American citizen. [volume] (Butler, Butler County, Pa.) 1863-1872, 1867-11-13
farnI, eartleu & atoltseI,o'd.
win it Paw.

ting present prices, there can be no doubt
that it would pay well. And, at all
events YOU cannot have good farming
without the use of large working cap
ital, or of liberal credit, and it is quite
certain that, if good farming will not pay
poor farming will not. And as agricul-
ture is the main business of the nation
farming will pay in the long rup, if any
thing pays. q
This question, so often asked, and
seldom answered, "Does farming pay"
is very absnrd one, OF course
farming pays. Farmers get liv-
ing, and 1t is rare that one of them
fails. / have three neighbors. One
came from the EASTERN part of the
State, when the country was new
He took up 100 acres Of land, clear
ed it, fenced it, lived probably, at
first in log house, worked hard, but
enjoyed himself He is a capitol far
mer, up early in the morning: attends
to his stock, always has his crops
sown in good season, treats his land
literally, and gets emple returns.-
Recommended with little, has borught
up large family, given them first.
class education, and is probably to-
day worth $25, coo to 100000. True
it has taken him 40 years to accumu-
late this amount of property and
nearly all of it has been derived from
the advance of real estate. Still he
has had good living, has enjoyed
life, is an intelligent pubIic-spirited,
energetic, and generous-minded gem
tleman, and enjoys the respect of all
his neighbors. | am sure such farm
ing pays. l have another teighbor
who has farm of equally good land.
He is we'll educated man, and seems
to work hard, but he is always behind
with his work. He occasionally gets
good crop, but the generality is
hardly sufficient to pay even for the
labor bestowed in preparing the
land He is in debt and seems to
depend more on chopping and selling
wood to meet his payments than ou
raising crops. His fences are out of
repair, and the land IS full of weeds.
Still he gets living for himself and
large family, and, l suppose, even in
this, we must conclude that farming
pays" l have another neighbor,
whose land is low, but would be very
productive if attention was given to
surface drainage. The same creek runs
through the south end of my farm
1t is choked up by old logs, branches
and fallen trees. The water sets
back in the spring, and floods his
land. | offered to do it for him, if
he would give me the wood, but no,
he intended to do it himself. | pre-
sumo he has been intending to do it
for years. A good portion of his land
does not produce enough to pay the
taxes, and the dryer portions are not
half worked and yield the most mea-
ger returns. l passed his house this
morning. He was cutting some hay
on the low land. His oats are har-
vested, but nearly half of them were
still lying on The ground among the
Clods, and his wife tbrashing the 9th
er in tho barn with a fail. Now
this is rather poor farming bat as
the family gets a living l suppose it
pays"
But hoa0 much does it pay ? Does
he make as much as he would if his
son and himself worked as hard for
some other farmer as they do for
thomselvs, to say nothing of the wife ?
| do not believe the y make half as
much, and certainly their land is not
improving, though they probably
persuade themselys that, owing to
the improvements Of Others, it is in
creasing in value.
Now, | have no douot that an in>
telligent enterprising man, with the
necessary capital, could take this
farm, and increase its productiveness
fourfold. But such q man cannot
live in the style of its present OCCUPANT
and his wife would notw want to thrash
in the barn. And SO the real cues,
ton is whether farming will afford
sufficient profits to enable an educa-
ted man to live in style suited to
his necessities. I think 1t ViU, but
there arethose that contend it will not.
Can an educated man get suita-
BILE living by making? Can he make
much more than the illiterate man
who sits on the adjoining bench ? Can
an educated farmer dig more pota-
toes in day than good stalwart
Irishman !? Can he chop more wood
than a French Canadian, or plow
better than a Scotchmau ? Can Gen.
Grant fight in the ranks any better
than Patrick O'Flaniagan?
The educated shoemaker, as soon
as he had learned the trade, would
have others helping him, and by and
by, if made of the right kind of stuff,
he would be the proprietor of a large
boot and shoe factory, and call to his
aid all the contrivances for saving
labor that modern science and inven-
i