The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1875-09-18 00:00:00

Ilcctoutbribgt (Nadler,

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBKR 18th, 1875

THE TIME OF HARVEST.

A man need not be possesbol of a highly- I
wrought or sensitive imagination to feel de
impressed at the arrival of the time of eliarevePsitY.
Impires may rise and fall,natiors may flourish
and decay, dynasties may sway the sceptre for
centuries sad then be overthrown, but the pro-
toile made long, long ago, still holds good—that
While the earth :remaineth, seed-time and har-
vest, summer and winter, cold and heat, day
awl night, shall not cease. Assyria and Phmni-
cist, Tyre and Sidon, Nineveh and Babylon,
TWA. and Macedon, Carthage and Sparta, have
eneeeseively, to a greater or a less extent, swayed ,
Ike rod of empire, and have gone to decay. The ,
sites of thcse once busy and populated areas. ,
whose streets resounded with the tramp of mul-
titudes, are now nothing but desolated plains,
where the silence is broken only by the scream
of the cormorant and the bittern. In some of
them you may, indeed,lstumble upon the ruined
pillars of a once gorgeous temple, symbolising
the columns of eternal truth, and pointing to the
harvena. :But the ministering priests, and the
worshippers, the scoffers, the cynics, and the
unbelievers, have long since been resolved into
that which is the common lot of man. "Our
fathers—where are they?" The grave Senate,
the animated mart, the devout congregation, the
noisy throng blocking up the thoroughfares in
times of potitical excitement, all, all have gone.
The peoples whose dust lies at our very feet
may have swayed the destinies of kingdoms for
ages and ages ; yet the signs of decay scattered
round to-day tell you with a force which is irre-
sistible, that the most ambitious works of man
are reared only to be conquered by Time, and
that the plan of Nature, as settled by the Great
Supreme, is as changeless and unchangeable as
in those far-off days of which we are told in the
sacred chronicles.
Scattered throughout the pages of Holy Writ
are allusions innumerable tolthe time of Harvest.
In the earlier periods of the world's history, no
lass than to-day, the season was one of great in-
terest and of some anxiety. Some of the choicest
parables in the New Testament are founded
upon the associations of the time of year which
la now being celebrated. For instance, there
Wae
.the impressive illustration drawn from
the passing of the harvest, and the ending of
the summer. Again, "the fields are already
white unto the harvest ;" "the harvest truly is
great, but the labourere are few." The progress
through the corn-fielde on the Sabbath-day, the
plucking of the ears of wheat, the gathering of
the wheat into the garner, the destruction of the
chaff, and a host of other homely pictures were
painted from the incidents occurring at a time
of the yeaeWhen the agriculturist is so busy,
and when all classes have their own opinions re
upecting the prospects of the mops. The farm-
ers as a body have the reputation of being ad-
dicted to the utterance of complaints. Not long
ago Mr. Justice Mellor declared that in all his
experience, and he is now approaching seventy
years of age, he had never known a farmer to
admit that he was doing well. Still it must be
admitted that the occupation of the agriculturist,
dependent as its success essentially is upon the
condition of the atmosphere, is a very trying
one. A dry season makes it bad for the root
crops; a wet season plays havoc with his hay
and corn. Upon the latter more especially he
has expended much time and anxiety. It has
ripened under the influence of a summer sun,
and a week more would finish it beautifully.
Then, perhaps, the wind veers to the west, and
as in the days of old, the heavens are black with
clouds, and there is a great rain. All his calcu-
lations are upset—all his hopes are dashed. Not
far from the saturated cornfields there is, it may
be, an observatory wherein sits and studies one
of the most eminent meteorologists of the day.
For a long while there has been no disturbance
of the atmospheric conditions calling for a dis-
sertation from his pen. These tropical rains are
Ito him a splendid opportunity for examining
Into the causes thereof. So he sets to work and
indites a learned treatise upon the gradual dis-
appearance of the forests as tending to increase
the quantity of rain which falls upon these
bilands, tells us many things that V7O did not
know before, and people read, mark, learn, and
inwardly digest what a great proportion of them
knew very little about previously to this en-
lightenment. The farmer's loss is thus the
philosopher's gain; be surveys the leaden skies
and the dripping clouds with the greatest com-
placency, for it has afforded him a chance of
showing forth his information, while to the un-
fortunate agriculturist the source of his neigh-
bour's increased reputation is a positive and
unmitigated calamity.
There is one point in connection with this
matter which should not be overlooked. An
occasionally adverse harvest season does not now
have the effect upon prices which would have
been exercised thirty years ago. The markets
of the world are now open to pour into our
granaries any quantity of food for the people
free from the slightest duty. A generation
since a bad harvest meant high prices L.r a
twelvemonth ; but now, if our own supplies fail,
we can fall back upon France, Russia, or the
United States to tilt the void which bad weather
has caused here. That the food of the people
should be free and untaxed is now the ruling
spirit of our legislation without distincti m of
class or of party. And as for our friends the
ariculturiste, if they occasionally- meet with "a
disagreeable season in one direction, who know.
that it might be counterbalanced by advantages
in another? The rain may deteriorate the
quality of his wheat, but has it not at the same
time given him a second crop of hay? The
market gardener's bed of strawberries may have
been injured by too much moisture, but his
bearing of tree fruit is beyond the best he has
had for years. And so we should find if we
pushed our inquiries further. The laws of
Nature cannot long work altogether antago-
nistically to the interest of man. The sun rises
and sets, the tide ebbs and flows, the oak spreads
Its mighty branches to the breeze, the dews des-
the unceasinglyptne_wo
pine-woods
pursue
are
oend silently from heaven, the wind bloweth
where it listeth, the rivers
their way towards the sea,
clothed in the glowing tints of autumn, the
moon is a beacon light in the heavens, the
firmament showeth the handiwork of the Crea-
tor, and the stars are scattered along the path-
ways of the skies, just as they were centuries
ago. If these laws sometimes seem to work
badly, it is only to our human and limited
Viiiiol3, for the hand that framed them is Divine.