of the reader from the principal subject. A peristrephic view, so to speak, of the entire operations of the farm is thus obtained. The leading operations forming the principal subjects of the narrative, are distinguished by appropriate titles in CAPITALS placed across the middle of the page. The titles are numbered by the single Roman numeral

(thus, 1.) constituting, in the aggregate, a continuous succession of titles running, arithmetically numbered, through all the seasons. The leading operations thus easily attract the eye. The minutiae or minor operations forming the constituent parts of the principal operation to which they belong, each implying some specific change in the principal, is contained in a separate paragraph in the large type, and also numbered with the single Roman numeral, but between parentheses (thus, (1.)), the aggregate of which form a continuous succession of numbered paragraphs through all the seasons. A word or words characterising most explicitly the nature of the minor operation, are put in italics, at or near the beginning of each paragraph. Thus not only the principal operations, but all the minor, which they involve, may at once be ascertained. Woodcut figures of implements, and other objects, requiring no detailed descriptions, and representing at once their form and use, are inserted in the paragraph which alludes to them in the narrative. The reasons for performing both the principal and minor operations, in the manner directed, also form a part of the matter of the narrative.

Implements, on the other hand, that require detailed descriptions to explain, and complicated figures to represent them ;-reasons for preferring one mode to another of doing the same kind of work ;-and explanations of agricultural practice on scientific principles, together constituting the subsidiary portion of the work, are given in paragraphs in the medium-sized type (bourgeois), and this matter in the small type is that which apparently interrupts the principal narrative. Each paragraph is numbered with a single Roman numeral inclosed within parentheses (thus, (1.)) the same as in the principal narrative, and these paragraphs carry on the numbers arithmetically with the paragraphs of the principal narrative. When references are made from the large to the small type, they are made in corresponding numerals. The words most expressively characteristic of the illustration contained in the paragraph, are placed in italics at or near the beginning of it.

Marking all the paragraphs with numerals, greatly facilitates the finding out of any subject alluded to, saves repetition of descriptions when the same operation is performed in different seasons, and furnishes easy reference to subjects in the index.

Wood-cut figures of the intricate implements, and other objects requiring detailed descriptions, are placed among the descriptions of them in the bourgeois type. Figures of implements, and other objects too intricate to be represented with sufficient distinctness in wood-cuts, or very numerous for one subject, are engraved on steel-plates. The portraits of the animals given are intended to illustrate the points required to

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be attended to in the breeding of the domesticated animals. traits are taken from life by eminent artists. The wood-cuts are enumerated as they occur in the order of succession, whether they belong to the large or the small type, and each wood-cut is designated by its distinctive appellation; both the numeral and appellative being requisite for quick and easy reference.

The matter in the small type appears somewhat like foot-notes in ordinary books; but in this instance, it differs in character from foot-notes, inasmuch as its occurs in unbroken pages at the end of the description of every leading operation. By this plan the principal narrative is not interfered with, and both it and its illustrations may be perused before the succeeding leading operation and its illustrations are taken into consideration. This plan has the advantage of relieving the principal narrative of heavy foot-notes, the perusal of which, when long, not only seriously interrupts the thread of the narrative, but causes the leaves gone over to be turned back again; both interferences being serious drawbacks to the pleasant perusal of any book.

Foot-notes required either for the principal narrative or illustrations, are distinguished by the usual marks, and printed at the bottom of the page in the smallest type (Minion) used in this work.

The paragraphs containing the matter supplied by Mr Slight, are inclosed within brackets (thus, []), and attested by his initials J. S.

5. OF THE EXISTING METHODS OF LEARNING PRACTICAL HUSBANDRY.

I have vowed to hold the plough for her sweet love three year.

LOVE'S LABOUR LOST.

I HAVE hinted that there are three states, in one of which the young farmer will be found when beginning to learn his profession. One is, when he himself is born and brought up on a farm, on which, of course, he may acquire a knowledge of farming intuitively as he would his mother tongue. Another is when he goes to school in boyhood, and remains there until ready to embark in the active business of farming;' the impressions of his younger years will become much effaced, and he will require to renew his acquaintance with farming as he would of a language that he had forgotten. Young men thus early grounded, ge

nerally make the best farmers, because the great secret of knowing practical farming consists in bestowing particular attention on minor operations, which naturally present themselves to the youthful mind before it can perceive the use of general principles. Farmers so brought up seldom fail to increase their capital; and if their education has been superior to their rank in life, frequently succeed in improving their status in society. It is to the skilful conduct and economical management of farmers so situated, that Scotland owes the high station she occupies among the agricultural nations of the world.

