The western Democrat. [volume] (Charlotte, N.C.) 1852-1870, 1858-04-13
w eStern Democrat.
CHARLOTTE, n. c.
HOW A THRIFTLESS FARMER WAS
RFFORMED

HOW A THRIFTLESS FARMER WAS
REFORMED.
IF you have place for everything, and keep
it in its place, if you have time to do business,
and to do it in its time, you will find that you will
"drive business" instead of business driving you,
and so you will have leisure instead of constant
worry. 1t pains me to see men undertake any bust
ness of moment. They sure to become entan-
ged and thrown on their backs their business atop
Of them, as they are to undertake it. Take farm
ing for instance Now | venture the assertion
that two thirds of the farmers in this State are
burning green wood this terrible cold weather. Go
into their houses, and you hear the sissing of the
beech, maple, or elm, like to the death dirge
of cockrOach can be. Out OF the chimney
tops comes forth smoke dark as Tartarus, and
their wives and hired girls are cross as bedlam.
These men could not find time to cut their wood
and have it seasoned. Now [ charge it on you,
that you fail not to do all that you undertake-in
order. Every day accidents, casualties, catastro-
phies, provdences are taking place, because men,
women and children have not time to do things as
they opGht to be done [ must tell you story
which is fact When | was boy, there lived
in my native village family by the name of Will
SON There were four boys and four girls, and
they were exceedingly gifted. Not one of them
was there who did rot rank in beauty, intellect
and personal physical power good way above
mediocrity. They all had more than common
educational requirements, for they learned easily.
The girls all married early and to men Of high
| promise The men all married and to respectable
women Yet all remained poor, Their failure
was directly attributable to rant Of O1der. Not
one Of them was ever known to do thing in its
| time, nor haN ing anything in its place-wlth one
| exception and he is the hero Of my story. Of one
of the girls I may say truthfully that for over
thrtv-fvc years she has nercr the san rise,
always going to bed past midnight and rising past
midday But to my story. Erastus Wilson was a
f,rmer-a shiftless, slovenly disordery, slip-shod
farmer The winds and the waters, the sun and
rain darkness and broad-day, all conspired to do
him harm. His gates unhung, his hogs
noses were unwrung, his sheep could leap his
fences like wild deer, his cattle with
boards their eyes, great spiked chains on their
necks, yokes on, and ''tied head and foot" His
horses were as thin Rhode Island spare rib
you could see the rise through them. His
windows had old hats, old coats, old newspapers,
and shingles, instead of glass. His corn was
stunted, his meadows half covered with grass and
around and about him the spirit of decay seemed
to brood. Yet he worked hard did not drink, nor
gamble nor quarrel. In fact, he was pious man,
but he did everything in the wrong time and the
wrong way.
poverty sat at his table acknowledged member
Of his family. One cold December day he was
going to his barn, and it happened that he lifted
up his eyes, and af;1r off in Of his lots he saw
something to hin Ike deer-horns sticking through
the ton of SNOW drift He all alive. He
would make conquest-so over the fence he leap
cd and made for the deer. He waded the drtted
ard undrifted snow till he reached the spot, when
behold instead of the horns of a buck, there
stuck up the t1co handles ofhis p!ouyh He was
very angry, and started to 60 back, when he said
he heard a voice as audibly as ever voice spake
saw "Erastus Wilson, you deserve good hogglnG
for leaving your plough out in the snow. 1t is by
such heedessnCss You have come to poverty. flck
up your plough and take it to your barn"
He Immediately set about it, and by what means
he did it he never could tell. But through that
deem Snow and over the drifts he dragged the i'm
plcment to the barn Once there he took raw
hide, striped himself naked, and addressed him
self thus 'Erastus Wilson, you are mean, dirty
! poverty-stricken-man All your long life you have
been too lazy to save what you have earned, or too
careless to do it. You deserve fogging Here
is the plough whose handles you could never see
= till You thought them the horns of deer, thcl
YOU could wade drifts waist deep to get them
You deserve good fogging, yG4 careless oloch
head, and you shall have it," and he laid the raw
hide on to his body legs and feet, till he ralset
great whales, skipping around the floor naked ane
screaming while he would say, Leave your plougl
out viii vou7 Pretty farmer you are, amt you
I'll see if / cent teach you better" Thus he fog
y ged himself most soundly, dressed himself, ant
y went in From that fogging he came forth
changed man. Ee was prompt, orderly, savln;
and up with the times. His neiShbers were sur
prised. His family was wonderstruck. He begal
to thrive, and in less than three years, his farm
his focks and herds all bore the evidence Of ben}
: under the guidance of spirit whose energies wer
of the ampcst order-N. c. P5o"ter
LITERARY MEN AND THEIR WIvEs.-l d.
maintain that a wife, says Sara Coleridge, whethe
:, Young or old, may pass her evenings most happil
n in the presence of her husband, occupied herself
It and conscious that she is still better occupied
e though he may but speak with her and cast hi
eyes upon her from time to time; that such even
ings may be looked forward to with great desire
- and deeply regretted when they are passed ava
forever. Wieland, whose conjugal felicity ha
n been almost as celebrated as himself, says, in
Il, Il, L. l,