NEW HAMPSHIRE ANTIQUARIAN SOCIETY.
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��the work had grown the love of it. Moreover, the beginning made had tended to enlarged and confirmed ideas of what could be accomplished by diligence in this direction. ' It was seen that much might be done to preserve the knowledge of things long out of use, and of methods once prevalent and necessary, but now superseded and abandoned. The expe- riences and situation of this generation are peculiar. So rapid have been the changes u within the memory of men still living," that the "time can not be measured by the flight of years." We have lived in the transition period of American affairs. Probably in no other age of history will a single life connect periods that are so remote from each oth- er. Persons not very aged can remem- ber a condition of society, in which methods of industry and commerce, and domestic habits obtained, as foreign to our present almost, as those of Sweden and Russia. "Old things have passed away; behold, all things are become new." Reckoned according to the ave- rage of progression in former times, the aged men of to-day in New England, have lived five hundred years.
It is certain that in dress, fashion re- peats itself, approximately. Garments out of style are liable to be in style again. But this can not be said of the implements of toil. They are never laid aside until supplanted by better. Once laid aside, they will never be taken up. Economy of time, material and muscle forbids it ; and our avarice and our ease induce obedience. Out of use once, out of use always. Our farmers will never again break flax or swingle tow. Our girls will never turn the wheel or beat the loom. It will never pay, and so it will never be. Almost numberless things employed by our fathers in the shop, in the field and in the home, will be matteis of curious interest to our children's children, and their fathers will with difficulty explain to them their use.
And our American habits are peculiar- ly favorable to the rapid destruction of all useless things. Reverence for the past is not a conspicuous national virtue. The "associations which no gold can buy," must be a very unmerchantable
��commodity. Every farm is in the mar- ket. Every man is ready to "move." Continuity and locality seem to be no part of the American idea of home. And every removal greatly reduces the num- ber of useless things. In the third gene- ration only a few samples remain of arti- cles found in every home in the first. Whoever then shall gather, classify, de- scribe and render accessible a collection of the domestic appliances and inventions of the early generations of a State, will not be thought at the end of a hundred years to have rendered a useless service to history.
In our own State no other eftort had been made toward such an object. The field seemed large, fruitful, unoccupied and inviting. To cultivate it profitably, seemed to demand only diligence, perse- verance and discretion, with the funds requisite to cany on the work. Ac- cordingly, at the annual meeting of the Club, July 22, 1873, a committee was ap- pointed to consult with men of promi- nence and skill in similar pursuits ; and to frame a constitution suitable to the new form and position contemplated by the society. On the 19th of November following, this committee reported in fa- vor of the change ; presented a draught for a new constitution ; and thus, on the Fourteenth Anniversary of its formation, the Philomathic Club was dissolved "by unanimous consent, and the New Hamp- shire Antiquarian Society organized in its stead. The disadvantage of locating a State society in a village ten miles dis- tant from the capital was not overlooked. But its location is not fixed by law, and is subject to the will of the majority. On the 2d of July, 1875, the society was in- corporated by act of the Legislature.
At the time it was dissolved, the Philo- mathic Club had on its catalogue 1200 numbers. Besides these, which formed the basis of a museum, it had a few hun- dred volumes of books, about an equal number of pamphlets, about 3000 news- papers and several hundred engravings. The objects of the Society were cordially endorsed by gentlemen of culture and prominence in various parts of the State, and its endeavors have been seconded by all classes of citizens. Additions are
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