-who have
lent me rare old books of husbandry, which are not easily laid hold of.

I have discussed no works of living authors, whether of practical or
pastoral intent: at some future day I may possibly pay my compliments to
them. Meantime I cannot help interpolating in the interest of my readers
a little fragment of a letter addressed to me within the year by the
lamented Hawthorne:--"I remember long ago your speaking prospectively of
a farm; but I never dreamed of your being really much more of a farmer
than myself, whose efforts in that line only make me the father of a
progeny of weeds in a garden-patch. I have about twenty-five acres of
land, seventeen of which are a hill of sand and gravel, wooded with
birches, locusts, and pitch-pines, and apparently incapable of any other
growth; so that I have great comfort in that part of my territory. The
other eight acres are said to be the best land in Concord, and they have
made me miserable, and would soon have ruined me, if I had not
determined nevermore to attempt raising anything from them. So there
they lie along the roadside, within their broken fence, an eyesore to
me, and a laughing-stock to all the neighbors. If it were not for the
difficulty of transportation by express or otherwise, I would thankfully
give you those eight acres."

And now the fine, nervous hand, which wrought with such strange power
and beauty, is stilled forever! The eight acres can well lie neglected;
for upon a broader field, as large as humanity, and at the hands of
thousands of reapers who worked for love, he has gathered in a great
harvest of _immortelles_.

FOOTNOTES:

[27] _Life of Sir Humphry Davy_, London, 1839, p. 46.

[28] See letter of Thomas Poole, p. 322, _Fragmentary Remains of Sir
Humphry Davy_.

[29] _Salmonia_, p. 5, London, Murray, 1851.

[30] _Fragmentary Remains_, p. 242.

[31] _Life and Adventures of Peter Porcupine._

[32] _Agricultural Biography_, etc. London, 1854. _Printed for the
Author._

[33] I ought, perhaps, to make definite exception in the case of a
writer so universally accredited. In his "Encyclopaedia of Gardening," he
speaks of the "Geoponica" as the work of "modern Greeks," written after
the transfer of the seat of empire to Constantinople; whereas the bulk
of those treatises were written long before that date. He speaks of
Varro as first in order of time of Roman authors on agriculture; yet
Varro was born 116 B. C., and Cato died as early as 1