We would by no means compare New England farmers with the Irish peasantry. We only present the contrast between these two classes of the Irish population as the result of unremitting toil on one side, and a more rational kind of life on the other. If we enter a New England church, containing a strictly rural assembly, and then visit another containing a class whose labor is lighter, and whose style of life is based upon different ideas, we shall see a contrast less marked, perhaps, but presenting similar features. The farming population of New England is not a handsome population, generally. The forms of both men and women are angular; their features are not particularly intellectual; their movements are not graceful; and their calling is evident by indubitable signs. The fact that the city assemblage is composed of a finer and higher grade of men, women, and children is of particular moment to our argument, because it is composed of people who are only one, two, or three removes from a rural origin. The city comes from the country; the street is replenished by the farm; but the city children, going back to the farm, show that a new element has been introduced into their blood. The angles are rounded; the face is brighter; the movements are more graceful; there is in every way a finer development. There is probably no better exponent of the farmer's life than the farmer's home. We propose to present the portrait of such a home, and, while we offer it as a just outline of the farmer's home generally, in districts removed from large social centres, we gladly acknowledge the existence of a great multitude of happy exceptions. But the sketch:--A square, brown house; a chimney coming out of the middle of a roof; not a tree nearer than the orchard, and not a flower at the door. At one end projects a kitchen; from the kitchen projects a wood-shed and wagon-cover, occupied at night by hens; beyond the wood-shed, a hog-pen, fragrant and musical. Proceeding no farther in this direction, we look directly across the road, to where the barn stands, like the hull of a great black ship-of-the-line, with its port-holes opened threateningly upon the fort opposite, out of one of which a horse has thrust his head for the possible purpose of examining the strength of the works. An old ox-sled is turned up against the wall close by, where it will have the privilege of rotting. This whole establishment was contrived with a single eye to utility. The barn was built in such a manner that its deposits might be convenient to the road which divides the farm, while the sty was made an attachment of the house for convenience in feeding its occupants.