discipline, instruction, are to be withheld.

These

are indispensable, but they should all be reconciled with the happy flow of life. This is, in fact, often attained by the instinct of mothers, whom God has given grace to combine government and indulgence, discipline and encouragement in such happy mixture and measure, as to check the weeds, and foster the fruits, of the soul. It is not always done it is not done perfectly, perhaps, in a single case. Yet I can not doubt that-despite all the difficulties which poverty, and ignorance, and sin impose upon the world-a majority of mothers do in fact temper their conduct to their children, so as, on the whole, to exercise, in a large degree, a saving, redeeming, regenerating influence upon them.

Nevertheless, there is room for improvement. There are too many persons who look upon children as reprobate-too many who regard the rod as the rule, not the exception. Some imagine that the whole business of education lies in study, and that to cram the mind is to enrich it. Some, indeed, are indifferent, and think even less of the moral growth and improvement of their children, than they do of the growth and improvement of their cattle. I think there are still others, who dislike children-who are annoyed by their presence, impatient of their little caprices, and regardless of their virtues; who only see their foibles, and would always confine them to the nursery. Even the Disciples of Christ seem not to

son.

have been superior to this common feeling. The answer of our Saviour was at once a rebuke and a les"Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of heaven." There is profound theology-there is deep, touching, divine humanity in this. Children are

not reprobate: they are docile and teachable, with thoughts and emotions so pure as to breathe of heaven. They are cheerful, happy; their presence was healthful, even to the "Man of Sorrows and acquainted with grief!"

It is in this last aspect that I particularly wish to present this subject. Children, no doubt, impose burdens upon their parents. No words can express the weight of care which often presses upon the heart of the mother-in the deep watches of the night, in moments of despondency, in periods of feeble health, in the pinches of poverty, in the trying, dark days of the spirit as to the future prospects of her offspring. Anxieties for their welfare, temporal and eternal, often seem to wring the very heart, drop by drop, of its blood. And yet, all things considered, children are the great blessing of the household. They impose cares, but they elevate all hearts around them. They cultivate unselfish and therefore purifying feelings: they cheer the old, by reviving recollections of early life: they excite the young, by kindly fellowship and emulous sympathy. Without children, the world would be like a forest of old oaks, gnarled,

groaning, and fretful in the desolation of winter. For myself, I can say, that children are the best of playmates when I am well with the world, and they are the best of medicine, when I am sick and weary of it.

It is children, here in the family, that are thus a blessing not the children of a community, as in Sparta, for there they were educated to crime. In every community, where they are not the charge of the parents, and especially of the mother, they would, I think, infallibly become reprobates. The family seems to me a divine institution. Marriage, sanctioned by religion, is its bond: children its fruition. No statesman, no founder of a religion, no reformer—after innumerable attempts-has given the world a substitute for Christian Marriage and that institution which follows-the Family. It is, up to this era of our world, the anchor of society, the fountain of love and hope and dignity in man and human society. Those who attempt to overturn it, are, I think, working against the Almighty.

LETTER VI.

The Inner Life of Towns-Physical Aspect and Character of Ridgefield— Effects of Cultivation upon Climate-Energetic Character of the First Settlers of Ridgefield-Classes of the People as to Descent-Their Occupations—Newspapers-Position of my Father's Family— Management of the Farm-Domestic Economy-Mechanical Professions-Beef and Pork-The Thanksgiving Turkey-Bread-Fuel-Flint and SteelFriction Matches-Prof. Silliman-Pyroligneous Acid-Maple Sugar— Rum-Dram-drinking-Tansey Bitters-Brandy-Whisky-The First "Still"—— Wine-Dr. G.'s Sacramental Wine-Domestic ProductsBread and Butter - Linen and Woolen Cloth· Cotton Flax and Wool-The Little Spinning-wheel-Sally St. John and the Rat-trap— Manufacture of Wool-Molly Gregory and Fuging Tunes-The Tunner and Hatter-The Revolving Shoemaker— Whipping the Cat-Carpets -Coverlids and Quiltings — Village Bees and Raisings-The Meetinghouse that was destroyed by Lightning-Deaconing a Hymn.

MY DEAR C******

It will be no new suggestion to a reflecting man. like yourself, that towns, as well as men, have their inner and their outer life. There is a striking difference in one respect, between the two subjects; the age of man is set at threescore years and ten, while towns seldom die. The pendulum of human life. vibrates by seconds, that of towns by centuries. The history of cities, the focal points of society, may be duly chronicled even to their minutest incidents; but cities do not constitute nations; the mass of almost every country is in the smaller towns and vil lages. The outer life of these is vaguely jotted down

in the census, and reported in the Gazetteers; but their inner life, which comprises the condition and progress of the community at large, is seldom written. We may see glimpses of it in occasional sermons, in special biographies, in genealogical memoranda. We may take periods of fifty years, and deduce certain general inferences from statistical tables of births and deaths; but still, the living men and manners as they rise in a country town, are seldom portrayed. I am therefore tempted to give you a rapid sketch of Ridgefield and of the people-how they lived, thought, and felt, at the beginning of the present century. It will serve as an example of rustic life throughout New England, fifty years ago, and it will moreover enable me, by contrasting this state of things with what I found to exist many years after, to show the steady, though silent, and perhaps unnoted progress of society among us.

From what I have already said, you will easily imagine the prominent physical characteristics and aspect of my native town-a general mass of hills, rising up in a crescent of low mountains, and commanding a wide view on every side. The soil was naturally hard, and thickly sown with stones of every size, from the immovable rock to the pebble. The fields, at this time, were divided by rude stone walls, and the surface of most was dotted with gathered heaps of stones and rocks, thus clearing spaces for cultivation, yet leaving a large portion of