Henry Ward Beecher On Farming

ïn an address before a rural club a few days since, Mr. Beecher said : ' I knew that you all under9tood 1 was a fannor, [laughter,] hut speaking not being ïny vooation, [rcnowed laughter,] I did not know that you would cali upon me to speak. I expoct whon I dio to have on my tombstone "Tho Farmer of Wostohester County." [Laughter.] As suoh, I want it to be remembered I havo lived a livo of usefulness. I have a farm of thirty or forty acres, and I am often asked whethor my farm pays. I always say, "Yes, evcrybody but myself." [Great laughter.] It has set up three or font men in business; they have built houses off of my farm, and thero are several moro who are just going to build. [Laughtcr.J Yet, although it has not taken care of me, as near as I can remember, I have always taken caro of it. If I have not derivod much from it in pocket, I am sure I have derived enough in enjoyment to make it a profitablo investment. I look forward to the day when I may be released from tho contaminations of city life, and may retiro to my farm in the country. I can say truly that when I ge among trees I am better pleased with my company, for the most part, than I am whun among men. [Laughter.] I find that I never had a tree that lied to me, and, although they do a great deal of whispering among themselvcs, I havo never had any reason to suppose there was any scandal in it. [Great applause and laughter.] I find in nature neither pecvishness nor troublo-making, but much instruction and much comfort. After aman has been in the exciteuiont of activo life I think there is nothing more wholesonio than the bath which one eets bv eoinir into the country. I think there is no inheritanco, there is no blessing that anybody can confer upon Lis children, no monoy, no name that can compare with a gift for natural scenery and rural occupation. This gift of being in the presence of nature is a greater gift than auy fortune than can be imagined [Applause.] I am sorry to say that this is a gift less often found atnong thoso who live in the country than anywhere else. I seo a great many persons who talk about ths country a great deal indeed, but they know very little about it with the inward man. But to love it until, soliciting it, it loves you- until, when you go thero, the trees lay bare their shrines, and bend and welcome you, until nature herself perceives you and wants to be the almoner of God'a bounty - that is apleasure which we cannot expect everybody to have. The New York inerohant has got to be wjrth soveral hundred thousand dollars if he is going into the country to live and be a farmer. He buys a place, and I look over to see what he does with it. He has been roading books and taking advice trom men, and he begins on it to lay off his ground and build fences, stone walls or hedges, and he goos on to drain it and square it up and deepen it, and to buy manure infinite and transport it without regard to cost to enrich the whole scil, and ho builds a fine barn, and then a fine house, and at last to slick up everything around about him ; and when he has got to that point nature Iets go of him, and he yawns and begins to be restless, for he has nothing more to do. The tact is, he has been mechanical, and the ohly thing in nature is that it gives him something to do, and so at last he sells the place for about one-half what he gave for it, and he goes back to the city and says : " You teil me about farming. I have that. I know what that is." [Laughter.] In conclusión, Mr. Beecher spoke of the great necessity that existed for a wider cultivation of the American trees, and said that he thought that in this direction this club inight probably work.