Year: 1859

:
hibits larger amount or proportion of use
less talent, of misdirected energy, than ours
Our clever young men, in fearful supera-
bundance, addict themselves to law, to phys
ic, to commerce, mainly because these seem
the only pursuits which promise wealth and
distinction. Hazardous as merchandising
is known to be, long and toilsome as is the
path to eminence and fortune at The bar OF
in medicine, these seem to most of our as
piring youth the only unofficial avnues to
fame and fortune; hence they are uniformly
ruinously crowded. There has been no day
of the last forty years in which there were
not four times as many trying to live by
trade in this country as were needed In that
oceupatic n-twice as many as could possi-
bly, succeed. Hence the fatal expansion and
looseness of mercantile credit; hence the
failure of at least nine -tenths of all who en-
gage in traffic. To fail is as natural an end
to mercantile career in this country, as to
be killed is to the soldier enlisted for life
If man opens store, the ready inquiry
is, "How long viii he last?" and he who
escapes bankruptcy for so long as ten years,
does Hell-better than the average. We
could name country villages which have had
their fifteen or twenty mercantile firms in
the course of the last thirty years. and bro
ken them all within two or three, and of
these not one has retired with a competence.


One is trading yet, and solvent; two, per-
baps, have retired, or removed, losers, but
not broken; the rest have gone the way of
all American traders, or so nearly all that
the exceptions help to prove the rule, Of
the young men who will this year embark
in trade, it is safe to say that three -fourths
viii want national bankrupt law within the
next ten years, and another eighth within
twenty. But they cannot break so fast that
others viii not scramble for their places
Thousands of new concerns will be opened
this year, to be closed as thousands were in
1857-58. 1t were idle to demonstrate
against this tendency; the thing to be done
is to countervail it.


OF the need Of good farmers among us,
we have frequently spoken. We will let no
one quarrel with US as to what constitutes a
good farmer, since we concede that every
tiller of the soil who grows larger average
crops pretty uniformly. makes his farm rich
er each year, and realizes profit therefrom,
is of the right sort, though he has no
knowledge of and 20 faith in science, never
saw drain tile, and believes the education
which suffices for an OK good enough for a
farmer. That there is deplorable defcien-
cy of good farmers, even of this sort, is
shown by the fact that the average yield of
our farms is diminishing, that of wheat be-
ing hardly half so much as it was fifty
years ago; while in England and Scotland
it has nearly doubled during the same peri
cd. Attribute this falling off to whatever
insect or other mischief you may, we are
sure that bad culture-the exhaustion from
the soil of certain elements essential to wheat
lis the real and principal cause. That the
midge has destroyed the growing wheat on
thousands of acres of virgin soil does not
shake our conviction that, had wheat been
our country, with a proper treatment of soil
and rotation of crops lntermediately, we
should have suffered comparatively little by
rust, or blight, or insects.


The Hessian fly came to US (as is sup
posed) from Europe; but, compared with
this country, Europe suffers very little from
these and all other destroyers. Man was not
made to be baffied and defeated by worm; /;
but if the worm is allowed to have the field
to himself, the man has no right to COM
plain. We hold that if half our capable,
clear seeing, ambitious young men were to
devote to agriculture the energy. enterprise,
and knowledge, that they now gave to trade
and the professions, they would greatly bless
those left in stores or offices, render our far
ming generally more efficient and success
full than it now is, and add millions to the
annual product and aggregate wealth of the
country.


But, beyond this, there opens a vast, in
viting field for talent and enterprise in man
ufactures, to which we would invite the at
tention of our young men


This country haa become the largest mar
ket on earth for fabricks, in proportion to
its population. 1t is rapidly increasing in
population and consumption. Whoever
among us knows how to make almost any
thing well and cheaply. need not look abroad
for market. We buy more broadcloth an
nually than any other nation, yet We do not
make one yard in hundred of it; while we
make cassimeres, delaines, prints, drills, fan
nels, counterpanes, and many other fabrics,
so cheaply as to defy foreign competition.


Of hosiery we are extensive consumers.
and hardly anything can be simpler than its
manufacture; yet we import the. great bulk
of what we consume, while exporting none
of our own production. In short there are
scores of opportunities on every side for
embarking in manufactures. with a moral
certainty of immediate success and ultimate
wealth. - ~


Nor do We need capital. as is often assert
ed. There is capital enough in this coun7
try, and readiness to invest it, if its owners
can but be sure that it will be wisely en-
pleyed. Our greatest deficiency is in prac-
teal knowledge. Were ten thousand of our
young men thoroughly qualified TO direct
and manage manufactures, there would be
room for them all. Mills and improved wa
ter-powers sell at ruinous rates, in good part
because theie, are few or none qualified by
training and experience 10 make the most of
them. Had one-fourth of our youth who
hQV QVoh haa-, = Il