For agreeable cares, and solid interests and pleasures, the life of the farmer is one of the first to choose. It is indeed a labor, but a labor peculiarly blest for its manly pursuits and ennobling mental exercises. Every farmer should be educated in useful knowledge, and elevated tastes and sentiments: every farmer should have a religion of the head, and heart, and life.

The farmer goes out upon his fertile fields and plants, and stands by his own work to behold the growing increase which the Lord waters and gives. Surrounded by symbols of the Father, he has but to open his eyes, and read the signs of His wisdom, providence, power and love. He stands in a temple of beauty and worship. His subjects of thought are the sky and mountain, the woods and waters, the genial fallow, the growing crop, the ripening grain. His companions are legion, for all things in Nature flock to his fellowship; his orchestra is the air and forest; his singers, the bobolink, bluebird and robin, who may be fancied incarnate with spirits from the next region, paradise, come down to gladden his heart with God's hallelujahs, and cheer his mind in the rural toils. God may appear most intimately with him all his days; he may plough God's fallows; he may plant sweet affections, and harvest ripe graces and joys; and every step on the green hills, and through the warbling groves, may seem a step toward heaven.

Matthew Fabens was a farmer in genuine heart and soul. Of mere book learning, he did not speak, although he was quite a reader; and in many acquirements which the world calls knowledge, he was limited as a child. But for acquaintance with a few fine histories and stories, and with the ways and wonders of God; for a knowledge of Nature and Scripture; for an enlightened reading of the lessons of Providence and human life, he might have been accounted wiser than many who possessed the wisdom of the schools, and looked down with vain contempt on his humble sphere. One of the few lovers of learning he was, who could say, with the shepherd David, "O, God, Thou hast taught me from my youth, and hitherto have I declared thy wonders!"

Nature surrounded him with symbols, and by the light of Christianity he sought their interpretation. And to his admiring mind, the presence, the beauty, and sublimity of God continually addressed their revelations; and he discovered in the water a mirror of this form; in the sun, a symbol of His light; in the thunder, an echo of His voice; in the wind, a delegate of His spirit and power; in the mountain, a ladder to His sanctuary; and in the rain and dew, the medium of His favor, and the means of His love.

Yet, with all his faith, wisdom, and virtue, he was by no means perfect. Several of the frailties of humanity he had failed to overcome, and a few of its sinful impulses he found the discipline of life no more than competent to rule. He was honest and upright to a nice conviction, and a large and gracious heart lay beating in his breast; but brief moments would now and then take him by surprise, in which he sighed for another and more pretending sphere; and he regretted to feel growing almost imperceptibly upon him, an unwarrantable love of show and praise. Still, perhaps we should regard these and other little errors more as misfortunes than sins, and attribute them measurably to the effect of growing fortune, and the influence of the world with which he had more and more to do.

Nor did such a faith in the Father, nor such an estate of beauty and affluence, render his life a perpetual or unqualified joy. Men would not be men if perfect joy and peace were theirs, and the glowing robes of angels dressed them. He had never prayed to be taken out of the world of trials and griefs; but to be kept from iniquity. Religion had not power to remove all sorrows from his life; but he prayed it might aid him to overcome them; to rise above them stronger and better, for the strength and courage required and employed to quell their stout assaults. That early, and most trying, unaccountable sorrow of his life, the loss of his beloved Clinton, still chastened his joy, and returned at times in all the freshness of its agony: and it was rendered more poignant and lasting by the painful mystery which concealed his fate, and fed suspense, and excited solicitous thoughts and cares.

But faith had a power so to lift and sustain the troubled spirit, and draw it away from communion with its griefs, he enjoyed a preponderance of elevated bliss. He had loved his parents with an affection which could endure the loss of their society only with the hope of having them restored to him hereafter; and many of his pleasures had been sobered, and life itself became more serious, and at times more desolate, since they both had been gathered to the grave. But there was a serene and unsubduable joy of the spirit abiding all the assaults of sorrow, that shone forth like gold from the fire of the refiner, and glowed like cheerful sunshine through the dusky wings of a storm.

His home had still remaining much solid happiness, for Julia lived to participate his fortune, to share his affliction, and strengthen his hopes; and the genial ardors of her youth, with love of Nature, and delight in rural fellowships, though calmed and refined by suffering, were yet her being's light and joy. Her simple home, and its peaceful scenes, and lovely enjoyments, were symbols to her mind, not unprophetic of the home of the soul on high.

