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Biographical Sketches - (From: "Fanshawe and Other Pieces") by Nathaniel Hawthorne
page 35 of 51 (68%)
Fessenden could appreciate what was excellent in her husband, and supply
what was deficient. In her affectionate good sense he found a
substitute for the worldly sagacity which he did not possess, and
could not learn. To her he intrusted the pecuniary cares, always so
burdensome to a literary man. Her influence restrained him from such
imprudent enterprises as had caused the misfortunes of his earlier
years. She smoothed his path of life, and made it pleasant to him, and
lengthened it; for, as he once told me (I believe it was while advising
me to take, betimes, a similar treasure to myself), he would have been
in his grave long ago, but for her care.

Mr. Fessenden continued to practise law at Bellows Falls till 1815, when
he removed to Brattleborough, and assumed the editorship of "The
Brattleborough Reporter," a political newspaper. The following year, in
compliance with a pressing invitation from the inhabitants, he returned
to Bellows Falls, and edited, with much success, a literary and
political paper, called "_The Intelligencer_." He held this employment
till the year 1822, at the same time practising law, and composing a
volume of poetry, "_The Ladies' Monitor_," besides compiling several
works in law, the arts, and agriculture. During this part of his life,
he usually spent sixteen hours of the twenty-four in study. In 1822 he
came to Boston as editor of "_The New England Farmer_," a weekly
journal, the first established, and devoted principally to the diffusion
of agricultural knowledge.

His management of the Farmer met unreserved approbation. Having been
bred upon a farm, and passed much of his later life in the country, and
being thoroughly conversant with the writers on rural economy, he was
admirably qualified to conduct such a journal. It was extensively
circulated throughout New England, and may be said to have fertilized
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