The Ashland union. [volume] (Ashland, Ashland County, Ohio) 1854-1868, 1856-04-23
MAKE FARM LIFE ATTRACTIVE

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Why do you young men run as By
some universal instinct from the farm
where they were born. to the city where
they learn to wish they had hob be6n
born anywhere Chiefly whatever ex-
PLANTATION they put forward as having d
handsome look-chieHy because on the
farm there is supposed to be an inevita-
BILE doom to hard, monotonous, wearing
bodily toll from daylight to- sundowH
life through with no room for mental
expansion, or generous tastes of social
recreation, and secondly, because after
all his labor, the farmer makes too little
money. Nor will my faith in young
mems natures suffer me to believe this
is always a sordid calculation With
them. For in thinking of money they.
think of it oftener as means than Az
end. They want it for what it bripgss
On the farm, very frequently are rooms
without books, walls without picturess
manners without grace, clothes without
fitness, grounds without shaping or deco
ration. On the contrary, the city mer-
chant buys library and works of art,
sends bis children to school where they
learn to move with elegance, as well as
to cipher and parse, gets garments that
are finer and that fit, and is not exhaust
ed physically at nightfall as TO prefer
sleep to any company Of books. He
comes back into the country and lays out,
beautiful estate sometimes with state.
lier animals, and seleeter frnits.snd tidy
hedges and fences, and more blooming
gardens on it. than his neighber, who has;
all the while been staying and making
farming the business of his life. Now, Il
would be hard task in persuasion to-
convince most young men that these
things are not good, nor desirable, aud's
that the dollars which command them
are not of the nature of an advantage. J.
1 confess I should be bad subject ifort
such persuasion myself. Besides; these
things are all of the nature of: picture
work the boy cannot help seeing them
they work upon him while he stops on
his way from pasture under the fra
grent shrubbery, or peeps through the
picket at the mellow peaches and peara !.
know how perfectly apt his sanguind'
blood. his ignorance of the ninety odd
failures in a city for every single sue-
cess, are to put fallacy into his plahsl
and cheat his choice. But none the lssG
is it true, that he goes to the city for =
chance, though but chance, for certain
means of refinement, ,liberality, and Width
in the whole style for1ife, such as scarce
ly mere farmer in the old way offarm-
ing has displayed. Who ever knew .
confident and chivslrous youth to doubt
he should be one of the FIVE that succeed,
though five hundred fanf Aud more
over, many young men at that aspiring
period of life, before the charm and gle-s
ry of early ideals have faded of, thirst
honestly for more stimulus to mental acs
tion, more enlarging ministries to thsns
than they have found in rural Places
This they dream of finding in the pres
ence of crowns and the sharp collisiosS
of traffic. Perhaps they dream delusions:
but this is the feeling. Depend upon il
if you would hold your sons and brotherBe
back from running away into the peril
GUS centres, you must steadily make
three attempts-to abate the task work
of farming, maximum crops and pro6th
and surround your works with the sxhik
erations of intellectual progress You
must elevate the whole spirit Of your vo<
cation for your vocation's sake. till ne
other can outstrip you in what moss
adorns civilized state O. r. Hunt
i'igton.
~The entire western coast of LaluS