It was a simple home, for their new frame house was not then commenced, except in the piles of boards and shingles that were gathering around the barn; but what if there was no embroidered muslin, or garish damask at the windows, and they looked through little narrow panes of blue and blistered glass? Did not their eyes find a recompense in the twinkling wings and warbling songs that flitted and floated in the air around? and in glorious landscapes of fields, and waters, and woods, that a glance could catch and hold through the smallest light! Did not the curtains of verdure beneath and about, and the infinite canopy of splendid sky above, make the bravest of all ambitious ornaments hung by man or woman's hands, look little and coarse as a rag of baize?

One only sorrow remained for Julia to conquer; and how could the triumph be won? She sorrowed still for the loss of her lovely first-born. She could not doubt but God permitted it in love. Perhaps had Clinton been spared, he might have imbibed some sentiment of evil, which would have poisoned his beautiful nature and prompted him away into paths of sin. Young Walter Mowry was a prodigal, and likely to bring down his poor old mother in sorrow to the grave. George Richmond had no idea of the value of the money left him as a father's hard-earned legacy; no self-reliance; and was likely to die miserable and poor. Perhaps, had Clinton lived to enjoy the blessings of such a home, he had been a poor prodigal, or met misfortunes and griefs.

Then she must acknowledge, that while her heart had been afflicted, it had been softened and refined; while her faith had been tried, it had grown strong and buoyant as an eagle's wings. Heaven seemed all about her now, as it had not seemed before her bereavement; the lights of its holy joy came gleaming through the veil; and its pure inhabitants were felt to range around, and sympathize, and bless.

As a central bliss of existence, Fanny had grown to early womanhood, while her mother seemed still young to be her companion, and Fanny was blooming as the flowers and trees that had been her communicants, pure as the fountains that mirrored her loveliness, and blithe as the birds that welcomed her rural walks. Fanny stood above a medium height, and though she stooped a little at the wool-wheel, and in a ramble on the hills, she presented a comely figure and interesting mien.

She was too white to please all tastes; her hair was almost a cream-color; yet it was long, abundant and glossy, and was greatly admired by some. Her eyes were the lightest sky-blue, yet they were full and quick, and flashed the fire of a luminous soul; and not glassy and languid, as blue eyes often are. She had a nose, mouth and teeth, like her father's, with her mother's cheeks, all ruddy-red with her mother's maiden blushes. She had hands and feet for a Bloomer, had Bloomers bloomed in her time. She had a round, clear, hilarious voice, that gave the birds lessons in melody, softened and sweetened the gentlest gales, and gladdened the day and the night on the farm. She loved her home and friends; she loved Irving, and Scott, and Goldsmith; she loved Beattie's Minstrel, Milton's Comus, and Campbell's Wyoming; she loved the garden and fields; she loved the woods, and lake, and sky; she loved bee-balm and clover; she loved double-pinks, and double-roses; she tasted the fragrance of peaches and apples, with a purer zest than that which relished their pleasant pulps; and every lovely and tender creature found in her a friend.

In Fanny, her mother found more joy—upon Fanny her mother centered more lavish affection than she could have afforded or realized, had another grown by her tide, to divide the endearments of the household. But, O, the agony she would sometimes feel at the recollection of that year of sorrow! How it would bow her spirit, and run thrilling along the delicate fibres of her heart! That night of woe! That panther scream! That dream of Troffater! That recovered hat, now sacredly treasured to remind her of her idol! That lingering, sad suspense! Those sleepless nights, and comfortless days! How could she forget them, nor shudder in convulsions of anguish, as often as they rolled back like lava-floods on her soul?

And the suspense which still haunted her! The dream and dying words of her mother breathed hope to struggling desire, but reason banished assurance as soon as it rose, and how dreadful the suspense that supported the mystery! Could she have known that he was devoured by a wolf or panther, and suffered no more, what an occasion of joy it had been! what relief to sorrow, what an end to disappointments, compared with this dreary and brooding uncertainty, which preyed upon her nature like a never-dying worm! How precious must have been the faith which could mitigate a sorrow like that, and introduce the suffering heart to seasons of joy and intervals of peace!