Butter-making in all its Attractions.--The Cream unequal to the Emergency.--Some Things can’t be Done as well as Others.--Electrical Phenomena.--Gathering Seed.--Incidental Reference to Satan and his Works.--not his agricultural ones.....216
A second Year’s Balance-sheet.--Still greater Promises.--Success assured.--Every Man should be his own Market Gardener.--No dearth of Onions.--Transported at the Result.--The last of the family Horse.--He closes his Career by a wonderful Feat in drawing Teeth Page......233
The Window Garden.--Warm Work.--Immense Resources of Science.--Mind against Matter.--What can the Matter be?--The new Flower......253
A perfect Jonah.--Very fine, only don’t do it again.--A Gourd runs away with its Master.--A changeable Crimson.--A new Specimen of Flax, Red one Year and Yellow the next......266
A Rockaway stricken with Palsy.--Sudden Recovery.--Honesty of country Mechanics their best Recommendation.--A Roof over one’s Head.--Its Necessity, as well as Beauty.--A Fellow-feeling makes us willing to lend Shingles.--The latter End......283
New Farms.--More Land.--No Rooms for Mushrooms.--Many Sects of Insects.--The Squash.--Unexpected Fungi.--The Triumph that Grazed Defeat.--The Joys of Memory......297
It was in consequence of reading a little volume called “Ten Acres Enough”--a practical and statistical, as well as, in certain points, a poetical production--that I came to prepare this volume. In that work a charming and interesting account is given of the successful attempt of a Philadelphia mechanic to redeem a strip of exhausted land of ten acres in extent. In the course of it, a vast deal of advice and most valuable directions are given on the subject of planting and sowing, draining and reaping, manuring and pruning; berries and fruits, vines and vegetables, are duly considered; and the question of outlay and income, expenses and receipts, losses and profits, is forever ding-donged into one’s ears. So useful is the instruction it contains, that no one should think of buying a farm, experimenting in rural life, or even reading this book, without first perusing that one. To be sure, the author forgets occasionally some minor matters--such as clothing, food, and the like, leaving his family naked and unfed for several years--but that is doubtless due to his poetical temperament and intense love of nature. In the same spirit, therefore, no matter how frequently I may refer to money matters in the course of the following pages, even if I should occasionally condescend to speak of food and raiment--those commonplace necessities--it must be understood to be with no sordid view; and if I keep these matters before the reader’s attention, it will be for the sole purpose of benefiting and enlightening him, and pointing out clearly the financial consequence of investing in rural residences.