The third state in which the learning of farming is requisite, is, when a young man, who has been educated and entirely brought up in a town, or perhaps passed his boyhood in the country, but may have bestowed little attention on farming, wishes to learn it as his profession. In either of these cases, it is absolutely necessary for him to learn it practically on a farm; for total ignorance of his business, and entire dependence on the skill and integrity of his servants, will soon involve him in pecuniary difficulties. To meet the wishes of seekers of agricultural knowledge, there are farmers who receive pupils as boarders, and undertake to teach them practical husbandry.

The chief inducement, as I conceive, which at first prompts young men, who have been nurtured in towns, to adopt farming as a profession, is an undefined desire to lead a country life. The desire often originates in this way. Most boys spend a few weeks in the country during the school vacation in summer, on a visit to relations, friends, or school companions. To them the period of vacation is a season of true enjoyment. Free of the task,-in the possession of unbounded liberty,―untrammelled by the restraints of time,—and partaking of sports new to them and solely appertaining to the country, they receive impressions of a state of happiness which are ever after identified with a country life. They regret the period of return to school,-leave the scene of those enjoyments with reluctance, and conceive that their happiness would be perpetual, were their hearts wedded to the objects that captivated them. Hence the desire to return to those scenes.

It is conducive to the promotion of agriculture, that young birds of fortune are thus occasionally ensnared by the love of rural life. They bring capital into the profession, or, at all events, it will be forthcoming when the scion of his father's house has made up his mind to become a farmer. Besides, these immigrations into farms are requisite to supply the places of farmers who retire or die out. Various motives operate to bring farms into the market. Sons do not always follow their father's profession, or there may not be a son to succeed, or he may die, or choose

another kind of life, or may have experienced ill treatment at home, or been guilty of errors which impel him to quit the paternal roof. For these drains, a supply must flow from other quarters to maintain the equilibrium of agricultural industry. This young race of men, converted into practical farmers, being generally highly born and well educated, assume at once a superior status in, and improve the tone of, rural society. Though they may amass no large fortunes, they live in good style. In the succeeding generation another change takes place. Unless he is well provided with a patrimony, the son seldom succeeds his father in the farm. The father finds he cannot give the farm free of burdens to one son in justice to the rest of the family. Rather than undertake to liquidate such a burden by means of a farm—that is, from land that is not to be his own-the son wisely relinquishes farming, which, in these circumstances, would be to him a life of pecuniary thraldom.

The young man who wishes to learn farming practically on a farm, should enter upon his task at the end of harvest, as, immediately after that, the preparatory operations commence for raising the next year's crop, and that is the season, therefore, which begins the new-year of farming. He should provide himself with an ample stock of stout clothing and shoes, capable of repelling cold and rain, and so made as to answer at once for walking and riding. From the outset, he must make up his mind to encounter all the difficulties I have described under the first head. Formidable as they may seem, I encourage him with the assurance, that it is in his power to overcome them all. The most satisfactory way of overcoming them is to resolve to learn his business in a truly practical manner. Merely being domiciled on a farm is not of itself a sufficient means of overcoming them, for the advantages of residence may be squandered away in idleness, by frequent absence, by spending the hours of work in the house in light reading, or by casual and capricious attendance on field operations. Such habits must be eschewed, before there can be a true desire to become a practical farmer. Every operation, whether important or trifling, should be personally attended to, as there is none but what tends to produce an anticipated result. Attention alone can render them familiar, and without a familiar acquaintance with every operation, the management of a farm need never be undertaken.

Much assistance in promoting this attention should not be expected from the farmer. No doubt it is his duty to communicate all he knows to his pupils; and, as I believe, most are willing to do so; but as efficient tuition implies constant attendance on work, the farmer himself cannot constantly attend to every operation, or even explain any, un

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